Letters to the Editor
SueNJ97
Published Letters: 175 Editor's Choice: 4
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And, once again, it doesn't shock me
[Read the article: Former advisor: Obama's Iraq plan "best-case scenario"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Someone got caught telling the truth.
Actually, it's all very rational. Just what I'd expect and, in fact, makes me feel better about Obama because, as I've pointed out, I didn't believe he meant any of it literally to begin with. He won't be there 100 years, but, he won't stick to the current plan if he gets in and it doesn't look feasible to get every single soldier out in 16 months. By that time, the people who believed he would do it no matter what will be extremely upset. That's politics. And, as Power pointed out, best case scenarios rarely happen.
He'll say what he needs to say to get elected and, deal with reality when and if he gets there. OK. Not a surprise. Not a tragedy. It just doesn't make him different from anyone else.
For anyone who is prepared to get really upset with Obama over this, and who DID get upset with Clinton when she essentially pointed out the same thing as Power in debates, consider this, their worst-case scenarios are infinitely better than anything John McCain offers. Their best-case scenarios and worst-case scenarios are infinitely more intelligent than anything the neocons offered (flowers, anyone?)
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@hanksf
[Read the article: Former advisor: Obama's Iraq plan "best-case scenario"]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]This is hysterical. I say anything mildly nice about either candidate (Obama or Hillary) and I am basically accused of being a supporter of either one. I have said it before, I was hoping for John Edwards. I NEVER believed Obama was different, I always thought he was another politician. However, that also means I'm just not going to get upset about stuff like this. If he winds up as the nominee, I will vote for him, same with Clinton, because I can't vote for McCain.
If he is elected and he can't get the troops out in 16 months because events on the ground make it impossible, I'd rather he (or she, btw) did it RIGHT than fulfill a campaign promise because he doesn't want to disappoint a bunch of people - and yes, I am suggesting that it doesn't matter to me that politicians lie about this stuff, because they all do it. I never pretended anything else.
Good god, this is ridiculous. I just don't expect purity in my politicians. Excuse me for existing.
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@Hajnal
[Read the article: Views of the race from across the Atlantic]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]They are certainly entitled to have an opinion. However, just as the opinions here aren't the best informed, theirs aren't always the best informed, despite the fact that they do follow events over here more closely than most Americans do events overseas. I say most, because there are Americans who are well informed about foreign affairs - I know that comes as a shock to people.
I say this because when I was at Oxford in the mid-'80s, I was constantly being asked when Teddy Kennedy was going to be elected President. Right. The man was never going to be elected. Never. He had a sort of shot at the Dem nomination in 1980 but that was as close as he ever came and as close as he was ever going to come but they were totally enraptured by the Kennedy myth. And many of these people would be happy to tell me Americans knew nothing about anything - even about their own country. I tried to explain about Chappaquidick, the difference between Massachusetts and the rest of the country and the fact that independent voters (an increasingly important block) might not see him in the best of lights, rightly or wrongly, and they couldn't see past the name Kennedy.
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@maureen
[Read the article: Views of the race from across the Atlantic]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Yes, I am talking about the undergraduate, and the graduate students. I am well aware that it's a town, and a large one, as well as a university, with a working population. I lived up the Cowley Road, among the working population, and they weren't the ones asking me the stupid questions. The students were. They couldn't understand why Mondale, not Kennedy, could have been nominated in 1984. OK, maybe Mondale wasn't the best choice against Reagan, but, as I said in my first post, I tried to explain the Chappaquidick factor, and the fact that while the population of MA might elect him as their Senator, it wasn't going to work for the rest of the country. I explained that yes, he had been an effective Senator for MA, but that didn't matter.
It wasn't one or two people asking. It was a constant topic of conversation and I wasn't the one bringing it up. They simply didn't understand American society or American politics, they just thought they did.
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@Alan Bennett
[Read the article: Tucker Carlson unintentionally reveals the role of the American press]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]You are correct about the coverage, especially re: the guests on the shows on MSNBC - the guests have obviously picked their candidates and quite frankly, they could be caught actually shooting someone, on camera and the talking heads would cheerfully explain why this is all someone else's fault and why it's all intended to get the candidate off-message. But the voters shouldn't be fooled. Ugh. And this is what passes for political coverage in this nation.
I can just imagine what Olbermann would have thought if one of Bush's advisors had tried to say something was "off the record" and the reporter had complied after a gaffe like this - and it had somehow gotten out. I wonder what some of the people around here who believe it was wrong to print it would have said then. I think Tucker's reaction would have been the same, though.