She sure stood by her Iraq vote for a long time. Good for her! Gotta stay the course!
Like Obama's buddy Kerry, Hillary was in the Senate and had to cast a vote, and she did. I presume you voted for Kerry in 2004? Nobody's perfect, but at least she hasn't complained that she wasn't a decisionmaker.
Sorry, she sure was a decision-maker. As one of the best known Dems in the country, she could have read the NIE and could have voted against the war.
I marched on a cold, cold day to try to stop that war. I made a decision about how I stood and so did she.
A lot of people are upset with her "authorization" vote. That's been evident in this primary and by the support by the "moveon"ers toward Obama. Seems to me to be a single issue nomination.
For many families and friends of fallen soldiers it is the ONLY issue.
Besides a speech, when marching did Obama do? What protests did he lead? What action did he take to end the war? Where are his letters, protests, bills introduced to stop the funding?
Hmmm... his resume in that department looks mighty thin.
If I say so myself, Helen Thomas says it all (see my sig.)
And yes, she was really appalled at the media when she said that.
What did Martin Luther King do to take the highest office in the land?
For that matter, what has Hillary done? Been reelected to the Senate seems to be the only answer.
Outside of Obama's statements against the war, he has made zero statements against the war.
Such a knowing voice.
You may have misread my point.
Did you vote for Kerry in 2004?
I also worked against the IWR from the very start. Unfortunately a whole lot of people in Congress voted for it. Personally I'm fairly certain Obama would have, had he been in there. The thing is, I've voted for people who have not always done as I would wish.
Clinton defended that vote for a very long time. And I think that she didn't take responsibility for her act until she very grudgingly admitted it had not been a good idea. And this diary is about taking responsibility.
Now that you keep refusing to answer my question, I'm even more determined to hear whether you voted for Kerry. The reason is, of course, that I wonder if you hold Hillary to a higher standard.
The thing I have the most problem with, when it comes to Hillary, is the AUMF vote. She did take responsibility, though. She didn't attempt to deny what she had done. My own belief is that it was a bad vote. At the time when I said that, I was in a small minority and was sometimes vilified for saying it. Now, of course, the country realizes people like me were prescient.
Yeah. And I worked hard for Kerry. But he admitted it was a bad vote long ago. Hillary took ages to do it, long after it was very, very obvious what a bad choice it was. I try to teach my kids that they have to fess up when they make a mistake. By doing so, they will get more respect than they lose.
that we'll work for and vote for whoever the nominee is, even if we don't support them in the primary season. I don't support Hillary, and one of the main reasons is because of her vote for AUMF and against the Levin amendment. If she'd become the nominee I would've supported her for president, though.
What a sucky argument. "But, but, but, Kerry did it!?!?!" Bwhahaha. Of course, we ABSOLUTELY SHOULD have a higher standard. Kerry was running against an incumbent who had 90+% approval ratings during his first term, and 50+ throughout most of 2004, plus a media environment dominated by Fox News. The GOP brand has taken a beating since, and we absolutely should be holding our nominee to a higher standard and expecting more from (ahem) him.
And while you may be right that Obama would have voted for the AUMF when he was in the senate, the fact is that he did not. You can whine and say that's unfair to your candidate, but this isn't a contest to be fair to Hillary. Taking responsibility isn't about what's fair to you, it's about owning up for your action. And Hillary was absolutely disgusting and Bushian in her refusal to admit her HUGE, OBVIOUS mistake. It would crystalize, once and for all, the weakness and surrender of the Dem opposition to GOP war-mongering to nominate someone in 2008 who voted for the war and refuses to commit to ending it. What better way to bookend this era in history as the one in which Lieberdems and their DLC patsies aided and abetted the GOP in their war crimes and affronts to human decency? Thank God the DLC doesn't run this party anymore. What a bunch of morons.
