Senate Pulls the Iraq Withdrawal Bill

The Senate voted 52-47 (a majority of support) to end debate and vote up or down on the Iraq withdrawal plan. Yes, fifty-two Senators voted to end debate, but because one needs 60 votes to end the filibuster, the bill had to be scrapped. This is well-known, but for Rethuglicans to try and spin this as a "circus" is preposterous. Kudos to the Rethuglicans who voted with the Dems. Republican Sens. Olympia Snowe (ME), Susan Collins (ME), Chuck Hagel (NE), and Gordon Smith (OR) voted to kill the filibuster. Shame on the sycophant Lieberman. Roll call is here.

So, Reid pulled the bill and he explained:

Because Republicans continue to block votes on important amendments to the Defense Authorization bill, we can make no further progress on Iraq and this bill at this time.
For these reasons, I have temporarily laid aside the Defense Authorization bill and have entered a motion to reconsider.

But let me be clear to my Republican colleagues — I emphasize the word “temporarily”. We will do everything in our power to change course in Iraq. We will do everything in our power to complete consideration of a Defense Authorization bill. We must do both.
And just to remind my Republican colleagues — even if this bill had passed yesterday, its provisions would not take effect until October.

So we will come back to this bill as soon as it is clear we can make real progress. To that end, I have asked the Democratic Whip and Democratic Manager of the bill to sit down with their counterparts to work on a process to address all outstanding issues related to this bill so the Senate can return to it as soon as possible.

Pulling the bill leaves the possibility that the bill will be voted on in the future. Here is to Reid and the dems for making the Rethuglicans look like bafoons. Let's keep it up.