Re: #54720

chanceny, do you honestly think that Clinton actually thought Bush, et al, was telling the truth? Why would she “patroitically” trust them? You don’t trust an office—anyone who knows anything about human nature and recent history knows that.

Either Hillary was 1. stupid, which she is not; 2. painfully naive, which she is not; or 3. cravenly betting on a quick victory, caring nothing for the country or for Iraqis, in order to secure her future political career.

Hint: it’s #3, and an apology is nice, but hardly cuts it. Voting for IWR was either stupid, naive, or craven. There is no other option.

All Sen. Clinton need say is the one word that seems to be ‘the thing that must remain unsaid’, LIAR.  She should say her mistake was her misplaced trust because, as former first lady who understood the sanctity of presidential decisions regarding foreign policy, she trusted this president to be truthful.  She was lied to, again in the public spotlight, but when Bill lied, it was personal.  This LIE had deadly and ferocious complications.  This LIE,this backstabbing mendacious in-your-face bullcrap that she bought out of patriotic respect for the presidency, was an affront to her personally, and another sign of the contemptuous complete disrespect shown to all loyal citizens who also bought into bushit’s cravenly calculated LIE.  That ‘mistake’ is supremely forgiveable.  Everyone knows how lies and the lying liars who use the lies to mislead us wreaks misery and betrayal on us humans!

I’d just like to say that comment #53730 is the funniest, most incisive, and most pithy comment I’ve seen on Hillary anywhere.

Spot. On.

Hillary will lose her edge in this election process because she believes that the war was worthwhile. That is why she is not sorry for her vote for the war and for giving Bush the power to do whatever he wants. This is very unfortunate because many of us expected more of the first potential woman to become president of the US.

Hillary shouldn’t admit any errors in judgement if she feels she didn’t make. Is it she just doesn’t want to discuss her historic vote? How about explain her own judgment?

Which of Bush’s weekly varying new evidence finally convinced her vote yes? Was is it Powell holding the vile? Maybe it was Cheney’s solemn drone? Did Condi have some heart to heart with her?

Was she on board with the idea of attacking a country to bring democracy? Or was it the preemptive-ness angle that wooed her over?

The “fight’em there, so as not to fight’em here” wasn’t trotted out at that time. But after all that was before Al Qaeda entered Iraq…Wasn’t it?

Did she fear facing irate voters? Or all of the above? Maybe Kerry or Edwards can shed some light on this process? So we can all feel their pain?

She had, not too long before, left a recent administration. Which had all the data on Iraq that the US had. She was well aware, first hand to what was going on between the US and Iraq. Was Bush somehow now enlightening her?

Is that what you now believe?

Maybe she was away that day? When Bill did his retaliation bombing of military sites? After the Bush family fussed about the botched assassination attempt on former President Bush Sr.

The Bush crowd was never satisfied with that response. They wanted more done…..Maybe a full war? Who knows? The media stories never explained that part in detail. But Bush family displeasure with Clinton was made public at the time. In tiny stories, buried in back pages. Soon to be passed over and forgotten.

My reply to all the “free passers” now, is Howard Dean. Was his judgment foolish? Why did he have the courage of his convictions and stand against the tide of the war hysteria?

Oh that’s right, I forgot… He’s mentally unbalanced? Silly me.

Yeeee Haaaa?

Onward O’Mighty Brave Democratic Party!

Mediocrity be damned… but rather embraced and acclaimed even exaulted!

What’s that Mad TV skit?

“Lowered Expectations”

GO HILLARY!

  Why should Hillary apologize for something she believed was the right course of action at the time. I admire her for standing her ground and not running scared leading to flip flop accusations which are sure to come if she does.
    Bush and his cronies lead all to believe that by dethroning Saddam was clearly the way to go. We all know he had his own agenda for doing so. And hasn’t he shown us since then that what Bush wants he just goes after anyways without any care who agrees or not?
    We shouldn’t be looking back to try and undo what can’t be undone, but be looking for what is the correct course of action right NOW!
    And I truly believe that that is what Hillary is trying to do.
    GO HILLARY!

The Iraq War was based on fabricated evidence and false pretence. Bush was wrong and refused to acknowledge his wrongdoing.