P.S. This diary, like so many of Alegre's, is really awful and bad for he party. It's obvious that she, like Hillary (and Jerome), puts her right to stamp her feet above the best interests of Democrats. And yet there it goes straight to the top of the rec list. You Hillary supporters really need some better quality control. It's absolutely hilarious that Hillary supporters would question Obama's ability to hire people, like that's a favorable comparison. She went into this race with more advantages than any candidate in recent memory, and lost because the incompetents who ran her campaign (a.k.a. the pople who pay Alegre's salary) were too dumb to realize their error in focusing on "big," "important" states. You're going to have to come up with better anti-Democrat smear jobs than this if you want to ruin Obama to maybe give Hillary the chance to get crushed by McCain in 2012.
I think your question is to politicsmatter. However, I would like to say I voted for Kerry, and Gore, and I even voted for Obama for Senate. I just don't think he's ready for prez.
I, too, voted for Gore and Kerry. Kerry's AUMF vote displeased me enormously, but there's never been a candidate who was with me 100%. We have to look at the overall person, and what's important in the race. Like trying to get Junior Bush out of the WH.
In addition I was pleased to see Obama win the Senate seat. I agree with you that he isn't ready.
So I hear you have concerns about experience. McCain has NO executive experience and his policy positions are dangerous.
anyway, you have to make choices between imperfect candidates, as we all do. That's how elections work.
You are right, we make choices between imperfect candidates. I think Chitown Denny has made the reasonable choice of Hillary Clinton.
he's a weirdo, for sure. Either of ours is head and shoulders, but she's the best, and looks like she's positioned to win the GE. She's got those working class white guys who never vote for a dem prez, but vote dem down-ticket. They're big on national security and she has a great relationship with the military, who totally back her Iraq exit plan which includes outlawing private armies and canceling Bush's no bid contracts. She also has hundreds of years of foreign policy wonks and retired diplomatic corps people. But the poll that they like her moxies, she doesn't whine, or complain, she just keeps going toward the goal. She's practical and she's relentless and for some reason these guys are voting for a girl. That is amazing, she can bring the country together. Pug women like her too, even though they disagree with her policies they also want out of Iraq, and they know she'll clean up the bush mess. It's always that way, if it's dirty enough let the girl do the hard cleaning. I"m sure they'll expect to take it back in 8 years when things are smooth again and we all have insurance, but I think getting a taste of a responsible and competent president will lead us away from the big personalities and maybe let some more girls in the door.
obama might have "had pizza" with monica too.....but we'll never know.
i am so tired of this high-pathetical. (the pun is always intended)
politicsmatters, Where the heck do you get your info? Do you simply repeat what you hear? I'm not very familiar with your postings but I'm under the impression that you're a much sharper tack then you've let on in the last comment.. If you're really interested in what happened leading to the invasion of Iraq - please skip David Corn and Noam Chomsky, okay? And read this - and if you're like some Obama supporters who think Pat Lang is a racist because he had the nerve to write historically about the Confederate Secret Service, please don't bother. And I will be disappointed in you.
http://www.mepc.org/journal_vol11/0406_l ang.asp
OK, for starters let's say I'm not thrilled about the AUMF yea vote and I will say Hillary, like others was duped. And I'm proud both of my senators, Levin & Stabenow voted nay. Hillary made the mistake of believing GWB, a sitting president would not lie and pull the inspectors out before they were allowed to finish their job. All the dissensions were taken out of the 27 page NIE. The INR & the Dept. of Energy's dissension[s] Energy were removed.
From Drinking the Koolaid..
First, there was the consistent refusal to provide witnesses and information to the U.S. Senate, especially regarding the projected costs of the war and the lack of opportunities to question key players such as General Jay Garner, who was appointed by the Defense Department to be the first head of the U.S. provisional authority in Iraq. There was also the subtle hiding of the objections of the Department of Energy and the State Department's Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) in the NIE of October 2002. One congressional source explained that the classified NIE was made available in its entirety to only a select few members of Congress. There were verbal briefings and an elaborate process to access the document in a secure location. But it was never clear that the 27-page unclassified version that was available to every office was missing any crucial information.
There were also false statements to Congress about providing the U.N. inspectors all the intelligence that might have helped them locate the Iraqi WMD and programs. Sen. Carl Levin of Michigan has accused the administration, and especially CIA Director Tenet, of withholding information because "the truth" -- that the United States had withheld the locations of 21 high - and middle-priority sites -- might have slowed down the drive for war. The truth might have convinced Congress to take action to delay military action until the inspections were completed.
