(Associated Press) - Arizona Sen. John McCain, a 2008 presidential candidate, contended the bipartisan nonbinding resolution amounted to a demoralizing "vote of no confidence" in the U.S. military because it criticized Bush's plans to send 21,500 more troops to Iraq without offering concrete alternatives.

"I don't think it's appropriate to say that you disapprove of a mission and you don't want to fund it and you don't want it to go, but yet you don't take the action necessary to prevent it," McCain said. "In other words, this is a vote of no confidence in both the mission and the troops who are going over there," he said, noting the proposal does not seek to cut off money for troops.

"I do believe that if you really believe that this is doomed to failure and is going to cost American lives, then you should do what's necessary to prevent it from happening rather than a vote of "disapproval," which is fundamentally a vote of no confidence in the troops and their mission," McCain said.

I agree with the Senator to the extent that a non-binding resolution expressing "disapproval" does not go nearly far enough. A far better measure has been proposed by Christopher Dodd (D - Connecticut) and Russell Feingold (D - Wisconsin), who want to see binding legislation to cap troop levels and force a new vote to authorize the war or to begin bringing troops home.

As for alternative courses, they were spelled out quite clearly by the bi-partisan Iraq Study Group, a commission put together by the President himself, who then proceeded to ignore their very recommendations for a greater diplomatic mission, something at which this president has never been very good, and a phased troop withdrawal. Instead, Mr. Bush has largely abandoned the diplomatic route and has called for an escalation of troops, not a withdrawal.

If the president and the Republicans are embarrassed by Monday's vote on the non-binding resolution and consider it a vote of no confidence, they have only themselves to blame for ignoring the very solutions that they themselves had commissioned.