I think the irony of the GOP being turfed out of office by a black guy called Obama is just too, too delicious.

Sounds like Ron Paul.

What Obama is doing is simply tracing back to the early days and trying to climb aboard the Iraq train again which he let it passby. He and his advisers are realizing they are losing grounds and the only weapon they had to reclaim lost ground is Iraq. Obama fucked up his only opportunity to overtake Hillary. All the polls seem to indicate Hillary is widening her leads. yes polls don't matter this early but it does provide snapshots of where you stand today.

Obama is great for the party but his advisers not helping him much. He should fire Axelrod and his cronies soon or there won't be a race.

Oh btw I forgot to add that Matt Yglesias is a whore. I don't know if Obama is paying him or not but he sounds like a paid whore.

Luther: "Sounds like Ron Paul."

I'm sorry, but I must have dozed off right before Barack Obama said he wanted to abolish Social Security, Medicare, the IRS, the Federal Reserve, the United Nations, NATO and the U.S. National Park System.

I thought Obama was our savior, but after his comments on invading Pakistan I lost about 79% of the respect I had for him. Heaven help us! Nothing but bellicose militarists from horizon to horizon!

bob: "Oh btw I forgot to add that Matt Yglesias is a whore."

What a shame that you didn't continue to forget.

James of DC: "Heaven help us! Nothing but bellicose militarists from horizon to horizon!"

Geez, I must have also slept through the part where Obama fired his M-16 into the air and vowed to annex Pakistan.

I love the smell of HRC trolls in the morning....

Obama the Naive. Obama the Reckless. Obama the Unknowing. Obama the Thoughtless. Obama the Flaky. Obama the Careless. Obama the Menace. Obama the Inexperienced. Obama the Foolhardy. Obama the Credulous. Obama the Sappy. Obama the Rash. Obama the Uninformed. Obama the Demagogue.

Barack Obama sat on a wall,
Barack Obama had a great fall.
All the king's horses,
and all the king's men,
couldn't put Barack together again.

An HRC backer with poetry limp
Lamely attempts to Obama crimp
But a pen badly wielded
'stead writer impairs
And loudly proclaims to the net, "I'm a gimp."

Bob, Obama may be trailing further in the national polls, but he's now leading in NH and SC according to recent polling. Those states could give a big bump going into the big Tuesday. HRC must be nervous.

Obama's Contradictions: Obama says he will talk to anyone - THUS use diplomacy EXCEPT he would invade Pakistan WITHOUT DIPLOMACY?

And Pakistan, of course, being on the verge of complete anarchy itself, so that if American invades Pakistan - in the absence of ANY diplomacy that it is just like Bush's cowboy-ish altercations. AND invading Pakistan - in the absence of diplomacy would be every bit as damaging as an MATT's "occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences."

Obama is NOT making any sense, and he is beginning to look like Howard Dean but with a bigger foot and mouth disease problem – that his lack of experience KEEPS showing the idiot side of Obama.

Obama is either for diplomacy or he is NOT – and there are no two ways about it.

Pakistan HAS nuclear weapons and the LAST thing ANY BODY should want to do in that particular region would be to cause a Pakistan insurgency with as much volatility as we now have in Iraq, which could actually GIVE terrorist access to nuclear weapons. The awful reason why Pakistan is so dangerously near the brink of anarchy is precisely because of Bush’s complete lack of diplomacy in the region. I mean, Musharraf doesn’t like the terrorist, or having his life threaten any more than Americans do so what is Obama's problem?

SO what IS Obama saying here? That Musharraf won’t work with the US? Or that Obama won’t work with Musharraf?

Rushing into Pakistan irregardless of whatever Musharraf says, is just more of same Bush’s cowboy diplomacy – which is of course, is a complete lack of diplomacy. Obama is saying the same things Bush said, “my way or the highway” - “You’re either with me or against me”. I've have enough of that kind of behavior – maybe Obama doesn’t really believe in diplomacy after all - it's hard to tell with guy.