Hilary supported the war, refuse to acknowledge her wrongful judgement and actually articulate the war on IRAN….......She is Dumbya’s recarnation in the name of Democratic Party.

So you want to look into the future, and see if Hillary was wrong once, but inclined to do the right thing in the future, or a gullible and politically malleable follower who looks to polls, money, and power to decide how she should act.

It is a commonly known fact in psychological profiling that past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior. It is a simple but very powerful tool.

So what data do we have OTHER than the Iraq war to help predict if Senator Clinton will drag us into further wars or return the Nation to sanity?;

1) The war in Lebanon. Senator Clinton had a clear choice here, completely independant of any of the factors that may have influenced her decision to back the Iraq war. Given that, she backed this war with all of the resources available to her as a US senator. She signed the Senate resolution, (which according to Z. Brzezinski was written by AIPAC and provided to Nancy Pelosi for delivery) which allowed Israel to use any means necessary to attempt to destroy or completely disable Hezbollah. She stood next to the Israeli ambassador and supported him as he said outrageous things such as “are we fighting disproportionatly? Hell yes we are!”.

The results of war? Israel, predictably, lost, in that the criterion that was proposed for success was impossible; to militarily destroy or disable Hezbollah. The infrastructure of the entire country was destroyed, setting them back decades, after recovering from the FIRST time Israel leveled the country. Thousands died, Many thousands were wounded, hundreds of thousands were left homeless. The government, which was a US friendly government that Hezbollah had little sway over was thrown into chaos, is now openly hostile to the US and Israel and is in danger of being overthrown by Hezbollah, who has never been MORE powerful or popular.

Israels loss was a major victory not only for Hezbollah, but also for the Insurgency in Iraq, who saw it as clear evidnce that the US and Israel are defeatable, increasing our difficulties there significantly.

What could Hillary have done? Counseled her considerable Israeli contacts to do a prisoner swap instead of fighting the war, which has been done numerous times in similar situations with Lebanon and would have accomplished much more, saved thousands of lives, hundreds of millions or billions of US dollars (they used our weaponry) and left Lebanon’s US friendly government in tact while actually HURTING or at least Maintaining Hezbollahs status as opposed to giving them the PR coup of the century by delivering them a military victory.

2) She chose to SUPPORT the nomination of ambassador John Bolton, a figure who played a major role in cooking the intel in the run up to the war and a who is a major Neocon. His presence in the UN was detrimental to US world standing at a time when we need the support of other member nations more than ever. He was there to clear the way for more wars for this administration, and Hillary and Lieberman were both planning on voting for his approval.

3) Hillary recently spoke at AIPAC (she is a major supporter of and recipient of funds from AIPAC) and assured the audience there that Iran is an one of the greatest threats to US security and that “all options are on the table”.

In conclusion, there is a clear trend in Senator Clintons behavior that indicates a propensity to choose violence as a method of gaining presonal political favor and power, while disregarding the good of the nation and the will of her Party. In other words Senator Clinton would take us to war with Iran in a New York Minute if she feels that it would benefit her personally , as she did with Lebanon, Bolton, and promises of war with Iran to AIPAC.

To be Hillary or not to be Hillary, that is the question (apparently):

It’s all a moot point, anyway. The only way to ensure that we get a President that’s going to do something for us (us being the poor and middle class), is to get us some serious voting reform.

But how likely is that?

Not very likely, IMO. After all, how likely is it that you’re going to get the foxes to agree to make it illegal to allow them to raid the chicken coop?

Venezuela?

I have no burning desire to hear Hillary apologize for her Iraq vote. She’s had a good four years to do so and she hasn’t yet. It’s far too late now. If it must be forced out of her mouth at this point, it will not have come from her heart. It will just be another political calculation. It will be worthless for those of us who seek leadership, principle and authenticity.

Her answer to the question of whether her vote as a mistake is inane and grating. “If I knew then what I know now, I wouldn’t have voted for it. If I were president, I wouldn’t have gone to war. I didn’t make a mistake. George Bush made the mistake by starting this war.”

There were millions of us who opposed this war from the very beginning, who could see that the administration was lying about WMD, that it was a diversion from going after bin Laden, that it was just a terrible idea to invade and occupy a major nation in the middle of the Muslim Middle East as a response to 9/11, and that it was the wrong way to deal with extremist Islamic terrorism.