The March 7, 2003, appearance by the chairmen of UNMOVIC (Hans Blix) and the IAEA (Mohamed ElBaradei) before the U.N. Security Council was a disaster for the neoconservatives. The Iraqis and Saddam Hussein had "accelerated" cooperation with the United Nations, said Dr. Blix. Blix told the Council that Iraq had made a major concession: they had agreed to allow the destruction of the Al Samoud ballistic missiles. "We are not watching the breaking of toothpicks," Blix said. "Lethal weapons are being destroyed. . . . The destruction undertaken constitutes a substantial measure of disarmament -- indeed, the first since the middle of the 1990s." ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~
Now the Al Samouds were very expensive to make for a country under sanctions and under the watchful eye of Centcomm. Saddam allowed unprecented access to the inspectors and the Samouds were destroyed until the inspectors were pulled out.
The the mission of disarming Saddam was being accomplished. And on Mar. 7, 2003, ElBaradei blew the neocons out of the water and destroyed their story completely with his revelation of the forged documents and the aluminum tubes. Col. Lang says..
But it was after the next presentation, by IAEA chairman Mohammed ElBaradei, that "all hell broke loose" in Washington. ElBaradei, in his statement, sank the U.S. intelligence community's prestigious NIE, President Bush's State of the Union address, and Colin Powell's February 5 address to the U.N. Security Council with one blow. ElBaradei was calm in what he had to say: "Based on thorough analysis, the IAEA has concluded, with the concurrence of outside experts, that these documents, which form the basis for reports of recent uranium transactions between Iraq and Niger are, in fact, not authentic." The Niger yellowcake documents were forgeries. Then, ElBaradei told the press that an IAEA staff member had, in fact, used the common search engine Google to determine, within hours, that the Niger documents, which had been passed on to the U.S. embassy in Rome through an anonymous source, were fakes! Members of Congress then began to grumble. In light of the contradictions, a bill was introduced demanding that the administration disclose the intelligence reports that were the basis for the statements made by Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and Powell about the Iraqi WMD threat. It was still locked in committee when the war began.
http://www.cnn.com/2003/US/03/07/sprj.ir q.un.transcript.elbaradei/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~
Yet at that point, it didn't matter. This WH had other plans and betrayed the trust of congress, the UN and the American people. Bush simply said the destruction of the Samouds was proof of the duplicity of Saddam. Blix, ElBaradei and others were aghast.
Then Illinois state Sen. Obama took a guess. He has admitted it but it is a far different story from what some of his followers say. Good for you for marching - and may there always be those that do - but neither you or I knew of the stunning level of duplicity. Ask Joe Wilson.
to recognize the error of his ways. After the 04 elections he apologized for voting for the war, said it was the wrong thing to do, that the country was worse off for it.
Hillary doesn't think there as anything wrong with her vote for the war. Has repeatedly refused to apologize for it.
Even John Edwards has been honest enough to say he made a mistake when he voted for the AUMF. Hillary, not so much.
A woman or a black man couldn't get away with an apology for that vote. Actually, now that I think about, even white men didn't get away with it. Because I don't see Edwards or Kerry in the White House.
Maybe Hillary really believes that it was a vote to empower inspectors in Iraq. It's just that it was never ever a good idea to trust the chimp for even one second. But whatever. If I could vote for Kerry, I can vote for Hillary. In spite of their AUMF votes, neither of them would ever do what the chimp did.
I voted for Kerry because I didn't get the chance to vote for someone who made the right call on the war. I would have rather voted for Dean or Clark... but now you have the oppourtunity to support someone who made the right call, before this thing even started. Who spoke out against it, when it was difficult to do so. That's guts, character and leadership. I'm excited to vote for Barack Obama for president.
I can agree with the first part of your comment. I worked my ass off trying to get Clark some momentum. Also I really liked Dean.