How does Yglesias read a speech wherein Obama says When I am President, we will wage the war that has to be won, with a comprehensive strategy... and determine that Obama is dovish on Iraq? Acknowledging Iraq as the foreign policy blunder it is, one which keeps on getting worse, doesn't seem dovish to me.
Withdrawal from Iraq is part of the comprehensive plan to wage an effective war instead of the most incendiary piece of GwB's plan of crusade. The Sunnis the US has decided to arm will turn to us at their most opportune moment. AQ in Iraq has little to no chance of being a major force in Iraqi politics once we leave. But a decisive victory over AQ, a difficult measurement at best, won't change the majority Iraqi view that we're a foreign occupation that has to be resisted and removed.

It's stupid to equate Hillary's vote for the war with some definite statement regarding her foreign policy ethos. As a woman who wanted to run for President she had no choice but to vote for the war: her poll numbers are weak enough now among independent white males - if she had voted against the war she wouldn't have a chance. Now, this 'realism' may offend the delicate sensibilities of the far left but it's disingenuous to talk as if it isn't relevant all the same. The emboldened left makes the mistake of believing that because the war has gone so badly it therefore was wrong and ill conceived to begin with and Obama must be a sage for having seen this - but the centrist, independent voter doesn't see it that way, the centrist sees mainly a war that has been bungled, not one that was necessarily ill conceived to begin with and it is the fealty of the independent voter that most concerns Hillary. Also it must be remembered that, regardless of how badly the war has gone, if any WMDs had been discovered any politician with presidential ambitions who opposed the war would not have stood a chance.

This fucked up war will be father to many unfortunate things - one of the worst being that the far left will think that its obsessions have been vindicated.

I'm a bit confused by the notion of giving candidates credit for things they could conceivably say. This sort of suggests that presidents are just hosepipes for distributing content fed in by advisors, which is the Bush II model of presidency. I think this leads to a basic lack of accountability. Which is to say, I'd rather pay attention to what they do say, and not what statements are encompassed in their potential range of motion as marionettes.

Gus: "As a woman who wanted to run for President she had no choice but to vote for the war"

This isn't, you know, actually true. She could have been put principle above politics. It's been known to happen. Now, maybe she would have lost votes, but she would have gained mine. You may be right; maybe democracy is a sham, and the best we can hope for is someone whose soul we know to be true, but lies about it throughout the campaign to dupe the rubes into voting for them. Put in the rare election where I'm given the choice between principle and pandering, I have just enough belief in democracy to give principle a shot.

I really lost respect for O on this one. The concept of a soverign nation is such a malleable idea, isn't it?

When will people apply to the US the Golden rule: don't do unto others what you wouldn't want done to yourself? Imagine enraged Panamanians bombing Noriega's cell or Iranians taking out the cancer hospital (in DC?) that treated the Shah.

Turn down the testerone. We've killed well over 100,000 Iraqis by fudging a link to Saddam for 9/11. Wrong people, but when can we say we're even for the deaths of 3,000 Americans?

oy. I've got to learn to proofread. Testerone: Testosterone that's not ready for the world stage.
No excuse for soverign

Me_again - I suggest you find a transcript of Obama's speech and read it carefully.

FWIW - Musharaff was dealing with assassination attempts before SCOTUS handed GWB the Oval Office - Bush's actions or lack thereof have no doubt exacerbated some of Musharaff's problems, but they can't be laid fully at Bush's feet.

Pakistan is volatile, no doubt. But there is a world of difference between anarchy and a military dictatorship, regardless of internal conflict. And we should be careful about pretending that there aren't 800 million Hindus next door, who have little desire to see extremist Islamists holding the keys to atomic weaponry.

Gus, you're wrong. Hillary had the choice to vote for the Levin amendment to force Bush to pursue diplomacy before he dropped those bombs and sent all these people to their deaths. She had the choice to speak up and demand the inspectors finish. She had the choice to tell Bush to back off if he can't provide evidence of WMD or any of the rest of his bullshit. She ran. She chose the coward's route and was scared to death to offend the neocon big money. She still is.