We protested in the streets and we called and faxed our representatives urging them not to write a blank check for Bush and Cheney. And they ignored us.

Knowing what we all knew then, we all showed better judgment than Hillary Clinton.

Every thinking person knows the Iraq war is a fake. Even the politicians know it, yet they continue to support it. Why? Because politicians act politically. That is what they are supposed to do. What does acting politically mean?  Well, to you or me it would mean acting in a way that expresses our will and the reason why we voted for so and so in the first place. But, U.S. politics doesn’t seem to work that way anymore.  Who knows when things really changed.  But, they have. So, what about Hillary and her expected behavior? How will the north-eastern Liberal act when the chips are down? She will do what all other Representatives and Senators will do. Acting politically for these individuals means knowing what side your bread is buttered on. In today’s context that means supporting something like the Iraq War and the State of Israel’s objectives because the ‘political environment’ tells politicians how to act. What is more important to a politician? A citizen who knows the Iraq War is a fake or a person or body of people who have an interest in such a war, and who are further able to influence a politician by other means as well?  I am talking primarily about things concerning money.

Mr. Baydala

I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again. The presidency is like any other job, albeit the most important one in the country and possibly the world.
We should be reviewing the resumes of prospective candidates to see what education, training, experience and accomplishments they have in their lives that would qualify them for this position. Certainly both Hillary and Barack have none.
If either one is nominated Nader will have my vote again even if he isn’t running. It shouldn’t come down to a popularity contest or the novelty of having someone of a different gender or race running this country.
We’ve all seen what lowering the bar has given us for the last 6 years. Please, people don’t let the sold out media determine the nomination process for us. It’s all about “sensationalism” for them and nothing more. Diebold willing, lets make our own choices.

We are plagued with the Moonies, the Fundamentalists, the Mormons, and the Zionists.  Hillery is in debt to the New York Zionist constituency big time.  In a sense she represents a foreign power.  All of these religious movements are totally bogus and corrupt, so Hillery must be just as bad.  She’s smart and bright, but her heart belongs to Israel first.  God I hate these phony crook religions!

Barack is ill fated. Clinton is ill fated. Perhaps, we will have another Republican president for the four years following ‘08.

Can we be adult enough to make a choice for ourselves, instead of letting them choose for us?

Or, has the human brain been so restrained by the media, through fear, that our creative and directive desires have become amenable to their choice for us?

The only reliable way to stop Hillary is to get a loud and clear message to the Dem big dogs.

So I set up this site:

http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/iwontvoteforhillary

If we get 500,000 sigs, CNN and MSNBC will pick up the story, and it will be a stake in the heart of her campaign.

That’s a lot more effective as a tactic than just complaining about her on progressive blogs.

The stakes are higher than ever, now that the CA primary has been moved up.  She’s widely expected to win right now - and that will will dwarf the other early primaries where other candidates have a good chance of beating her.

So - if you’re likeminded that you don’t want to see any more Clintons in the White House - and especially not THIS Clinton, here’s what to do:

1.  Sign the petition

2.  Pass this note to your friends.

If the petition goes VIRAL - she can be stopped.  Otherwise - as Borat says - not so much.

GO NETROOTS!

Do I want Hillary to become President? No, I do not. Why? For the very simple reason that I have a gut reaction that dynasties have no business being a part of the American political scene: Daddy Bush to Poppa Clinton to Junior Bush to Momma Clinton just seems to be too much of an alternating cycle of nepotism for my tastes.

It’s time for somebody new.

“...who do you think middle America is going to to vote for as Commander and Chief during a war ??? ...”

maybe they would vote for a cowardly drunken moron who shirked his duty to his country and started a war for oil, (or appeared to do so as the puppet in chief), over a bona fide war hero like John Kerry. Yes the public is fickle, but it apparently can’t be counted upon to vote for war heroes over cowards in time of war, can it?

In fact, the fickle electorate can’t be counted on for much at all, looking at what it did in California not once but twice when it elected an actor who knew nothing whatever about leading anyone anywhere. In the California example, neither man knew diddly about foreign affairs OR military matters, and both were bone stupid, but not as idiotic as the moron in the White House today.

