Iraq Debate Heats Up Presidential Campaign

Sept. 1, 2007 — -- The political wrangling over Iraq reignites this fall when lawmakersreturn to Capitol Hill after their August recess.

Members will consider several key reports and hearings assessingIraq's military and political progress, and President Bush's U.S.troop surge plan in Iraq.

Many of the reports on Iraq are widely expected to provide Democratsin Congress -- and Democrats on the campaign trail -- freshammunition for their argument that a fundamental shift is needed inPresident Bush's Iraq policy.

The president is expected to push Congress to fund a heightened U.S.troop presence in Iraq through spring, as initially planned. However,Democratic leaders have suggested they will use the war spending billsto demand a change of course in Iraq before then.

The renewed Iraq debate in Washington will spill onto thecampaign trail, as presidential candidates stake out positions on thedebate -- and are pushed to flesh out their Iraq policies in greaterdetail.

For White House contenders doing double-duty as members of Congress --like Sens. Hillary Clinton., D-N.Y., Barack Obama, D-Ill., and JohnMcCain, D-Ariz. -- the Iraq debate could quickly become a politicalminefield.

"They will have to take formal positions that are represented by voteson legislation that they don't necessarily control and that willrepresent an enormous challenge that each one will have to deal with,"said Rand Beers, a national security expert who was an adviser on theDemocratic presidential campaign of Sen. John Kerry in 2004.

"There will be an effort on the part of Republicans in Congress tohave votes that make Democrats, and therefore the presidentialcandidates, look weak," said Beers, president of the National SecurityNetwork, a foreign policy group calling for the withdrawal of U.S.troops from Iraq.

All of the Democratic presidential candidates advocate ending the warin Iraq, with slight variations on how they would do it. However, theyhave attempted to distinguish themselves from their rivals.