Regarding election, she faces the same problem Kerry did. She is trying to straddle the fence and flip flopper and manipulative opportunist are far worse political poison than being seen as dovish on a nightmarish invasion.

Two weeks ago, Obama was for precondtions.

Last week, he was for kumbaya-ing with Iran, North Korea, Syria, Cuba, and Venezuela with no precondtions.

This week, he's for unilaterally invading an unstable Middle East nuclearized ally preemptively?

All this from a guy who claims to be the most-experienced in foreign affairs of the entire Presidential field, Democratic and Republican?

Two weeks ago, Obama was for precondtions.

Last week, he was for kumbaya-ing with Iran, North Korea, Syria, Cuba, and Venezuela with no precondtions.

This week, he's for unilaterally invading an unstable Middle East nuclearized ally preemptively?

All this from a guy who claims to be the most-experienced in foreign affairs of the entire Presidential field, Democratic and Republican?

I'm generally undecided among the field at this point and I like Obama and view him as a possibility, but lately Obama on foreign policy for whatever reason has been turning me off. Not so much because I disagree with what he says, but because I'm getting the impression that it is all-talk. The invading Pakistan comment is one example. The other example is his constant distinguishing himself by saying he did not authorize the war like other Democrats. Seems to me that the reason he didn't do it is because he wasn't a Senator then. Is there any indication (other than what he is telling us now five years later) that if he had been a freshman junior senator (who had just won his election in part because the GOP couldn't field an even semi-credible candidate) at the time of the authorization that he would have voted differently? Lots of people (other than Hillary) can say now that they wouldn't have voted for it. Is there any reason to think that he would actually have done so? Note that I'm not saying he got elected because he didn't have any opposition -- just that lack of opposition certainly didn't hurt and as a freshman senator facing reelection in a few years, I'm not sure he would have rocked the boat. That's why his using the fact that others voted in favor of the authorization seems like such a bogus argument to me.

Obama is right.
Too bad many can't see it.

Double-ewe tee eff?
Somebody want to give me a link and point out where Sen. Obama used the word "invade"?

What's that? He didn't use that word?
Would those of you who have been doing so in reference to his statement, please stop?
Whether or not it is disengenously deliberate on your part, you are muddying the waters.

I like Obama's approach that one must negotiate first and use armed force as only a last resort. But, with Pakistan's government not being the most solid as far as controlling the country, it seems to me that anything that would de-stabilize the country whereby the Taliban/al Queda might be able to take control of Pakistan's nuclear weapons is something that should be avoided.

Screw Pakistan. Ignore that problem. Contain it and get the heck out of Iraq.

Seems to me that the reason he didn't do it is because he wasn't a Senator then. Is there any indication ... that if he had been a freshman junior senator ... at the time of the authorization that he would have voted differently?

Uh, yeah. His words at the time that HRC and Edwards were granting GWB authority to invade Iraq, which you would have actually known if you were an actual Obama supporter.

You HRC concern trolls sure are out in full force, arncha?

What seems different about Obama's foreign policy stance is the advisers. Lippert, a 34 year old senate staffer, just got called to active military duty. Power, a Harvard professor, writes about genocide. Lake, Rice, and Craig -- more typical -- were pulled from the Clinton administration. Rice worked for the Kerry/Edwards campaign. Lake is the only one I had heard of.

Some common threads point toward a thinking foreign policy divorced from ego, more attention to the third world and Africa, broad support of UN intervention, and a willingness to intercede unilaterally in situations like Bosnia. In other words turn on a dime.

I guess this is one reason I feel myself being drawn more and more to Obama. I think that he looks at things in a fresh, responsible way. Unlike Hillary, who is tied to the same old solutions. I think both are incredibly able, but Obama is not tied to the past.

And I'd add this. Obama is the only politician in the last 40 years who actually has what JFK had. Charisma, responsibility, innovation. We've had a JFK wannabe every 15 minutes since then, but Obama, without ever mentioning the comparison so far as I know, really has that stuff. If he wins an early state, he'll take the whole thing.