Enough already, with the Clintons and the Bushes.  This country can surely find many men and women better and more decisive to run for president than these cyphers.  We need to change:  1.)  The media pre-coronation of glamour candidates and find those who have the huevos to speak up for our rights;  2.)  The pre-loaded, horse-and-buggy era Electoral College, which dilutes the votes of the most populous states in favor of tiny ones (a Wyoming or Deleware resident’s vote outweighs eight - do the math and count ‘em - eight personal votes from a California resident);  3.)  Press conferences for incumbants, and if they don’t show or leave before questions are truly answered, have reporters keep asking pointed questions to an empty podium still on camera, until they’re shamed back to their respective bully pulpits.  Do not allow a flack like a press secretary to answer questions.  4.)The so-called presidential “debates” which are now nothing more than celebrations of procedure over substance and the perfect format for lobbing back nonresponsive answers to creampuff questions; true campaign reform, with tax credits for those citizens wanting to contribute and stiffer criminal penalties for lobbists trying to do indirectly what they may not do directly.  Until all this comes about, the government will remain owned by the big interests of lobbyists and fat contributors.

Hillary always make some mistakes. In this case I don’t understand why a lot of people still think that she’s a great politician?!

in a word; thucydides. i knew before i read his treatises on war that any misadventure in iraq was in theory as it could only be in reality which is to say a catastrophe. how stilted is one’s detachment that they would consider anything sen. clinton might say as worthy of hearing? her vote in support of the debacle in iraq does not consititute and administrative misunderstanding but a moral and ethical failure. neither is the ramification of wrongdoing reversed by mere confession. shame on her and many others. shame on anyone who would support such a venal, unscrupulous, grasping opportunistic fraud. shame on those who would intellectualize the immolation so many innocents.

I am no big fan of David Brooks, the NY Times columnist who is generally right of center, and is certainly no apologist for the Democrats.  So it was a surprise to read his column in today’s NYT, which it would do everyone well to read before continuing this discussion.  The link is below.  However, because it is a “Times Select” item, not all people will be able to access it.  If you cannot, try to get a copy of today’s (Thu) NYT:

http://select.nytimes.com/2007/02/15/opinion/15brooks.html?pagewanted=print

Hillary needs to publicly apologize for her error in supporting George Bush’s invasion of Iraq. And then she should bow out and not run for President. She’s bought by organizations like AIPAC and AEI and I don’t think she’s yet shown any leadership in foreign policy matters at all, let alone tackling health care issues since she became a senator. She’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing and I sincerely hope the Democrats DO NOT select her as their candidate for 2008. She’s just not Presidential material and neither is/(soon to be was) George W. Bush, the latter, one of the worst presidents this country has ever seen….

Also Hillary was showing something else we don’t like about her—her self righteousness and refusal to acknowledge error.

jon….

For an irreverent response to climate change report, see http://EcosystemCollapse.com/ellen.html

What sort of democracy is this anyway, where two thirds of us oppose the Iraq war, yet Congress, which is supposed to represent us, continues to support it?  A phony democracy, that’s what. How can our nation become a real democracy?  No problema!  First we prevail upon Congress to cut off all funding for the Iraq war, then to impeach President George Bush, after which he’s carted off to the International Court of Criminal Justice, there to be tried for his crimes against humanity, whereupon empire collapses.  And then?  It’ll be up to us.

We don’t need to resort to Israel-based conspiracy theories as to why Congress hasn’t spoken out against possible action against Iran.  It’s pretty simple…Iran is giving us the same headache now that we gave them when we tried to use Saddam to harrass Iran way back when.

Unfortunately, we’re caught at a bad time in which we’ve lost our resolve as a nation to address our threats so proposals to conduct proper action against Iran are pretty much Dead On Arrival in Congress.  We’ll just have to wait and see what pathetic response we provide if a Dem is sitting in the White House and Iran has reached production phase for its nukes.

