| Somehow, someway, Democrats in the U.S. Senate finally found a backbone this week. After weeks of hesitating on whether or not there should be a hard deadline for removal of troops from Iraq tied to war funding, Senate Leader Harry Reid announced yesterday that there must be "definite timelines" for troop withdrawal. As Daily Kos said, "Hallelujah."
Now that Democrats have finally found the strength to lead follow the 2/3 of Americans that have wanted real troop withdrawal for months, the problem will be how to make troop withdrawal a reality. There will be many amendments to the Iraq war funding bill that make an attempt at bringing the troops home. One amendment, which has a strong likelihood of passing, has been proposed by Senators Jim Webb and Chuck Hegel and is called the "Dwell Amendment."
From an e-mail from Senator Webb, via Daily Kos: We will be offering an amendment that requires our troops have a 1:1 deployment-to-dwell ratio for active units and members. This is a minimum floor. The Department of Defense's historic policy and current goal is a ratio of 1:2. Currently, Army units are deployed for 15 months with 12 months at home...
This Dwell Time Amendment provides a safety net under our troops. However long a servicemember has been deployed, they deserve at least that much time at home. It is a very simple, common sense amendment.
In July, my amendment received 56 votes. We need just 4 more votes this time to pass this amendment, and I am asking for your help. Senator John Cornyn voted against this amendment in July (no surprise). Both of our Democratic candidates to replace Cornyn -- Noriega and Watts -- support troop withdrawal. In his responses to the DFT questionaire, Noriega even specifically mentions his support for the Webb-Hegel amendment. We could count on Noriega or Watts for one of those needed four votes.
But right now, we're stuck with Cornyn. So let's encourage him to vote the right way on this common sense amendment. Ask him, "don't you think our troops should spend at least as much time at home as they do fighting overseas?" You can fill out an automated form by following this link, or contact Cornyn's office directly at any of the numbers provided on his website. |
