Here's the pertinent excerpt from the Time article:

"Part of his job has been to make the case that his wife and Obama aren't so different in their records on Iraq: though Obama opposed the Iraq invasion as a Senate candidate, the former President argues, Obama's voting on the war has been virtually identical to Hillary's in the Senate."

So, once in office, exactly HOW has Sen. Obama's voting record on Iraq differed from Sen. Clinton's? I would think that an impartial conclusion could be reached based on actual votes cast. Right?

...this is the closest I can come to finding a primary source for the quote. It comes from here:

http://hotlineblog.nationaljournal.com/archives/2007/05/notebook_obama.html

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Obama, who has made his 2002 opposition to the war a centerpiece of his presidential campaign, was asked this morning on MSNBC about comments made last night by former President Clinton, in which he said that Sens. Clinton and Obama have had similar voting records on the war.

"I suppose that's true if you leave out the fact that she authorized it, and supported it, and I said it was a bad idea," said Obama. "That's a fairly major difference."

While Obama has sought to draw this contrast with Clinton throughout the campaign, he has previously avoided making such a pointed criticism of his rival.

When asked the same question about his voting record last fall, by the New Yorker magazine, Obama admitted that "it's not clear to me what differences we've had since I've been in the Senate."

"I think what people might point to is our different assessments of the war in Iraq," Obama said at the time, "although I’m always careful to say that I was not in the Senate, so perhaps the reason I thought it was such a bad idea was that I didn't have the benefit of U.S. intelligence."

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This does put Obama's latest quote into a couple of different contexts, doesn't it? His reluctance to put distance between himself and Sen. Clinton prior to his formal candidacy calls into question the depth and quality of his current claims. If MSNBC posts a transcript, perhaps all of this will be clarified even further.

We've always heard of the so-called "law of unintended consequences" -- well, now it seems to have merged with another old favorite, the "self-fulfilling prophecy".

Maybe we need a new wrinkle -- I'll suggest calling it the "law of prophetic consequences", in which you darkly warn of dire results, then go busily about the process of CAUSING those awful results. It's not too much of a stretch, though -- seems we've always known about the practice of identifying an enemy (real, or too often, imagined) who then provides the unifying force justifying an "Us versus Them" mentality.

In this case, though, we've succeeded in conjuring up an even more effective "Them" than in our wildest nightmares. Good job, Bushies -- MISSION ACCOMPLISHED!!!

...are all in the spirit of McCain's memorable vow on May 3 to follow Osama bin Laden "to the gates of Hell", followed by a bizarre and TOTALLY creepy grin.

It's sad to witness the mental meltdown of a human being, almost in real time.

A question for the ever-dwindling group of McCain supporters: Can you actually imagine and approve of THIS MAN occupying the Oval Office, with his finger on the nuclear trigger? Seriously, can you?

Um, would we be building an embassy complex in Baghdad that's bigger than the National Mall in Washington DC if we DIDN'T plan to be there for decades?

They always said "Follow the money" in the context of the Watergate scandal -- same goes for Iraq, in almost every respect.

John Ehrlichman coined an apt phrase during those golden days of the Watergate scandal -- the "modified limited hangout".

Sure looks and smells exactly like that again. There must be something really JUICY in those documents...smoking gun, anyone?

...here is text from Dubya's infamous speech delivered in October 2002 in Cincinnati:

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We know that Iraq and the al Qaeda terrorist network share a common enemy -- the United States of America. We know that Iraq and al Qaeda have had high-level contacts that go back a decade. Some al Qaeda leaders who fled Afghanistan went to Iraq. These include one very senior al Qaeda leader who received medical treatment in Baghdad this year, and who has been associated with planning for chemical and biological attacks. We've learned that Iraq has trained al Qaeda members in bomb-making and poisons and deadly gases. And we know that after September the 11th, Saddam Hussein's regime gleefully celebrated the terrorist attacks on America.

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(AND FROM LATER IN THE SAME SPEECH...)

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The attacks of September the 11th showed our country that vast oceans no longer protect us from danger. Before that tragic date, we had only hints of al Qaeda's plans and designs. Today in Iraq, we see a threat whose outlines are far more clearly defined, and whose consequences could be far more deadly. Saddam Hussein's actions have put us on notice, and there is no refuge from our responsibilities.

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How's that again, Tony? No effort to conflate 9/11, al Qaeda, Saddam Hussein and Iraq? It doesn't take a student of speech or rhetoric to realize exactly what impression Dubya and friends wanted to deliver -- and to acknowledge how well they succeeded! MISSION ACCOMPLISHED, in spades.