a neo-con point of view

      Iraq is the least of Hillary’s problems. all it points out is her flip flopping tendencies to say what ever the polls tell her too!! come on people !!! lets look at the facts here, first she had to carpetbag to ultra lib NY, cause she was unelectable in her home in Arkansas ?? how many press conferences does she do ??? until now almost zero !!!  see how she screeches when asked pointed questions on the war lately ?? she sits on the eternal fence refusing to ever take a stand,if she does get the Dem nomination all the not so forgotten scandals will all come back to dog her relentlessly! the pardon scandals, with her brother, the White House furniture she tried to steal, her constant verbal assault on any poor woman who dared to accuse Bill of his improprieties, she was not a jilted woman she was an active partner in his dalliances ! she is Slick Willey’s right hand man !!(probably guarded the door while he took care of his business)

  my advise to the GOP would be to leave her alone, or say we are afraid of her, until she gets the nomination, then crush her!! it will be a slaughter, she will carry the lib strongholds on the coasts and that’s it !!! she’s a joke the libs just don’t get, I’m praying to the voting gods, please, let Hillary win the nomination so that the GOP can destroy her, and the coat-tails will put the GOP majority back in all three bodies for good !! same thing with Barack “Hussein” Obama too, he has never even had a opponent in an election yet? and you guys think he going to be the next Pres.??? the GOP will destroy both of these candidates and the Dem’s will cry swift-boat!!  so be it!!

    don’t count on the war getting a Dem elected, the 70% that supposedly are against the surge!! were 80% for the invasion at one time all this proves is the American people are fickle !!! the 2008 election is going to to be about national defense as presidential elections should be !!! 08 is not a mid-term, its a presidential election !!! I’m more than sure that most of the readers of Truthdig will vote for what ever candidate the Dem’s pick and I’m sure most in your circles will be shocked when the country does not follow suit !!! McCain is a card carrying war hero who has two sons in the military, he refused to leave his cage at the Hanoi Hilton when he could have because other soldiers were captured first !!! his opponent will be a flip flopping Hillary 60’s war protester or Barack “Hussein” Obama !! come on?? the way the masses feel today are not the way they will feel in 21 months and McCain is still winning today! his numbers will only improve because everyone will face facts and realize we are at war !!! who do you think middle America is going to to vote for as Commander and Chief during a war ??? Hillary or McCain ???

Yes, she should, but she cannot since she is beholden to the Israel lobby. Can you name all, or even one of,  the Washington politicians who have vigorously opposed the coming war with Iran? Israel wants the war, so they cannot oppose it.

Hillary vs. any of the leading republicans wouldn’t be much of a choice.

By choosing her, we’d be showing the politicians that triangulation is far better than leadership and, nobody would ever vote against a president asking for war again.

Voting with Bush in 2002 was either way too much politics or way too much stupid!

If you ever trusted Bush or Cheney you are a lousy judge of character.

Does anyone seriously want Lady Macbeth as President?

Hillary reads her statements on camera and even they are tentative.  She’s a smart, experienced woman and should speak from her heart. Not admitting a mistake is too Bushian.  I think she’s already doomed.

Let’s cut to the chase. Hillary has her nose so far up the ass of AEI and AIPAC, both of whom used their money and influence to…ahem…promote “regime change” in Iraq that she dares not deride her benefactor’s middle east disaster.

Now they, Kristol, Krauthammer, Podhoretz, Perle and otheres, all mouthpieces for the above mentioned Likud nut lobbying organizations, are calling for “regime change”, sometimes also referred to as “War”, with Iran. Watch Hillary dance on the head of a pin.

Or you can be more realistic by noting that Hillary wouldn’t BE there had she not satisfied her Jewish voting bloc by approving a war which was for their purposes designed to prevent Saddam’s retaliation against Israel for bombing his nuclear facilities and destroying his reactors—-never mind that this had nothing whatever to do with the Bushitter’s war plan for stealing control of Iraqi oil.

Hillary is no worse a liar than 99% of Americans, none of whom to this day will admit to coveting, lying, stealing, and murdering for oil—-and ultimately for economic survival and the maintenance of a rich upper class, all of whom have profited greatly from the Iraq war. No one dares tell the truth in the USA any longer, or his income source will strangely dry up, present company not excepted.

Hillary Clinton trusted Bush when he promised to invade Iraq only as a last resort? I doubt that political bacteria like Clinton are capable of trusting anyone. And Joe Conason trusts Hillary Clinton when she says she trusted Bush? Conason has about as much discernment as a hungry racoon.

Of course Clinton needs to acknowledge she was wrong, not so as to propel her presidential candidacy but to get right with God about all the unnecessary deaths - and torture - in which she’s has a hand. Clinton has a moral problem not a political one.

John Lowell