17 GOP votes for HConRes63, good.

I came across this interesting editorial from The Hill, one of the newspapers that circulate around DC (I'm not sure if it also goes around outside it). Remember that last week, the Congress voted on H. Con. Res. 63 supporting the troops in Iraq but is against the escalation desired by Dubya. Out of the 246 that voted for the resolution, 17 of them were Republicans including my representative. Several posts ago, I put his speech regarding that matter. I only took it to mean that he was a good man for voting against the escalation and for thinking that it's a mistake to place the American troops between the feuding Shia and Sunni; I didn't dig further to give it some political interpretation. I think the article I saw today gives quite a good one on the 17 GOP votes.

Instead of excoriating Republicans who said no to Bush’s plan, they should be privately thankful that someone in their party broke ranks. In the long run, if handled right, those “no” votes will benefit GOP candidate recruitment and electoral success in swing districts, helping the party recapture majority control.

...Republicans, both those who voted yes and no, must have been motivated by their principles rather than partisanship. Otherwise, it would have been a straight-line party vote. It speaks volumes [that] some Republicans feel so strongly about their principles that they chose to walk the hard path of defecting. It says that Republicans think. It says that Republicans listen to the people they represent. It says that Republicans are principled. It says that Republicans stand their ground even when it’s tough. These messages benefit all Republicans.

A key problem with the war in Iraq is that it’s become a partisan affair in the minds of too many Americans. And a difficulty with GOP partisan strategies regarding Iraq is that they are perceived as the personal agenda of just one man, George Bush.

The whole article can be found here