Credit Where Credit Is Due

I am not a friend to the Democratic party. I feel that they have abandoned many (or most) of the principles that democrats are supposed to stand for --standing up for our liberties being the most important. I felt that the Senate Democrats made a huge mistake when they made Harry Reid the majority leader. Dick Durbin, from Illinois, would have been a much better choice.

Nevertheless, I have to give Harry Reid (and the Democrats) some credit with regard to the National Intelligence Estimate on Iran that was released on Monday. There has been much talk about the information held in that estimate, and predictably, the Bush administration is spinning it to support their desire to march toward war. What seems to be glossed over in most accounts I've seen, is that this NIE, which I think everyone can agree reveals intelligence that is of vital importance, would not have been generated if not for the Democrats requesting it.

From Reid's statement (from the Senate Democrats' web site):

Democratic Committee leaders and I requested this assessment early last year so that the Administration could not rush this Congress and the country to another war based on flawed intelligence.

This underscores the importance of the Democrats taking back control of the Senate in the last election. If the Republicans had still been in the majority, there's no way they would have allowed the Democrats to request this NIE, and we'd all be counting down the days until Bush's World War III.

So to Harry Reid and the Senate Democrats, I have to say that despite how much I despise your lack of integrity and your inability to stand up to the Bush administration (until recently), you've done good. I think that all Americans (and indeed the entire world) should be thankful that you were able to inject at least one tiny glimmer of sanity into the madness of Bush's foreign policy.