WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Accusing Republicans of failing to adequately monitor the conduct of the war in Iraq, Senate Democrats on Wednesday announced their own series of hearings into what they called a failed policy."Three years into war, the American people still don't have a clear picture of what's gone wrong in Iraq -- or how to set it right," said Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada.
"We've been going backward for too long," he said.
Democrats said they had invited Republicans to attend the hearings, which will start in Washington on Monday and move across the country in October and November -- before and after the November 7 congressional elections in which control of both houses are at stake.
Reid and other top Democrats told a news conference the current Congress had conducted fewer oversight hearings than previous wartime Congresses. They said lawmakers held 152 days of hearings on the Korean War and 328 days on Vietnam.
Republicans countered that they had held dozens of hearings and briefings on Iraq and the full Senate had debated many aspects of the war.
NEW YORK With less than seven weeks to go until the midterm elections, Americans have a distinctly negative view of the Republican-controlled Congress, with overwhelming majorities saying they disapprove of the job it is doing and that its members do not deserve re-election this fall, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll. The alienation with Congress is as intense as it has been since 1994, when Republicans swept Democrats out of control after 40 years of dominance in the House. It signals the challenge the Republican Party faces in trying hold on to power in the face of a clear surge of anti-incumbent sentiment. Two-thirds of respondents said Congress had done less than it typically does during a congressional session. A majority said they could not name a single major accomplishment of this Congress. Just 25 percent of respondents said they approved of the way Congress was doing its job. The Times/CBS News poll found that President George W. Bush did not improve his own or his party's standing through his intense campaign of speeches and events marking the fifth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.
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