| Chris "Both Ways" Shays' cynical flip-flops on the Iraq War have become breathtakingly blatant. Last August, Mr. Shays returned from his fourteenth trip to Iraq and announced that "the only way we are able to encourage some political will on the part of Iraqis is to have a timeline for troop withdrawal." Shays added that he supported a one year timetable for withdrawing most of our troops from Iraq. Yet just two months after insisting that he advocated a timeline for withdrawal, Shays came out in strong support for Bush's "surge" that is sending tens of thousands more young Americans into combat, and voted against the Democrats' anti-surge resolution (HR 157, roll call #97, February 13, 2007). |
| Incredibly, Shays even suggested that Democrats who opposed Bush's "surge" were not trying to halt a clear escalation of the war, but were supporting "the status quo" and "micromanaging the war." Yet last week, when Shays was presented with the opportunity to vote for precisely the sort of timeline for withdrawal that he repeatedly told voters last year he supported, Shays reversed himself and voted against it (HR 151, roll call #186, March 23, 2007).
But Mr. Shays went further. In his remarks on the floor of the House in February, he disingenuously pretended to support the bi-partisan Iraq Study Group's (ISG) "three recommendations." Yet the three recommendations Shays listed did not include the ISG's most important recommendation: that most American combat troops be withdrawn by March of 2008. Shays' pretending to support the ISG's recommendations, while completely omitting to mention its call for a troop withdrawal by early next year is just plain dishonest.
It is now abundantly clear that Mr. Shays' reversal of his position in support of Bush's war last autumn and his call for a timeline to withdraw American troops was nothing but a cynical ploy to win a difficult election and retain his seat in Congress. With the election over, he has reverted to what he has really been all along: George Bush's strongest supporter in Congress for the bloody and senseless war in Iraq.
He fooled us once; we mustn't let him fool us again.
Sources:
"Chris Shays Joins Republican Shift On Iraq," by E.J. Dionne. August 29, 2006
"Shays Urges Iraq Withdrawal," by Anushka Asthana, Washington Post, Friday- August 25, 2006
"Sound and Fury Over Iraq," by Michael Sherer. Salon.com, February 14, 2007
Congressman Christopher Shays Floor Speech on H.Con.Res. 63- February 14, 2007. Congressional website of Congressman Chris Shays. |
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