I don’t think we should be setting a deadline … That just gives a green light to the insurgents and the terrorists, that if they just wait us out they can basically have the country. It’s not in our interests, given the sacrifices we’ve made.

George W. Bush?
Dick Cheney?
Donald Rumsfeld?
Condoleezza Rice?

Nope. It was said by Hillary Clinton in February 2005.

If you think John Kerry got slammed with flip-flopping on Iraq in 2004, just wait until Hillary is nominated in 2008.

Am I not mistaken but did she not authorize this god forsaken war? Even without READING THE NIE! Did she not side with this president to “stay the course”.

Exactly right.

Liberals who are fervently supporting Hillary Clinton seem to be suffering from amnesia.

Hillary Clinton gets a lot of mileage criticizing Bush for his mishandling of the war but has yet to take responsibility in both initiating and prolonging the war.

Hillary Clinton has been among the most hawkish Democratic supporters of the war. She voted to authorize the war in October 2002. Yet she didn’t bother to read the National Intelligence Estimate that came out before the vote. And she reiterated her support for invading Iraq—unilaterally, if need be—a mere two weeks before the first bombs fell on Baghdad. And when her fellow Democrats proposed withdrawal from Iraq in 2005, Hillary Clinton was among the first to criticize them and insist that we stay the course.

And if you or Joe think there was no substance in the statements from the candidates last night, then they should be taken to task for being too cowardly, devoid of ideas, or hostile to the idea of a democratic election.

Not really what I said. What I said was that it really isn’t a debate. It’s a bunch of 2-3 minute speeches with little soundbyte barbs thrown at your opponent.

A true debate requires the debaters to respond to the actual points made by their opponents. This NEVER happens in political debates these days, if it ever did.

That doesn’t mean that they lack substance. They try and convey their ideas to the American people. Some of them are good. Some of them are bad. But the ideas themselves aren’t debated.

What they think is that it is time a woman should be President.

Or at least, they don’t have the prejudice against a woman running for President (before that, Congress, mayor, whatever) that all the elites assume or claim that they have.

What has she done?

She has arrogated Presidential powers already, in the past, and tried to engineer the federal takeover of medical care in this country, in a way so imperious and outrageous (as well as fascistic) that she generated Republican landslide victories in 1994 (though only the out-of-touch alien-to-real-America-and-real-American elites were truly surprised, not to mention shocked, offended, or outraged by this).

Do you realize that she is likely to be elected in 2008, anyway, and has that likelihood independent of the GOP challenge’s implosion or self-destruction we see? (From the start the GOP has been the challenger against her, even though a Republican won in 2004 and 2008 and is in the White House today.)

I’ll laugh if Obama does become Hillary’s VP given the good chance that so much conflict between them may well be scripted — so he can play the lefty while she remains “safe and sane.”

When was the last time you saw a substantive debate policy between Presidential candidates?

I haven’t witnessed it yet, but there were some policy issues debated last night and those should be examined before we start dissecting which shoes each candidate wore.

For example, do you think Hillary is right when she says that it’s irresponsible to discuss foreign policy theoreticals, or Obama correct when he says foreign policy decisions should not be left to Washington elites?

And if you or Joe think there was no substance in the statements from the candidates last night, then they should be taken to task for being too cowardly, devoid of ideas, or hostile to the idea of a democratic election.

Those women don’t know half of what’s going on that you do, don’t watch 2008 election debates on a summer evening in 2007, nor could tell you what the NAFTA acronym stands for……..but they outvote you 10 to 1.

What they think is that it is time a woman should be President.

Yes, if the election would be held today, Hillary in a landslide. (yet, as I always say, an awful lot of things can change in 15 months.)

When was the last time you saw a substantive debate policy between Presidential candidates? Heck when was the last time that there was substantive debates between any politicians seeking office? Lincoln-Douglas?

Debates are about getting your message out and coming up with whitty quips to jab your opponents.

We keep focusing on how “presidential” a client sounds and looks, but instead we should be paying attention to what they are actually saying.

Where’s the substantive debate about policy? Do we want to elect people that SEEM competent or people that ARE competent?

I have yet to watch last night’s debate but I have it tivo’d so I will watch it once I get a chance. But I am still very much not a fan of Hillary Clinton. I still believe she is nothing more than an opportunist. She may not be bringing the eye of newt to the witches but it seems that every action and statement she makes is calculated for maximum effect with little consideration for her actual beliefs. I believe she would be even worse than her husband when it comes to poll driven leadership.

Now don’t get me wrong. I do believe a President should be mindful of what the people want. And it should greatly influence his or her actions. But if his or her actions are completely driven by the fickle feelings of 300 million people they are doing nothing more than pandering.

FTR, I don’t much care for her voting to authorize the war. That vote was a set up and any Senator with Presidential aspirations had no choice but to vote in favor of it or be seen as against giving the President the tools to accomplish the mission.

But I find her middle of the road foreign policy views now to be completely blah inspiring. I don’t want warmed over Bush Doctrine. I want smart and thoughtful policy intended to make a real change in how our foreign policy apparatus operates. That’s why I thought that Obama’s Paksitan speech was spot on. The part about Pakistan was minor. The part about bringing the State Department back into the game and working with countries such as Pakistan or Sudan or Afghanistan to build real countermeasures to extremism is the way to go.

IMO, she is still a centrist like her husband, which will help with Independents and some moderate Republicans who are fleeing their own party. The other key factor she brings to the race is competence- which many are willing to accept as a trade-off for warmth or perceived compassion.

I actually like Joe Biden the best, and hope that at least he ends up in the winner’s cabinet. He did well in last night’s debate- out-performing John Edwards, and actually has the experience in foreign policy that the rest lack.

This ‘If’ should have been put into bold letters!
Hehehe, finally, KLo states shes isn’t a normal American.
Well, most of us knew this since a very long time, but nice to see her admitting it.
ggg