In a January 11 editorial about President Bush's January 10 speech that proposed expanding the U.S. troop commitment in Iraq, The Daily Sentinel of Grand Junction disparaged alternative policies advanced by “the likes of Sen. Edward Kennedy and like-minded Democrats in Congress” as “amount[ing] to 'cut and run.' ” The editorial failed to note that proposals for withdrawal or redeployment from Iraq enjoy bipartisan support, including that of Colorado Republican U.S. Rep. Tom Tancredo.

Media Matters for America has documented media repetition of leading Republicans' use of the derogatory label “cut and run” to characterize approaches to the Iraq war associated with or advanced by congressional Democrats. An early use of the line came from Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) on November 15, 2005, after the Senate rejected, 58-40, a Democratic proposal that would have required the White House to clarify its Iraq war strategy and formulate a timetable for troop withdrawal. A similar measure sponsored by Republicans passed the Senate 79-19, but it did not mention a timetable. Congressional Quarterly quoted Cornyn as saying after the votes:

CORNYN: Let me just say -- then we'll be glad to answer any questions you have -- this morning the Senate was given an importance choice: on one hand whether to cut and run when it comes to our commitment in Iraq, or on the other hand to stay and finish the job and then to bring our troops home as soon as possible, leaving a relatively stable democracy in place in Iraq.

On November 17, 2005, Rep. John P. Murtha (D-PA) introduced the House Joint Resolution 73 that would have forced the U.S. military to withdraw from Iraq “at the earliest practicable date.” In a statement he released that day, then-House Majority Whip Roy Blunt (R-MO) also responded to Murtha's proposal with the “cut and run” line:

America will not abandon Iraq. We must not cut and run as they fight alongside us to ensure a democratic government in their country.

Media Matters has documented numerous instances during 2006 (including here, here, here, here, and here) in which Republicans and conservatives used the phrase to dismiss calls for withdrawing troops from Iraq. As Media Matters also has noted, on the January 4 broadcast of MSNBC's Scarborough Country, New York Times reporter Anne E. Kornblut suggested that Senate Democrats are wary of being associated with a “cut and run” strategy:

Iraq is much more difficult and I think made more so by the fact that you have, you know, 9,000 people in the Senate running for president, and all of them are going to take a position, especially the Democrats who are running, that's careful not to make them look soft on foreign policy. I think the biggest nightmare for some of the Democrats in the Senate would be a Democratic Party that looks as though it just wants to -- from -- the words from 2004, “cut and run.”

The accusations of “cut and run,” repeated in the Daily Sentinel's editorial, fail to note that proposals for withdrawal from Iraq enjoy bipartisan support, including that of prominent Republicans. In a November 26, 2006, Washington Post op-ed (“Leaving Iraq, Honorably”) Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-NE) called for a “phased troop withdrawal from Iraq”:

The time for more U.S. troops in Iraq has passed. We do not have more troops to send and, even if we did, they would not bring a resolution to Iraq. Militaries are built to fight and win wars, not bind together failing nations. We are once again learning a very hard lesson in foreign affairs: America cannot impose a democracy on any nation -- regardless of our noble purpose.

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The United States must begin planning for a phased troop withdrawal from Iraq. The cost of combat in Iraq in terms of American lives, dollars and world standing has been devastating. We've already spent more than $300 billion there to prosecute an almost four-year-old war and are still spending $8 billion per month. The United States has spent more than $500 billion on our wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. And our effort in Afghanistan continues to deteriorate, partly because we took our focus off the real terrorist threat, which was there, and not in Iraq.

As Media Matters has noted, in a June 21, 2006, statement on the Senate floor, Hagel -- a decorated Vietnam veteran -- criticized Republicans' use of “political slogans” such as “cut and run”:

HAGEL: This debate should transcend cynical attempts to turn public frustration with the war in Iraq into an electoral advantage. It should be taken more seriously than to simply use the focus-group tested buzz words like “cut and run” and political slogans and debase the seriousness of war. War is not a partisan issue. It should not be held hostage to political agendas. War should not be dragged into the political muck. America deserves better. Our men and women fighting and dying deserve better.

As CNN reported on December 8, 2006, Sen. Gordon Smith (R-OR) declared in a Senate floor statement the previous evening “that he's at the end of his rope and he can't support the war in Iraq any longer”:

SEN. GORDON SMITH (R), OREGON: I, for one, am tired of paying the price of ten or more of our troops dying a day. So let's cut and run or cut and walk but let us fight the war on terror more intelligently than we have, because we have fought this war in a very lamentable way.

On the December 8, 2006, broadcast of CNN's The Situation Room, senior political correspondent Candy Crowley reported that, according to Smith aides, “a dozen of the Senate's Republican colleagues have approached him with positive responses, including, they say, one extremely conservative senator who told Smith: 'That's how I feel.' ”

Other Republicans who have announced their support for withdrawal from Iraq include Rep. Christopher Shays (CT) and Tancredo, who stated support for a phased withdrawal during an October 2006 debate in the race for his 6th Congressional District seat. As The Denver Post reported:

Tancredo also said he wanted a phased withdrawal of American forces from Iraq.

“I think we are at a point where we need to say to the Iraqi government, 'We have given you a democracy, it is up to you as to whether you want to keep it,' ” Tancredo said.

In addition, five Republican Representatives -- John J. Duncan Jr. (TN), Wayne Gilchrest (MD), Walter B. Jones (NC), Jim Leach (IA), and Ron Paul (TX) -- co-sponsored H.J. Resolution 55 (“Withdrawal of United States Armed Forces From Iraq Resolution of 2005 -- Homeward Bound”), introduced June 16, 2005, which would have required the United States to initiate withdrawal from Iraq no later than October 1, 2006. The measure was not scheduled for a vote.

From the editorial “The president's tough sell” in the January 11 edition of The Daily Sentinel of Grand Junction:

With public opinion polls showing that scarcely more than 25 percent of the American people approve of the way President George W. Bush is prosecuting the war in Iraq, his speech Wednesday night calling for a major escalation of U.S. military forces in the conflict seems likely to be met by widespread public skepticism.

As well it should be. An increase of 20,000 American troops three years ago, at a time when bloody sectarian violence began to spiral out of control following the rapid success of American-led forces in toppling Saddam Hussein from power, would seem to have held more prospect for success than such an increase today.

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Even before the president's speech Wednesday night, Democrats in Congress were making it clear that they would strongly oppose the president's plan to increase U.S. troop strength in Iraq. One need not agree with the likes of Sen. Edward Kennedy and like-minded Democrats in Congress -- whose policy alternatives to the president's really do amount to “cut and run” -- to understand their objections. The American people have turned against a war they once supported by overwhelming numbers and the results of last fall's congressional election certainly prove it.