For those who may honestly not know that Obama was against the Iraq from the beginning, here's a quote from a speech he gave at an anti-war rally in Oct of 2002:

But I also know that Saddam poses no imminent and direct threat to the United States, or to his neighbors, that the Iraqi economy is in shambles, that the Iraqi military a fraction of its former strength, and that in concert with the international community he can be contained until, in the way of all petty dictators, he falls away into the dustbin of history. I know that even a successful war against Iraq will require a US occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences. I know that an invasion of Iraq without a clear rationale and without strong international support will only fan the flames of the Middle East, and encourage the worst, rather than best, impulses of the Arab world, and strengthen the recruitment arm of Al Qaeda. I am not opposed to all wars. I'm opposed to dumb wars.

So for those of us who seek a more just and secure world for our children, let us send a clear message to the President today. You want a fight, President Bush? Let's finish the fight with Bin Laden and Al Qaeda, through effective, coordinated intelligence, and a shutting down of the financial networks that support terrorism, and a homeland security program that involves more than color-coded warnings.

Obama has been consistent from day one in his position on the Iraq War and who the real enemies of the US are.

Disputo, people have the right to support or oppose whichever candidate they choose without being labeled "concern troll" or troll. That's the kind of "you're with us or against us" non-thinking tactic the Republicans use.

I wrote:

Obama was against the Iraq from the beginning

That should of course be "against the Iraq *War*".

Thank you for the Obama quote, Disputo. Talk about prophetic.

Confirms my view that Obama has real judgment. Judgment counts.

Disputo, people have the right to support or oppose whichever candidate they choose without being labeled "concern troll" or troll. That's the kind of "you're with us or against us" non-thinking tactic the Republicans use.

Sorry, people don't have a right to make stupid comments on this forum without response.

To the contrary, I have the *right* to call it like I see it.

When you got a tidal wave of people feigning support for Obama, but now claiming that because of a misreading of his speech, and their total misunderstanding of any of his positions, that they no longer support him, then it is quite obvious that they are concern trolls.

The only question is, who are they working for. Concern-trolling is a typical tactic of Republicans, but you also have to assume that anyone being backed by Rupert is likely to be using the same tactic.

That I am getting so much push-back for id-ing them as HRC concern trolls, means that I am probably on the right track.

Disputo, sorry but what you consider "on the right track" is "off the rails".

Get a grip.

Get a grip.

That people have nothing substantive to say in response is even more evidence I am on the right track.

I welcome a reasoned argument by anyone who actually knows what Obama's what positions are and doesn't have to resort to making crap up. I haven't yet seen one of those in either of the threads in this forum about his recent speech.

All the polls seem to indicate Hillary is widening her leads.

Obama is ahead or tied in the most recent NH and SC polls--you have no idea what you're talking about.

Disputo, people have the right to support or oppose whichever candidate they choose without being labeled "concern troll" or troll.

No, they don't. People have a right to express their opinions (or even to misrepresent them strategically), they do not have a right to not be criticized for the opinions they express, and part of that criticism may be suggestions that they are dishonest in what they are saying about their background to lend credibility and weight to their negative opinions of particular candidates.

Such criticism based on ascribed motives may not be particularly productive, but then neither is the attempt to support one's argument by an unverifiable reference to a contrary bias in the first place.

This week, he's for unilaterally invading an unstable Middle East nuclearized ally preemptively?

Taking action based on actionable intelligence concerning specific, identified high-value al-Qaeda targets is not preemption.

Since that is the only condition under which Obama has suggested that the US would need to be willing to take action in Pakistan with or without Musharraf's consent, I think you are rather misguided on this suggestion.

The rest of your suggestions in the same post are similarly distorted.

I like Obama's approach that one must negotiate first and use armed force as only a last resort. But, with Pakistan's government not being the most solid as far as controlling the country, it seems to me that anything that would de-stabilize the country whereby the Taliban/al Queda might be able to take control of Pakistan's nuclear weapons is something that should be avoided.

