I've tried tea leaves and a crystal ball and assorted voodoo incantations, but I still can't precisely divine what in hell the Foreign Relations Committee's ranking apologist, Senator Dick Lugar, was saying this week. At least two other senators seemed to suggest they knew what he was saying, but their comments on Lugar's comments only further confounded the obscurity.
Speaking for nearly an hour on the Senate floor, Lugar said, "In my judgment, the costs and risks of continuing down the current path outweigh the potential benefits that might be achieved. Persisting indefinitely with the surge strategy will delay policy adjustments that have a better chance of protecting our vital interests over the long term."
OK, in his first line -- among his prepared, carefully scripted lines -- his concern is expressed in the present tense: the downsides of staying, as is, now outweigh whatever might otherwise be accomplished. This emphasis sets up the future: failure to alter course now will delay inevitable adjustments -- I like that: "adjustments" -- that, good or bad, nevertheless have a better chance of working than the lunacy in place.
Lugar added that our Mad King Ludwig should begin "a downsizing and redeployment of U.S. military forces" in Iraq.
In its literal interpretation, that sounds like an exit strategy, does it not? Yet the following day he extemporaneously remarked to reporters that "he thought it was too late to begin devising" -- wait for it, here it comes -- "an exit strategy." What in God's name, in the Queen's English, does "redeployment" mean? A reverse surge? When one redeploys, Dick, one exits. Calling it anything else is just strategic b.s.
Further muddying any clarity was Lugar's comment -- again, later, and to reporters -- that "he had no intention of suddenly voting with Democrats, particularly in their efforts to limit war financing or set a timetable for withdrawal." So it seems the "costs and risks of continuing down the current path" aren't costly or risky enough to warrant a rationally scheduled withdrawal -- yet we should downsize and redeploy?
Then, of course, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell "and his top aides" splattered even more mud on any transparency by saying "it was still not clear whether [Lugar] would vote with the Democrats on procedural motions related to cutting or limiting war funding." So Lugar says point-blank he won't, while his party leader says he might. My, my, it seems the usually well-oiled Republican machine could use a couple more squirts.
But the most puzzling of comments on comments? The prize goes to Senator Carl Levin, who announced: "I am encouraged by what [Lugar] said and it just adds to the momentum for change. Hopefully he’ll take some very specific steps to implement what his words mean. They are powerful words."
Not only were Lugar's words more teasing than powerful, why is a leading member of the majority suggesting that a member of the minority do something "to implement" policy? Isn't the "something" some something-or-other the majority is supposed to do?
But let's bottom-line this thing. Sure, Lugar was playing a bit of a game, doing a dance, dangling a red cape just to get the White House's attention, and to let it know that all is far from peachy in Minorityville. But coming from one of the most respected, most somber senators, on such a somber issue, isn't it time for unmistakable forthrightness, not coyness?