Here's where I disagree with you - "but now you have the oppourtunity to support someone who made the right call" - getting chimpy out was job number one, and the Iraq invasion was the thing that could almost get it done. In 2008, things are quite different. Iraq is a mess, but it's not my most important issue. Why? Because the whole country knows by now that it was a mistake. Therefore I'm not excited by Obama. One policy stance is far from enough for me. While I liked that Dean and Clark knew that invading Iraq would wreak havoc, that alone wasn't enough for me even then. They had excellent stances on all sorts of other issues. Both had spent many years running large concerns - a military base, the state of Vermont. Both had excellent experience in an executive capacity.
Until the day of the caucus, I wasn't entirely sure which way I'd go. I didn't love any of them that much this time around, but in the end, I had to give Hillary credit for all she has done over the years.
I hope if you find your candidate doesn't make it through the primary, that our nominee can count on your enthusiastic support... just as I'm sure you supported Kerry.
My support for Kerry was pretty tepid. I tried, I really did, but I knew he would lose. In the end all I did was vote for him.
There is a big problem this year. It's called sexism. I am extremely appalled at the sexism that has resurfaced. No such thing happened in the Kerry campaign.
Obama will never get my enthusiastic support. Whether he will ever get my vote remains to be seen.
If you believe Senator Obama is responsible for the elements of sexism that have arisen during this campaign cycle... then there probably isn't much I can say to change your mind. I hope that after things cool down you take a moment to re-evaluate him as a candidate, and the choice that you face in the general... and then consider who would do more for women's right. The guy with a 100% rating from NARAL, or the pro-lifer that calls his wife a 'c--t'.
Yes, I do believe Obama has vaguely sexist tendencies. But I also acknowledge that all human beings have failings, along the lines of his grandmother making some cringe-worthy comments about race.
I've already evaluated him as a candidate and found him strongly lacking. That said, Dukakis wasn't ready to be president, either, but I voted for him.
As for women's rights, the people who can do more don't run for the presidency. The only person in this race who can make a difference is Hillary, and that is because she is female and would serve as a role model to girls who have been told that anyone can be president. They might finally believe it. Same for black children if Obama were there. We need a law supporting abortion rights, and that will come from the Congress. Otherwise we are held hostage to conservatives on the Supreme Court until the twelfth of never. NARAL isn't my bellwether; I believe they endorsed Lincoln Chafee and Joe Lieberman. Now, Linc and Lie-berman are pretty good Rethugs, but I wanted Lamont and Whitehouse.
Women's rights are a lot more than abortion rights (and I know you were merely using that as an example). At this point in my life, I have some limits and will no longer necessarily vote for someone who has pissed me off big-time. Obama himself blew past those a long while back.
I understand what you are saying because I have spent many hours trying to convince friends of mine to vote for Gore over Nader, or Kerry over whoever the Green Party candidate was that year. I may no longer be able to do a Dukakis. Kerry lost it for us in 2004 because of his hubris in thinking he had to be the nominee. Obama is pulling a Kerry in 2008. I'm tired of Rethug presidents, but you know, I haven't been able to stop it in decades and I can't now.
I'd like to see you provide some examples of vaguely sexist tendencies Obama has. I don't see them, but obviously you have so I'd appreciate your insight.
Also, you want protections for abortion right, but suggest you might not be able vote for the candidate that will provide that protection. I'm a little dumbstruck by this logic, so please help me out.
I want all rights for all people. I don't single out abortion rights necessarily. Chafee supports abortion rights but I would have voted for Whitehouse had I been a citizen of Rhode Island at the time. I hope that wasn't too dumb-founding for you. Congress and statehouses are more important in the abortion-rights battle, anyway.
There's not much point in me trying to point out examples of Obama's actions. His supporters will not see it the way I do and there will be blood (so to speak). Your tone is a tad insincere, unlike the person with whom I was conversing.
Well, you brought up abortion rights, so I was just following up. Actually, if the Supreme court bans abortion, states won't have any say, so I'd say that the fed plays a pretty hefty role.
I think you won't provide examples of Obama's alleged sexism, because there aren't any. Prove me wrong.
So it's reasonable that you used it as an example.