The problem with that thinking is that, up until threatened by the US after 9/11, Pakistan's government was a close ally of the Taliban and al-Qaeda, and with them continuing to provide pressure, Pakistan's government has returned to shielding both those groups now that it has realized that it faces no consequences from the US for doing so. It is only the credible threat of consequences from the US that divides the Musharraf regime, even a little bit, from the Taliban and al-Qaeda totalitarians and terrorists it had sponsored for years prior to 9/11.

If this is all really the case, then why doesn't Obama support full withdrawal from Iraq.

He either knows, or ought to know, that a partial troop contingent still there will remain as "flypaper" and nothing else.

Sorry, but I'm not supporting any candidate who doesn't call for full withdrawal.

Just think that had we not found out about Barack Obama early on we might have voted for him.

Some complained about the long primary season. I think it has proven its value.

There's also a video of an interview w/ Obama conducted in October, 2002 in which he is clear about saying that he'd have voted against the war resolution. When this interview was conducted, many senior Dems had already voted in favor of it.

He also predicts the civil war we are now in the midst of. At this point, most American politicians probably didn't know that "Sunni" and "Shia" were names for two distinct groups of Muslims.

Saying you would have voted against the war resolution and actually having done it are two different things.

"I would have if I could have" just doesn't cut it.

Given that Obama was right, and prescient, about civil war in Iraq, it makes his failure to support full withdrawal both more puzzling and more off-putting.

I don't "support" Richardson right now; in fact, I leave very open the possibility of voting Green again. (I voted for the official Green Party candidate, and not Ralph Nader, in 2004.)

Wow. Did HRC send the B-team or what?

"What Obama is doing is simply tracing back to the early days and trying to climb aboard the Iraq train again which he let it passby."

Obama - who wasn't in the Senate when you claim he "let it (sic)passby," has the moral authority to say "I wouldn't have done this." Which does, as Yglesias notes, give him added punching power. If John Kerry had had it, we'd be looking at a very different world today.

Heaven help us! Nothing but bellicose militarists from horizon to horizon!

Do mind the gap, sir. If you go messing around in the foreign policy, you might get something on your petticoats.

Obama is either for diplomacy or he is NOT – and there are no two ways about it.

Right. We haven't had enough of false choices these last six years, so thanks for that. Obama's point is this: There are real bad guys out there. Bad guys who killed 3,000 of our countrymen on 9/11, and would do worse if they had the chance. George W. Bush has not only failed miserably at bringing these people to justice, he's strengthened them. Obama pledges to not only undo the damage Bush has wrought - through diplomacy - He pledges to try to right the wrongs Bush been too incompetent to fix: Bin Laden, Al Zawahiri, Mullah Omar. They should be brought to justice.

See that? Two, two, two ideas at once. Diplomacy and force. Used appropriately. The same common sense most of us learn on the playground.

"As a woman who wanted to run for President she had no choice but to vote for the war..."

Come ON. As a person who wants to run for President it is incumbent upon her to demonstrate superior judgement. A trained chimp could see there were no WMD's in Iraq, and no reason to even talk about Iraq other than to cover for the administration's failures, and provide pyrotechnic support for the 2004 mid-terms. Any senator who voted otherwise was guilty of bad judgement, bad politics, or just-plain-stupidity. What's that phrase she likes to toss around? "Irresponsible and naive?"

I worked my ass off for two years for John Kerry, and it was all for nothing because of this very issue. I'm telling you, people, the Iraq War Resolution is the political version of pancreatic cancer.
I like Hillary. She's smart as hell, and we could certainly use that in the White House. The Clinton machine is a seductive tool I'd love to bludgeon the right with. But I'm not going near any Senator who voted for that damn fool war. I can't. I won't. And you shouldn't, either.

Wow. Did HRC send the B-team or what?

The B team, I guess. Still, it was entertaining to see the gang shredded so handily.

What Obama is doing is simply tracing back to the early days and trying to climb aboard the Iraq train again which he let it passby.

Yeah, obama needs to identify himself with the biggeest foreign policy disaster in a generation so he can be more like the visionary hillary, who knew it was necessary to kill hundreds of thousands in a country that was no threat to us, all the while letting the taliban regroup.

calling these new commenters HRC's B-team is far too generous.

if Hillary wins the nomination, of course she has my vote, I won't vote Nader this time.

