Finally, the Democrats have given up on including a timeline in their Iraq War funding bill. They made their case - clearly - against staying in Iraq and the bulk of their corpus was elected specifically because of Americans’ discontent with the way the war was going. However, funding the troops is the right thing to do from a public policy perspective.

Again, I’m the first one to congratulate the Democrats on their victory in the 2006 elections. Those elections were exactly what they should have been - the American people making their feelings towards an overwhelming policy known. This is exactly how public policy is supposed to work down to the very details. What is not, however, part of those details is the way some Democratic leaders are deriding the funding bill. From today’s New York Times:

“There has been a lot of tough talk from members of Congress about wanting to end this war, but it looks like the desire for political comfort won out over real action,” said Senator Russell D. Feingold, Democrat of Wisconsin, who was unsuccessful last week in his push for a withdrawal of combat troops by spring. “Congress should have stood strong, acknowledged the will of the American people, and insisted on a bill requiring a real change of course in Iraq.”

With all due respect, that’s just wrong, Senator Feingold. Congress “holding strong” to a course of action that would have detrimental effects on our troops in action would be the exact wrong way to go about this bill. The best thing that the Democrats and anyone who voted for them could have asked for was the House of Representatives passing the bill that included a withdrawal timeline. That was their mission - to represent the people. They did that job admirably.

But that doesn’t mean that our troops should suffer the consequences of those who do not understand the basic concept of public policy. That’s just not fair to the men and women who volunteer to defend our country.