Kerry's Plan Gets Nods

John Kerry's OP/ED in today's New York Times is getting nods around the blogosphere and amongst his peers. Gary Hart has a blog post on the HuffPo today about Kerry's OP/ED and Russ Feingold issued a statement endorsing it.

Gary Hart:

John Kerry has drawn a line in the sands of Iraq and has forcefully and specifically laid down a marker for the administration, the Democratic party, and the nation.

No other public official to date has had the courage to face the truth, that Iraqi democracy is now, finally, up to the Iraqi people, not the United States.

The Bush administration must now be required to respond to the Kerry time-table, to refute it with more than slogans and rhetoric, and to tell the American people, once and for all, when and how we intend to extricate ourselves from this Vietnam-in-the-desert.

Other Democratic leaders must now be heard on the question of whether they agree or disagree, in specific terms, with the Kerry initiative.

Russ Feingold:

“Since August 18, 2005 I have been calling on the Administration to aim to redeploy U.S. military personnel from Iraq by the end of this year so that we can focus on the threat posed by global terrorist networks. I applaud Senator Kerry’s call today for our combat forces to be withdrawn from Iraq by the end of this year. Senator Kerry has been a strong leader in calling for a clear, coherent strategy to complete our military mission in Iraq while engaging Iraq’s leaders with genuine diplomacy. Having just visited Iraq last month, I witnessed the desperate need for Iraqi politicians to form a unity government to prevent the country from falling deeper into violence. Senator Kerry is absolutely right to say that the end of this year is a reasonable target date for redeploying our troops in Iraq.”

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