(unless she picks Lieberman as her Veep). (I wouldn't put it past her).

But her stance on her war vote is a real deal-killer in my book. She reeks.

Anyone seen the WaPo's "The Trail"? Didn't even know about this new blog.

Anyhow, really nice rundown on expert reaction to Obama's August 1 speech at the Wilson Center. Richard Clark, CSIS people, Peter Bergen, etc.

The Trail

If Richard Clark wrote a speech for me, I could stand infront of a tele-prompter and read it, too!

Unfortunately for Obama, the debates illustrated that he's as clueless about how to respond to a terrorist attack as he is about Presidential diplomacy.

Obama does not seem very impressive when he moves beyond generalities.

But this notion that we are "giving the terrorists what they really want" when we pound terrorists in Iraq seems at best strained. I realize there is an argument that terrorists use Iraq as a cause/recruiting tool (imagine what they will do if we withdrawal), but even if you support withdrawal, it seems at least vastly overstated that we are giving terrorists what they want in Iraq. And he claims "ending" the war (as if one side can "end" a war, rather than lose it) doesn't give them what they want?
Don't we give them something great if we pull out and they declare victory? Obama's argument seems so illogical.

let's keep in mind, obama probably knew when the war started he would be running for US senate the next year. admittedly, IL is a blue state, but not as blue as NY (where hillary ignored her constituents), still, the war was popular then, and obama spoke up against it. hillary blew with the wind, as she does today.

brian check in with the RNC. the withdrawal = defeat meme is getting way stale.

last week it was "obama's not tough enough - he would actually talk to chavez!"

now it's "obama is a crazy warmonger -- he wants to attack pakistan" (never mind his position is the same as hillary's)

guess he's making people nervous, they're flip-flopping like mitt romney reincarnated as a beached fish. (FWIW, i made my first contribution to obama after the debate. i made my second after this speech.)

Saying you would have voted against the war resolution and actually having done it are two different things. "I would have if I could have" just doesn't cut it.

As has been pointed out to you numerous times this thread, Obama didn't retrospectively say that he would have voted against the resolution -- Obama said at the time the resolution was being voted on that he did not support it.

So, if you say that you didn't support the resolution at the time it was voted on, should I retort that that doesn't mean smack and that you are nevertheless a war monger because you didn't actually vote against it?

Your HRC campaign staffer tag is showing.

Irony alert: brian, everyone's favorite faux-reasonable concern troll, complains about illogical arguments.

The latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll is out and it bears good news for Hillary Clinton and continuing bad news for Barack Obama and John Edwards.

Mrs. Clinton leads Obama, 43-22 percent, with Edwards coming in third at 13 percent. No other Democrat gets more than 6 percent in the poll.

That's interesting, of course, but what's perhaps more interesting is the following result noted by The New York Times:

QUOTE

[Mrs. Clinton's] efforts to capitalize on Barack Obama’s inexperience may be paying off, as 53 percent of those surveyed said they feel positive about her experience and competence just days after the latest Democratic debate. About four in ten said they had positive feelings about Mrs. Clinton’s values and character, personality and style, warmth and compassion, and the fact that Bill Clinton is her husband.

UNQUOTE

The more folks learn about Hillary Clinton, the more they like her.

And, by the by, Karl Rove's two-year effort to discredit Mrs. Clinton as being "divisive" goes by the boards. Rove seems to be running out of smear options. Soon he'll be left with no strategy for the GOP other than diddling the electronic voting machines in select counties and districts.

Listen, realstory, when you guys send these out, you're supposed to put "Press Release from Hillary Clinton" on the top. Good luck in NH and SC!

Poll Haiku:

Today's poll numbers?
What short memories we have.
Dean in Iowa.

The more folks learn about Hillary Clinton, the more they like her.

The problem is that this is not true beyond the Dem base.

