In the Democrats' response to this year's State of the Union address, Sen. Jim Webb, D-VA, demanded retreat from the War on Terror, saying we must "in short order allow our combat forces to leave Iraq." He pledged that if President Bush refused to accept our defeat, Democrats "will be showing him the way."

Just three months later, the Democrat "way" of retreat is clear, but not pretty. It's a path of half-measures, timetables, and pork-barrel spending on the backs of our troops.

If liberals believe this war is un-winnable and unjust, they should have the courage of their convictions to announce our defeat and bring our troops home immediately by cutting off war funding. I believe this would be a foolish and wrong course for our nation, but at least it would be honest.

Instead, we have sadly come to a point in American politics where a major party is willing to use troop funding as collateral in exchange for pork and politics.

President Bush recently sent Congress an emergency war spending bill for our troops in Iraq. Democrats in the House and Senate have amended the bill to contain a date certain for withdrawal of American troops from Iraq by March 2008. This sends the terrorists a save the date card and undermines our commanders in the field by micromanaging the war.

Unable to convince a majority in the Senate to abandon our mission in Iraq on a similar vote just a week ago, Democrats have sunk to outright bribery. They have crassly added as much as $21 billion in unrelated spending to the bill.

A huge chunk of this money is aimed at projects in the districts and states of members of Congress who are wavering in their support for a muddled withdrawal from Iraq.

Included in the Democrat priorities is $283 million for the Milk Income Loss Contract program, $74 million for peanut storage costs, $60.4 million for salmon fisheries, $50 million for asbestos mitigation at the U.S. Capitol Plant, $13 million for ewe lamb replacement, $24 million for sugar beet producers, $40 million for tree assistance and $25 million for spinach growers.

Democrats have not been shy about this shameful effort to buy votes for their Iraq policy. The AP reported this week that "Democrats also think Republicans will be reluctant to reject a much-needed spending bill that would fund popular projects in their home states..."

In the House, Democrat Congressman Peter DeFazio of Oregon admitted he will vote for withdrawal for Iraq because of pork sent to his state. His spokeswoman in an interview with Politico.com pointed to a $400 million rural school project in their district and said, "That's pretty vital for our district, so we'll be voting for the bill."

Thankfully, President Bush has done the right thing by issuing a veto threat against a bill that contains wasteful pork spending and binds the hands of our commanders in the field in Iraq. Democrats understand that the president will veto such an irresponsible bill, so why do they continue to insist on adding their poison pills?

This is a high stakes game. On one side, you have Democrats who appear intent on larding up an emergency spending bill with pork and political priorities for their base with the full knowledge that this will draw a veto.

On the other side, you have the troops in Iraq who are now in danger of having a much-needed funding bill blocked because Democrats lack the discipline to pass a clean bill.

The truth is that Democrats know they are between a rock and a hard place. Their liberal anti-war base wants to end the war in Iraq now. But their more moderate members are rightly judging that the vast majority of Americans do not want to lose this fight and remain adamant that we support the troops. So Democrats are left forced to use troop funding as a bargaining chip.

Is this the much heralded "end to a culture of corruption" that Democrat leaders promised us?

Let's not hold our troops hostage over pork and politics. Democrats should vote to bring them home now or pass a clean emergency spending bill that supports our troops with the vital equipment they need to defend themselves and to carry out their mission.

Throwing billions of dollars of pork on the backs of our troops in the field is wrong. Using a troop funding bill as a vehicle for politically charged payback to your base is wrong. If this is "the way" out of Iraq that Sen. Webb and Democrats talk of, I am certain the American people will not follow.

Sen. Jim DeMint is a Republican from South Carolina.