Senate Rejects Call For Troop Pullout

(CBS/AP)  Congress plunged into divisive election-year debate on the Iraq war Thursday as the U.S. military's death toll reached 2,500. The Senate soundly rejected a call to withdraw combat troops by year's end, and House Republicans laid the groundwork for their own vote.

In a move Democrats criticized as gamesmanship, Senate Republicans brought up the withdrawal measure and quickly dispatched it, for now, on a 93-6 vote.

The proposal would have allowed "only forces that are critical to completing the mission of standing up Iraqi security forces" to remain in Iraq in 2007.

Think of it not so much as a debate with a real chance of changing anything about the war in Iraq. It is more of a political dare, a non-binding resolution Republicans are putting to a vote that says the United States should hold firm on Iraq and the war on terror, reports CBS News correspondent Sharyl Attkisson.

Across Capitol Hill in a daylong House debate, Republicans defended the Iraq war as a key part of the global fight against terrorism while Democrats assailed President Bush's war policies and called for a new direction in the conflict.

"When our freedom is challenged, Americans do not run," House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., said in remarks laden with references to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

"This is a war that is a grotesque mistake," countered House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of California. She called for a fresh strategy, "one that will make us safer, strengthen our military, and restore our reputation in the world."

Republicans moved toward a vote on a resolution to reject any timetable for withdrawing U.S. forces.

Congress roared into debate on the three-year conflict four months before midterm elections that will decide the control of both the House and Senate, and as Mr. Bush was trying to rebuild waning public support for the conflict.

The administration was so determined to get its message out that the Pentagon distributed a highly unusual 74-page "debate prep book" filled with ready-made answers for criticism of the war.

"We cannot cut and run," the Pentagon battle plan says at one point, anticipating Democratic calls for a troop withdrawal on a fixed timetable.

House Democrats are mindful that voting against such a resolution could leave them vulnerable to attacks by Republicans who could claim that Democrats who opposed the resolution don't support U.S. troops and advocate a "cut-and-run" strategy.

To that end, a memo this week by House Majority Leader John Boehner (.pdf), R-Ohio, urged his fellow Republicans to frame the debate as "a portrait of contrasts between Republicans and Democrats."

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