HRC has not been able to do a thing to cut the size of her negs in the general population. Her negs are so consistently high that she cannot defeat Guiliani or Thompson in a match-up, whereas both Edwards and Obama can.

However, HRC is indeed having an effect. Her constant smears on Obama are raising his negs so that they are approaching hers. After HRC has her way with him, Edwards may be the only logical choice to beat the GOP in the general.

It will be fascinating to see if Hillary actually can get her likeables high enough to be elected president. Under normal circumstances (with her history and her actual unlikeability), you would think no. But this may be a year when all the stars line up and a largely unliked person can be elected president (similar to Nixon).

Gregory seems like he is never willing to provide a serious reponse. I don't know why he bothers to respond at all. Does he ever engage anyone who he disagrees with?

As to Benjoya, if withdrawal is not defeat (or at least will not be used as defeat by our enemies), what is it? It just seems like the disagreement about going in four years ago causes people to have a hard time seeing the reality today.

"Taking action based on actionable intelligence concerning specific, identified high-value al-Qaeda targets is not preemption."
____________________

Well, there's actionable and then there's actionable. Extensive military operations on the Pakistan side of the border will require the assistance of the Pakistan government. We've been unable to push the Pakistanis very far in that regard for a couple of reasons. The Pakistani government is unwilling to risk civil war in order to gain actual jcontrol of the border area. Our leverage with them isn't the greatest, especially since our supply lines for Afghanistan run through Pakistan. Anything that seriously disrupts the precarious balance of interests in Pakistan will threaten our ability to prosecute the war in Afghanistan.

It will be a tough call for whoever is President.

But I'm not going near any Senator who voted for that damn fool war. I can't. I won't. And you shouldn't, either.

this is one of several reasons why I would prefer not to nominate Hillary--although I will vote for her over any of the current Repub candidates.

My dream ticket is now Obama/Richardson. This ticket has it all.

"Her negs are so consistently high that she cannot defeat Guiliani or Thompson in a match-up"

Depends on which poll you believe. The recent NBC/WSJ poll, for example, shows her beating Rudy 47 to 41. The most recent Fox News poll shows her beating him 46 to 41. In that poll, Guiliani has been slowly but steadily falling since March, whie Hillary has been slowly rising since the beginning of the year.

"'The more folks learn about Hillary Clinton, the more they like her.'

The problem is that this is not true beyond the Dem base."
_________________________

Maybe so, maybe not. Depending on who the Republicans choose, I'll consider voting for Senator Clinton. She's pretty conventional on international affairs and generally supports traditional American interests. She'll get an automatic honeymoon with most of the world, especially Europe. She'll be about as protectionist as President Bush was with steel imports - meaning she'll make the proper noises, but eventually back off from a trade confrontation. Her very negatives will keep her Administration cautious. She won't be disliked by most of the military as her husband was.

She could be the best choice out there when it comes time to vote.

Disputo: "HRC has not been able to do a thing to cut the size of her negs in the general population. Her negs are so consistently high that she cannot defeat Guiliani or Thompson in a match-up, whereas both Edwards and Obama can."

Sorry, but recent polls released this week show Hillary Clinton not only widening her lead in the Democratic race, but also strongly suggest that either she or Barack Obama would win the White House quite decisively, regardless of whomever the GOP eventually nominates as its candidate.

The good news for Obama is we're still six months out from the first primary or caucus, and further that his hold on the runner-up position has solidified, making him the one candidate who's well-positioned to take advantage of any Clinton miscue.

The good news for Clinton is that her candidacy is gradually assuming an aura of inevitability with the general public, which is slowly but surely warming to the idea of her return to the White House as "the Decider."

Sorry, but recent polls released this week show Hillary Clinton not only widening her lead in the Democratic race, but also strongly suggest that either she or Barack Obama would win the White House quite decisively, regardless of whomever the GOP eventually nominates as its candidate.

With negs consistently ranging from 48 to 50%, any match-up that has HRC winning over a GOPer in a two way race with less than 50% doesn't strongly suggest much, unless there is a strong Trashhauler demographic out there who are willing to vote for HRC although they hate her.

