all i saw was the bite sized news clip: senator clinton in iowa, "defending her vote to go to war."
she trotted out the "if i knew then what i know now..." bit. she said it loudly and slowly, emphasizing each syllable. when a politician talks like that, they want to be believed.
but i humbly ask everyone to realize just how unsatisfying this sounds, coming from her in particular, and perhaps in lesser degrees from any democrat. and in the long run, it is not exculpatory because it is not plausable.
lets cut to the chase here: the propaganda campaign by which the iraq war was "marketed" (thank's again andy card)was the centerpiece of a patisan political campaign designed and implemented by the same ruthless and powerhungry radicals who bedeviled the clintons for eight years. i hope no one here thinks so little of senator clinton as to believe she didn't know that at the time.
senator clinton today also relied on the "bait and switch" argument: "when we voted, we were promised our 'allies' would be with us. the war we were promised is not the war we got."
but remind me...in the weeks and days prior to 3/20/03, did she move heaven and earth to support those of us who heard ritter and blix, and everyone else who credibly claimed to loath the inevitable carnage about to be unleashed, and who refuted every argument given for the immediate necessity of invasion?
no, what senator clinton and most democrats feared was the political backlash they foresaw as the 2002 and 2004 elections loomed. and they may have been right, too. maybe by january 2005 there would have been a filibuster-proof senate if all the senators who knew that the intelligence was phoney and that saddam posed but little danger to us compared to the real faunts of terror stood on principle.
for me, who i support for president is a tiny thing compared to what we do now. so please, senator clinton, and the rest of the democrats, risk being president(and risk being in the majority) later to lead the country now. and trust the people with the truth.
if we cannot be trusted with the truth, what can you accomplish when you get into power?