WASHINGTON, Jan. 22 (UPI) -- The Bush administration has failed to confront threats to national security as it has become engulfed in Iraq U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said.
Reid, D-Nev., highlighted current global challenges to U.S. national security, citing in particular the threat of the Taliban in Afghanistan, nuclear ambitions of North Korea and Iran, genocide in Darfur, human suffering and instability elsewhere in Africa, leftist leaders of young democracies in Latin America, and the U.S. dependence on foreign oil.
"Unfortunately, we have yet to confront these or other problems because this administration has been all-consumed and, frankly, overwhelmed by the war in Iraq and its own failed policies," Reid said at the National Press Club on Friday.
Reid appeared with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) in a preview criticism to President George W. Bush's State of the Union address, which will take place on Tuesday, Jan. 23.
They pledged to address the upcoming challenges by engaging the members of the Republican Party. "We must reclaim the bipartisan spirit we had after 9/11," Reid said. "We should be equally inspired by this opportunity to keep America safe."
Both leaders strongly criticized President Bush's proposed plan for Iraq.
Reid said that the role of U.S. troops in Iraq needs to change. "The United States forces have been given an impossible mission of policing a civil war," he said.
"What is the success of the status quo?" Pelosi asked. "There is no success. ... The policy and the practice is not making the American people safer, our troops stronger, or the region more stable," she said.