Here's where you are incorrect: The Supreme Court cannot ban abortion. That would be the equivalent of legislating, and the court doesn't have the right to legislate. The court can uphold or strike down laws, and it can use its interpretation of the constitution in so doing.
The Congress can make laws about abortion that are federal. The states can make laws that are statewide, but also, states are massively important in case of any attempt to make a constitutional ban on abortion. This is why it's important for Democrats to hold statehouses.
I won't provide examples of Obama's sexism because a bunch of you are just waiting to pounce (see below) and I'm not in the mood for it.
My point is that overturning Roe v. Wade with McCain appointed judges would be equivalent to a ban. With McCain in the WH, you can be sure that the blue dogs would roll over and give the GOP whatever legislation they want.
As seen in the case of the arcane federal drug laws, the fed and the courts have decided that federal law trumps that of the states, so so a federal ban on abortions would be the law of the land.
There will not be a federal ban anytime soon. Some blue dogs will roll over for McCain, I agree. In fact, many of them will roll over in November and that's going to help put McCain in the WH. I don't see that it can be stopped at this point. It would be hard for Hillary to beat McCain, and, I fear, impossible for Obama to do it.
anytime soon. Whether Hillary had won, or as it stands with Obama as the nominee, McCain has the albatross of Bush hanging nicely around his neck. New voters, pissed off conservatives and indies along with the reenergized Democratic base will carry us to the White House pretty easily this year.
But that you would vote against what you hold dear based on your personal dislike of the candidate is pretty sad.
Actually, when you accuse Obama of being sexist I think we all have a right to see some concrete examples.
Chirp. Chirp. Chirp.
You don't have the "right" to anything specific from me.
But then don't expect to have any credibility with us.
Don't worry, I wasn't expecting or wanting any.
Then why are you here?
Am I allowed to engage in politicial discussion on this site without having to seek the approval of Obama supporters or having to convince them of my credibility on their terms?
that isn't how a dialogue works.
Again I ask, if you are not looking for any common ground (in your words "on their terms") why are you here? Honest question.
It seems as if you are less interested in "politcal discussion" and more interested in political disagreement.
I'm finding PLENTY of common ground with Hillary supporters. Isn't this a Hillary diary anyway?
Those are different. Pro-Hillary diaries generally show up on progressive sites. Anti-Obama diaries generally show up at wingnut sites like RedState, Captain's Quarters, Ace of Spades, etc., though they've become quite popular at dead-ender haunts like No Quarter, Hillary is 44 and MyDD.
what are you doing here? Big Orange calls!
I just keep each open in a window, with a third currently open to DemConWatch to see the drip, drip in real time.
Unfortunately, Obama wasn't a ballot option at the time.
What's that got to do with it? Barbara Boxer wasn't an option, either. I'd love to have voted for her as president in 2004. Heck, I'd have loved voting for Gore for a second time.
Do you ever address the subject at hand? Oops, silly question. Seems impossible for you.
Guess what? Each diary raises lots of different issues and posters have the right to pursue those.
Maybe he responded in one of the multipe other diaries referencing the silly yellow journalist Jack Tapper. Maybe it doesn't count until alegre address it and her willfully ignorant following jump on it. But what he said did address the last line of alegre's diary. Guess you missed that.
With all respect, Hillary didn't have some sort of investment deal with Nadmhi Auchi and Tony Rezko involving Iraq that was threatened by the war.
Opposing the war was simple economic opportunism for Barack Obama.
Why should Clinton apologize for casting a vote in support of the IAEA and the UNITED NATIONS.
The vote was not a "vote for war," as you say. There is a very big distinction here, and you are seeking to conflate the vote at the time it occurred and Bush's violation of the vote at the time he invaded Iraq.
