So, rather than admit a mistake, Sen. Clinton tells us we can shove it:
“If the most important thing to any of you is choosing someone who did not cast that vote or has said his vote was a mistake, then there are others to choose from,†Mrs. Clinton told an audience in Dover, N.H., in a veiled reference to two rivals for the nomination, Senator Barack Obama of Illinois and former Senator John Edwards of North Carolina.
Great. Didn’t think much of you as a presidential candidate in the first place, but I’d said I’d be willing to listen over the next year, and see if perhaps I was wrong about you. But this? This nails the door shut. Thanks for wasting our time and money over the next year.
Mark
I’m sorry, I admire her for this. I don’t get this rabid obsession with forcing apologies for these votes out of congress. The fact is, if you put yourself back in that place and time, you are hearing that Saddam had weapons, you are hearing Condi talk about mushroom clouds, if you’d been paying attention the last 10 years you know that Saddam will only cooperate if he thinks his opponent has credible leverage over him. So how do you NOT vote in favor of giving the President authority to use that pressure if necessary? IMO that votge worked brilliantly, if you remember Saddam caved & let the inspectors back in, and had those inspectors been given more time we would have been able to put our mind at ease about our security, without all the bloodshed that actually happened.
No, there was absolutely nothing wrong with giving the President of the United States this authority. What went terribily wrong is how that President USED this authority. Congress put a trust in him, and empowered him, to act responsibly in the best interst of the nation, and he proved unfit to handle that responsibility.
Don’t get me wrong — I was fone of the 10% (or whatever) who opposed this war from the very start. In fact I suspect I have been more consistently against this war than many of the masses so clamoring for contrition from congresspeople now. But I think if you REALLY wanted to avodi war the calculus for 2003 clearly was: give Bush a credible stick to force Saddam to let in inspectors, then let those inspectors have the time to verify or dismiss the intelligence we had. The inspectors were teh key to making sure we had the security so we didn’t need to go to war, and the power congress gave Bush was the key to getting those inspectors in. Don’t blame Hillary & other congresspeople for holding up their end of the peaceful way out when it was Bush who abused that trust & took us a direction they probably didn’t expect!
MB
You admire her for defending her right to give a weaselly answer that takes no responsibility for her failure in judgment?
Well, I guess that’s one way to react to it.
To expect a Senator or member of Congress to take responsibility for his/her failures (including the failure to ask the questions that should have been asked) is not to absolve Bush for his (much greater) failures.