Hillary agrees with Obama. So Hillary supporters should just shut the hell up

http://www.abcnews.go.com/Politics/Story?id=3441342&page=2

Clinton did not take issue with that as an option, but suggested Obama should not have been delivering such messages publicly....

"I am concerned about talking about it," she said. "I think everyone agrees that our goal should be to capture or kill bin Laden and his lieutenants but how we do it should not be telegraphed and discussed for obvious reasons."

Clinton didn't seem to have any problem "talking about" the subject on Wednesday, when interviewed on American Urban Radio News Network.

"I've long believed that we needed tougher, smarter action against terrorists by deploying more troops to Afghanistan, and if we had actionable intelligence that Osama bin Laden or other high-value targets were in Pakistan I would ensure that they were targeted and killed or captured," she said.

And so does Edwards. There is little disagreement among the candidates. So for anyone who won't vote for Obama because of this. Guess what, most other candidates agree with him as well. So what are you going to do?

"I think everyone agrees that our goal should be to capture or kill bin Laden and his lieutenants...."

Everyone? Now hold on now. Bush clearly doesn't think so.

Hillary agrees with Obama. So Hillary supporters should just shut the hell up

Looks like they heard ya. You got teh power.

Thx for the link.

Candidates do not receive the big money from big business unless they accept the big lie of using military might to solve foreign policy issues.

Clinton and Obama are the big candidates because they enunciate the big lie well.

For the past few years every time I saw or heard Sen. Clinton speak I liked her more and more. Now that the Chauvinistic platitudes about using America's military to solve problems have become part of her candidacy's platform, I like her less and less.

Since Sen. Obama had no visibility prior to his 2004 convention speech and was not given the same kind of media attention as Sen. Clinton, I had no feelings about him one way or the other. (Speeches at conventions do not sway me much.) Now that he has incorporated the might is right policy into his platform, I like him less.

All of this was expected, of course. Just like Sen. Clinton thought she needed to vote for the AUF in order to become president, the candidates that really want to become president must also demonstrate their allegience to this worst part of American policies. So, it is too bad for us, and whomever our next victims will be, that our defeats in Viet Nam and Iraq have not led the US to become a more peaceful and nation.

"I think everyone agrees that our goal should be to capture or kill bin Laden and his lieutenants but how we do it should not be telegraphed and discussed for obvious reasons."

The "obvious reasons" are that discussing anything but the most vague reference to uncontroversial objectives makes it possible for other Democratic Presidential candidates to differentiate themselves from Senator Clinton, and such differentiation is exactly what a frontrunner wants to avoid to win on sheer inertia.

Enclosed is a link to whoever was asking about what Obama really said. Worth a read rather than blogging on speculation and snippets of a speech:
http://www.barackobama.com/2007/08/01/the_war_we_need_to_win.php

It's funny because some of the first people I saw cry about our relationship with Pakistan and why Bush coddled them were right here on this board. I'm glad that at least one of the candidates brought up the fact that Pakistan is a far more dangerous place for us than Iraq (well....who knows how many terrorists are going to bred out of Bush's playground now?). Clinton seems intent on skating through this, giving what has become the politically acceptable "right" answer and basically promising more of the same politics as has been evident in D.C. for the past 15 years.

This country needs to break the Bush-Clinton cycle.

brian wrote: Gregory seems like he is never willing to provide a serious reponse. I don't know why he bothers to respond at all. Does he ever engage anyone who he disagrees with?

Shorter brian: Please join me in pretending I'm a good-fath commentator despite all of us knowing otherwise.

You post your faux-moderate concern trollery here enough to know that I do engage honest disgreements, brian, so your question reveals your dishonesty yet again. Thing is, "honet" leaves you out.

Equally dishonest is your presumption that your faux-moderate concern trollery -- injected with enough phony GOP memes to sink a battleship -- is "serious." You don't have any credibility, brian, and your bad faith commentary results in no one taking you seriously. I know there's no honest way to defend the mendacity, incompetence, corruption and tyranny of the Bush Administration, but your decision to embrace dishonesty is your problem, no ours.