Boston Globe: Democrats to revisit Iraq war authorization: Seek to limit '02 resolution

[DeepModem Mom]

Democrats to revisit war authorization
Seek to limit '02 resolution
By Diedtra Henderson, Globe Staff | February 19, 2007

WASHINGTON -- Unable to block President Bush's plan to send more US troops to Iraq, leading Democrats said yesterday they would seek to limit a 2002 resolution that authorized Bush to go to war, imposing restrictions on how US forces are used....

Democratic leaders now say they plan to revisit the resolution authorizing the war, to declare that the mission of US troops in Iraq does not include interceding in a civil war.

"We will be looking at a modification of that authorization in order to limit the mission of American troops to a support mission instead of a combat mission, and that is very different from cutting off funds," said Senator Carl Levin, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Levin, Democrat of Michigan, told "Fox News Sunday" that the "wide-open" authorization approved by Congress four years ago needs to be scaled back to one that "will remove our troops from the middle of a sectarian civil war."

Levin said Congress can modify its original binding authorization measure without infringing on the president's constitutional power to wage war. "We think that that would be constitutional, and it also would move us toward the end of our presence in Iraq," he said.

On CBS's "Face the Nation," Senator Joseph Biden said Congress should make it clear that the US troop mission in Iraq is "to protect against Al Qaeda gaining chunks of territory, (and) training the Iraqi forces."...Senator Richard Lugar, the top Republican on the (Senate Foreign Relations Committee) led by Biden, said that while the new authorization measure was unlikely to become law, it could galvanize more of the same public opposition that fueled last week's votes (on the Iraq resolution).

"I think the president would veto it and the veto would be upheld. I think the point that Senator Biden (is) making, however, is that there is public pressure," said Lugar, Republican of Indiana. "Certainly, public opinion is out there that influenced the votes that we have just seen."...

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2007/02/19/democrats_to_revisit_war_authorization/