In this post, I'm going to talk about some actual history of what happened at the time, behind the scenes, as recounted by Hans Blix - who was the Director General of the IAEA from 1981 to 1997 and the Executive Director of UNMOVIC from 2000 to 2003 in charge of the Iraq inspections team. Blix published a book "Disarming Iraq" in which he objectively recounted the events leading up to the invasion of Iraq as a high-level, third party, UN official who was closely involved both with US officials and Iraqi officials at the time. As you read the book you will notice that Blix tried his best to make the inspections work and he was not a supporter of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. However, he repeatedly states in his book how important it was to establish a credible and unified threat of military force against Iraq to get Saddam to not just let inspectors back in but also agree to the stringent terms of the UN inspections regime without playing "cat-and-mouse" games with the inspectors and the UN. Indeed, Blix calls out how he specifically asked Colin Powell, in early Oct 2002, for help in getting a credible threat of force included in any resolution to make sure that Iraq would really comply with the UN inspections regime and not play games with the UN as they had historically done. I'm going to reproduce a few extracts from his book showing some of the chronology and I will follow that up with comments from other bloggers (from back in 2004) - to make it clear that it was a very legitimate argument that Democrats who voted for the resolution might have partly done so in order to make sure that the inspections regime against Iraq worked - the kind of inspections that Sen. Obama said he was very much for in his Oct 2002 speech. Put another way, without a credible and unified threat of force, Blix's view was that it was rather unlikely that Iraq would have really agreed to an unimpeded inspections process, even though his view was that the threat of force should not have carried over into an invasion in March 2003. This view is not significantly different from that of Sen. Kerry or Sen. Clinton.
Blix published a book "Disarming Iraq" in which he objectively recounted the events leading up to the invasion of Iraq as a high-level, third party, UN official who was closely involved both with US officials and Iraqi officials at the time. As you read the book you will notice that Blix tried his best to make the inspections work and he was not a supporter of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. However, he repeatedly states in his book how important it was to establish a credible and unified threat of military force against Iraq to get Saddam to not just let inspectors back in but also agree to the stringent terms of the UN inspections regime without playing "cat-and-mouse" games with the inspectors and the UN.
Indeed, Blix calls out how he specifically asked Colin Powell, in early Oct 2002, for help in getting a credible threat of force included in any resolution to make sure that Iraq would really comply with the UN inspections regime and not play games with the UN as they had historically done.
I'm going to reproduce a few extracts from his book showing some of the chronology and I will follow that up with comments from other bloggers (from back in 2004) - to make it clear that it was a very legitimate argument that Democrats who voted for the resolution might have partly done so in order to make sure that the inspections regime against Iraq worked - the kind of inspections that Sen. Obama said he was very much for in his Oct 2002 speech.
Put another way, without a credible and unified threat of force, Blix's view was that it was rather unlikely that Iraq would have really agreed to an unimpeded inspections process, even though his view was that the threat of force should not have carried over into an invasion in March 2003. This view is not significantly different from that of Sen. Kerry or Sen. Clinton.
The facts are clear. Sen. Clinton and Sen. Kerry BOTH voted for the AUMF because they were under pressure to support a credible inspection of Iraqi weapons systems and Hans Blix was seeking an AUMF with a threat of force included in it. Bush violated the AUMF by pulling OUT the inspection teams and launching the invasion.
http://www.theleftcoaster.com/archives/0 11884.php
Barack Obama made a speech against Iraq and gave himself cover in that same speech by saying he didn't oppose ALL wars, just SOME wars. How convenient for him. But, then, that is his pattern--he never takes a position; never plays his hand; always bluffing. Guess he learned that skill playing poker all those years up in Illinois with his lobbyist friends!
The alleged speech Obama made--to an anti-war rally in a blue state--wasn't reported in any news media at the time, and it wasn't recorded on any video. He has re-created it on video! Oh, well, Clinton might have "re-created" her vote, but she chose to take responsibility for it--like any responsible adult does.
Obama didn't even take responsibility for sitting in Wright's church for 20 years--when he was finally forced to denounce Wright, he said "that's not the man I knew for 20 years," and "I didn't know him as well as I thought I knew him," or some such nonsense.
This is a man who blames EVERYONE else for his own actions, who doesn't take a stand on anything, and who offers platitudes and nothing else. He's a political opportunist with no values, no dedication to an ideal, and no substantive record of accomplishment, save what he has accomplished in his own interests, like making a secret deal with a criminal to purchase a mansion he couldn't afford.
Ha! This is hilarious.
