Letters to the Editor
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And this is my problem...
...with strategists and pollsters.
Being able to admit you make mistakes doesn't make you look weak -- it makes you look human.
Just as refusing to admit you made mistakes doesn't make you look "strong" and "resolute" -- just look at Bush.
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Bias
"For every Obama supporter I consider an Obamaton (they're out there), there are many others who decided with integrity that they simply could not support Clinton because of that Iraq vote and her failure to adequately lament it.
So Obama supporters have no integrity? I know this was probably more of an unfortunate phrasing than insult, but it is somewhat revealing.
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two things
Lamenting her decision would not make hillary palatable. We always knew she was a self serving political animal. With the Iraq war resolution, we learned that she put her own political ambition above the lives of others. We can't, as a nation, afford to reward her for her murderous ambition. That tells the next political animal that we'll forget about the dead and wounded. Hillary should leave political life and wash bed pans at Walter Reed. Maybe then she can remove some of the tarnish from her soul.
As for the "100 year occupation", it really weakens your arguments when you use it out of context as a punch line. Do you even recall the context? The US still occupies Germany, Japan, and South Korea. Those nations have been at peace for many many decades. They are our allies. Why shouldn't we hope the same for Iraq?
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Not a Mistake
Joan, the reason she can't call it a mistake is because it wasn't one ... she knew exactly what she was doing. It was a politically motivated decision to position herself as strong militarily to make up for being a woman. It was very obvious at the time, and it still is, that she will say whatever it takes to become president.
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She won't apologize and shouldn't.
Hillary, Kerry, and Edwards voted to put pressure on Iraq at a time everyone thought Iraq had WMD because Bush was lying to them.
She has no reason to apologize. The most you're going to get is that she regrets trusting liar Bush. Kerry is a panderer so of course he "apologized."
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That Entire Vote Was Bogus
If there wasn't clearly enough votes beforehand Iraq would have been attacked before a vote or with no vote.
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Journalistic Integrity
It's amazing to me. No matter how you try to phrase your pieces, some of which are thoughtful and well-written indeed, you appear to be unable to mute your clear HRC bias. It's the mark, perhaps, of an ardent political advocate. It's most certainly not the mark of a journalist.
On the subject of honest and admitting one's past and current biases, why don't you just let the truth set YOU free. Admit it, Joan. You are a staunch supporter of HRC and, at the same time, Obama's success unnerves you. Admit it and you'll be free. And the hypocrisy of pretending to have journalistic integrity will dissolve, just like that.
As for HRC and Iraq, I can see it now. Forget the tens of thousands of children and women and old people who were sure to be slaughtered. Forget the moral indignity of sending our young troops to their deaths for no coherent reason. It was just HRC and Bill, sitting in bed, discussing which vote would be the most advantageous for her in her maniacal obsession with getting to the White House. It's morally corrupt and sick. Just like HRC's continuing battle despite having lost the pledged delegate war.
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What you mean "we"?
at a time everyone thought Iraq had WMD
Um, don't know how to break this to you, sport, but an awful lot of people who spend time at Salon NEVER believed that BS. And we think those who did are kind of, you know, stupid, or at best incapable of critical thought.
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Does HRC also get a mulligan for her vote authorizing the Iranian guard as a "Terrorist Organization"?
One might think that Senator Clinton would have learned from
her earlier vote authorizing force in Iraq. But no.
We all know the rules under the Bush Doctrine: any nation harboring terrorists is subject to pre-emptive attack. Is anyone out there not clear on the meaning?
So, when the GOP trotted out this justification for military action as Bush/Cheney and their lapdogs in Congress were doing the bigtime sabre-rattling against Iran last Fall, did Senator Clinton understand what her vote meant? I think we have to agree that she did. And she voted in favor.
Fortunately for us, whistleblowers in our intelligence community leaked the new NIE on Iran the following week. If those good people hadn't acted, who knows how far along we'd be toward invading Iran.
And so I ask: how many mulligans does Senator Clinton get?
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Thanks For Asking
You ask the questions that all of us would like to have answered by Ms. Clinton, Joan. She seems to have made an art of dodging them, however.
I can't help but recall John Edwards mention of "the Clinton people" helping to tip the vote to approve the invasion of Iraq by the "coalition of the willing," too.
Her 3 a.m. call ad would seem to suggest that she is following Bill Kristol's advice for strategy. He suggested, via Faux News, that she play the fear factor just a week or ten days before it ran. She plays to McCain's hawks.
She may not REALLY regret the vote too much. Her objections about the occupation always revolve around the mismanagement angle and the Iraqi's who refuse to grab the reigns of the lovely dead horse we've delivered.
I appreciate that you asked, though. Few else seem to bother anymore.
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a third thing
You mention that a vocal minority knew that bush was lying to get his war on. That is maybe true if you stay within the US border. The rest of the world knew what was going on. That is why our traditional allies refused to partake - except for the UK puppet regime. Do you remember the moniker "coalition of the billing"? From a global perspective, only a very small minority of the people believed the lies coming out of DC.
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And this is the problem many of us have with Clinton
It boils down to this: She just won't be herself.
Joan, you offer us no reason to give Clinton the benefit of the doubt as to what she thought Bush would do with that war authorization. It was perfectly obvious to many, many, many of us inside-the-Beltway types that Bush had forced this vote upon Congress just prior to the mid-term elections in order to force Democrats to either support Bush or be labeled "weak on national security" (and, of course, for Clinton the risk was especially acute, since she had this "gender barrier" to overcome and couldn't risk being seen as unmanly).
But the thing is, that fall of 2002 was the right time for Clinton (or anyone in the Democratic party leadership, for that matter, but she's the one running for President now) to stand up and not only oppose this effort, but to truthfully address the issues of patriotism and national security, and how both have been and continue to be used as a cudgel by the right wing and were being used to justify this war. There was a great speech to be had on this topic, a once-in-a-lifetime address, one on par with Obama's of yesterday and consistent with what Glenn Greenwald has been saying for years now about the cult of manhood in this country and how it affects our foreign policy discourse. Somebody needed to stand up and say that there was nothing weak or unmanly or unpatriotic about opposing an ill-advised war. And I think it was Clinton's speech to give.
But she didn't do it. Instead, she just consulted her pollsters and her managers, and continues to do so. I for one am not remotely interested in having a woman president who continues to be this intent on proving her "manhood." I mean, sniper fire in Bosnia? Come ON!!!