No sleep for you, Reid tells senators debating war

Tuesday, July 17, 2007 | 7:17 a.m.

WASHINGTON - Americans want out of the war in Iraq, but will they care if Congress stays up all night tonight trying to make it so?

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is about to find out.

Reid is keeping the U.S. Senate in session for the first all-nighter of the new Congress to try to get senators to vote for a Democratic plan to start bringing the troops home.

Or at least to show it's Republicans who are blocking their efforts and prolonging the unpopular war.

Reid says that if Senate Republicans want to kill another Democratic attempt to set an end date for withdrawing troops from the field, then let them argue through the night why that's such a good idea.

"We're not going to let everyone go home and get a good night's sleep," Reid told reporters Monday.

"I've made enough phone calls to Nevada to talk to parents (of soldiers) who are so upset . The American people deserve what we're doing - that is focusing attention every minute of the day on what is going on in Iraq."

Reid and Democratic leaders announced the all-nighter as they continue to be thwarted in their efforts to change the U.S. policy in Iraq.

By threatening to filibuster, the Republicans are in effect requiring that the Senate muster a supermajority of 60 votes to approve Iraq amendments to a Defense bill. Sixty is the number required under Senate rules to cut off a filibuster, and the Democrats cannot achieve that with the 50 votes their party holds.

Reid took a strong stand rather than do the gentlemanly thing usually done when one side invokes the 60-vote rule, which is to schedule a vote the next day rather than put everyone through a laborious talkfest with the outcome already known.

But this time, Reid will force everyone to stay all night to run down the clock until Wednesday morning's vote - forcing Republicans to explain all through the night why they don't want to bring the troops home.

A publicity stunt? Yes, one Democratic aide said, in a comment that was amplified in a Republican news release.

But Democrats might as well go down in style, others observe.

The strategy is a good one for Democrats in that it continues to badger fence-sitting Republicans as well as those who are up for reelection in 2008 who are increasingly peeling away from President Bush and their party. And it shows Democrats are trying to do what voters sent them to Washington to accomplish. Anti-war groups are planning a candlelight vigil outside the Capitol.

But the strategy has its risks . As Americans grow tired of the war and frustrated with Congress, an all-night session that fails to get the troops out of Iraq may breed further cynicism.

Jennifer Duffy, an analyst with the Cook Political Report in Washington, said Americans "want to know the bottom line, not what it took to get there."

The best-case scenario is Democrats get their point across - or even get the vote on the bill, which is similar to one passed by the House last week, to begin withdrawing troops in 120 days, leaving only a limited force by April.

Worst case, Duffy says, is "nothing changes, and people say, 'They stayed up all night for that?' "