Biden's Iraq-Only Debate Falls Largely on Deaf Ears
Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., challenged Democratic contenders to an Iraq-only debate.
June 8, 2007— -- Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., enjoys a good debate.
He'll debate in the Senate. He'll debate on the campaign trail. And as he proved Wednesday night, he'll debate even if there's only a handful of other presidential contenders around.
Biden, who has served in the Senate since 1972 and is in the midst of his second bid for a promotion to the Oval Office, challenged his fellow Democratic contenders to an Iraq-only debate; only two longshot nomination rivals -- Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, and former Sen. Mike Gravel of Alaska -- took him up on the offer.
Delayed by a Senate vote on immigration, Biden ceded the stage to Gravel, who repeatedly referred to himself as "the crazy uncle," lambasting his fellow Democrats for not using the congressional power of the purse to end the Iraq War.
In his 40 minutes at the podium, Gravel attacked the other Democrats in the race as incompetent or overtly political in voting for the war.
The former senator, who railed against the Vietnam War during his time in Congress, compared Gen. David Petraeus to Gen. William Westmoreland, and pitched his own plan for Iraq, which involves jailing members of the executive branch if they persist with the war after a heretofore unplanned congressional vote declares it illegal.
Kucinich also arrived late but before Biden, and took the stage after Gravel.
The Ohio Democrat offered a plan for Iraq that would immediately cease funding the war and replace the current occupying army with a new force, composed primarily of troops from Iran and Syria.
In a wide-ranging presentation, the congressman expounded on his holistic principles, the encyclicals of Leo XIII and Paul VI, physics, Martin Luther King Jr., Gandhi, Jesus Christ and "punctual equilibrium and the transformation of the species."
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