Latest Debates Coming Up

Drama every day in the primary election process. Today John Edwards will announce his departure. That leaves us Democrats just two to fight it out tomorrow in the latest presidential debate.

If eventually McCain does become the Republican candidate, his age and physical frailty will be against him as the year progresses. He also has to unify his own party behind him and that may be quite a feat. Also, if he keeps beating the war drums that noise will fall on many deaf ears. On the other hand, Hillary (who I think on February 5 will emerge as the real contender) is in her prime. In debates, McCain tends to get snappish, nasty even (example: his outbursts against Romney). But Hillary lately has kept cool under fire in the face of numerous debates and crises. Even Bill seems to have piped down the last few days. Hillary's strengths could make McCain look like a querulous old man. I admire and respect Barak, but I doubt he could pull off the general election. I've heard the talk about a McCain-Huckabee ticket, but there's a danger the Huckster will go off point and insist on bringing in his embarrassing notions about gender, anti-science and everything else. That could send the Republican ticket off the rails.
Hillary vs. McCain = two known quantities with Hillary having a good chance of winning.
Barak vs. McCain = one new to the national stage and one a very well-known performer.
In this house at the moment we have one pragmatic Hillary supporter and one passionate Barak supporter. However, we will back whoever becomes our leader.

Not So Hot on Hillary!

I'm not so hot on Hillary today! Shortly after I wrote my rave endorsement for her candidacy I watched the latest Democratic Candidates Debate on MSNBC. I kept in mind that she is preparing the ground for the time when she is the party's presidential candidate and will then have to present herself to the voters as the candidate of choice. In order to defeat her Republican opponent she will have to appear to be middle-of-the-road or even a bit rightist. In actuality, although her politics have no doubt mellowed since she was a flaming leftie student at Wellsley College, she remains a devoted Democrat.

But another problem haunts me, and that is her warlike stance--voting to allow George Bush to once again invade another country (Iran) if he feels like it. At least Hillary puts to rest the old saw that if women ran the world there would be no war. We have examples already of warlike women from Elizabeth I to Margaret Thatcher, in fact.

Hillary Must Listen to the Blogosphere Voices of Readon

Hi Hillary. Are you out there listening to the voices of reason on the blogosphere that ask you to express sincere regret at having voted for the Iraq War resolution in 2003? This would be a good time now we hear how Iraq wounded are being so badly treated at Walter Reed Military Hospital.

Excerpt that follows from Amy Goodman's latest column presses the point that other distinguished members of Congress in 2003 knew then what Hillary professes not to have known. Goodman has impeccable feminist credentials going back decades. However, these don't precipitate her into giving Hilary a blank check endorsement. Voters today want straight-talking candidates who own up to their mistakes and live up to the responsibility of working on the voters' behalf.

"Sen. Robert Byrd, D-W.Va., fought the resolution authorizing the use of force in Iraq. He said the president wants "to have the power to launch this nation into war without provocation and without clear evidence of an imminent attack on the United States, and we're going to be foolish enough to give it to him." Byrd seems to have known then what Clinton says she knows now. He called the resolution "dangerous" and a "blank check," and now, with more than 3,145 U.S. soldiers killed, and with Iraq War costs through 2008 projected at more than $1 trillion, it appears he was right.

"Reps. Barbara Lee and Lynn Woolsey also seemed to know then what Clinton says she knows now. They were lauded by the 50 activists who, on Jan. 30, 2007, occupied Clinton's Senate office, weaving a web with pink yarn "to symbolize the senator's web of deception and the innocent people - Americans and Iraqis - caught in it." Protesters have promised to "bird-dog" Clinton at all of her public appearances. These actions recall the student sit-in at Clinton's New York office on Oct. 10, 2002, while Clinton stood on the Senate floor and made her case for war.

Sen. Clinton has drawn the line in the sand over Iraq. She will not admit that her vote to authorize Bush to use military force in a unilateral, unprovoked war based on lies was a mistake. She is open to a military strike on Iran. Her latest message to voters: "There are others to choose from." Anti-war voters already know that, and are lining up behind candidates Barack Obama, John Edwards, Dennis Kucinich and, perhaps before long, Ralph Nader.

Amy Goodman is a nationally syndicated columnist who appears in The Union.

Hillary Made a Mistake When she Voted for the Iraq War: She Should Amit That

Fellow blogger, Long Live the Village Green, defends Hillary Clinton who yesterday defended her decision to vote to go to war in Iraq back in 2002. In answer to an audience member's question as to whether she's ready to admit that her vote was a mistake, she said that it was the administration who made the mistake, not her. But the administration, from its point of view, was not making a mistake. It cleverly and consciously fed a tissue of lies to gullible senators who sopped it up because they felt their political lives were threatened. Below is a list of senators who had the guts to vote
against the measure. If you follow Hillary's logic, it was these anti-war senators who were making the mistake at that time by voting against what she felt were plausible reasons for going to war. Hillary must own up to her error in judgment. If millions of us out here in the hinterlands could see from the get-go that invading a sovereign nation on pretexts was wrong, who looked at Colin Powell's aluminum tubes with disbelief, who understood that Saddam had no fangs, then she should have too. She's paid to know these things.

From Democrats.com:

"Although we spend a lot of time talking about what – and who – got us into this quagmire, let's take a moment to look at the names and the words of the Senators who defied bullying by Team Bush and had the wisdom and courage to vote "nay" on October 11, 2002.

"Here are the brave ones:

• Daniel Akaka (D-HI)
• Jeff Bingaman (D-NM)
• Barbara Boxer (D-CA)
• Robert Byrd (D-WV)
• Lincoln Chafee (R-RI)
• Kent Conrad (D-ND)
• Jon Corzine (D-NJ)
• Mark Dayton (D-MN)
• Richard Durbin (D-IL)
• Russell Feingold (D-WI)
• Robert Graham (D-FL)
• Daniel Inouye (D-HI)
• James Jeffords (I-VT)
• Edward Kennedy (D-MA)
• Patrick Leahy (D-VT)
• Carl Levin (D-MI)
• Barbara Mikulski (D-MD)
• Patty Murray (D-WA)
• Jack Reed (D-RI)
• Paul Sarbanes (D-MD)
• Debbie Stabenow (D-MI)
• Paul Wellstone (D-MN)
• Ron Wyden (D-OR)