It's about time!

After a big majority of the public has been clearly soured on the Iraq War for a while, Congress is finally starting to pay attention to Bush's Mesopotamian Mess.

I'm almost tempted to say they're paying "serious" attention. But the Republicans still control both houses, so they aren't quite to that point yet.

From the Washington Post: Iraq War Debate Eclipses All Other Issues: GOP Flounders as Bush's Popularity Falls; Democrats Struggle for a Voice by Jonathan Weisman and Charles Babington 11/20/05.

After largely avoiding the subject since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, lawmakers are suddenly confronting the issue of President Bush's handling of the war. The start hasn't been pretty.

Political stunts by both parties have created an air of acrimony that is infecting the parties' entire agendas. The bitterness reached a new high - or low - on Friday when House Republicans forced a late-night vote on a resolution for immediate withdrawal of U.S. forces.

The resolution failed, 403 to 3, but only after members nearly came to blows when a GOP newcomer suggested a veteran Democratic military hawk was a coward.

"Iraq is now a cloud over everything," said Stuart Rothenberg, a nonpartisan political analyst specializing in Congress. "It's the 800-pound gorilla in the room."

The article has mostly safe punditocracy kinds of analysis of what it all might mean. This quote from Democratic pollster Peter Hart was a bit more substantial:

"Iraq is now the dominant issue that is affecting voters, and it's affecting Bush's ratings," Hart said. "The public has reached a firm, fixed position on Iraq, and it's not going to change: This is not going to come to a successful conclusion, so how do we figure out how to get out of Iraq?" (my emphasis)

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