2008 Primaries Thread 2: THE QUICKENING

I said that a war in Iraq would be unwise. It cost us thousands of lives and billions of dollars. I said that it would distract us from the real threat that we face, and that we should take the fight to al Qaeda in Afghanistan.

There's your "Democrat war" for the next 4 years, changemakers.

hey one war better than two right!

There's your "Democrat war" for the next 4 years, changemakers.

you would rather not get bin laden?

i.e. I'm all for going after people that actually hit the U.S.

I'm sure occupying Pakistan and Afghanistan can turn into a black hole, too. Obama's "war on terror" figures to be just as endless.

(and, of course, he's not withdrawing from Iraq)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M70emIFxETs

^ lol @ rating

killing real actual alQ dudes is a good thing, imo. babysitting a civil war and paying $200bn+ a year for the privilege is not.

any 'nation building' project in afganistan is probably just as doomed long term as trying to remake iraq

xp "of course"

The Hillary gameplan is to claim victory if she wins Ohio - which she's probably gonna do, by a small margin - and momentum if she wins Texas too.

lol at max

xp: bet, gff?

I think "actual alQ dudes" are frequently going to be identified the way "Cong" were in Vietnam -- if they're dead, they're Cong!

sure, i'll bet. his stated timeline means it'll take what, two years?

how they are identified is sort of not the point -- alQ does exist, still. s

ha whoops

somewhere.

if Obama is smart (and I think he is) he will frame and approach catching Bin Laden and dismantling Al Qaeda as primarily a police/intelligence operation, and not a military one. Indiscriminate bombing and invading with large scale military forces accomplishes nothing and in many ways makes things worse.

Al Qaeda isn't ontological. We're paying lots of Sunnis in Iraq who were once "AlQ" (in Iraq), some of whom will be so again once we stop throwing cash at them.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/27/AR2008022703842_pf.html

xpost

I'm glad that Obama is highlighting what is so blatantly clear -- that Hillary is trying to win the election with almost exactly the same tactics that Bush and Rove used in 2000/2004 (even in her complain of Obama using "Karl Rove tactics"):

I do want to take a moment to respond, because the press is, I’m sure, curious, to an ad that Senator Clinton is apparently running today. It asks a legitimate question. It says, who do you want answering the phone in the White House when it's 3:00 a.m. and something has happened in the world. It’s a legitimate question. And we’ve seen these ads before. They’re usually the kind that play upon people's fears and try to scare up votes.

I don't think these ads will work this time because the question is not about picking up the phone. The question is, what kind of judgment will you exercise when you pick up that phone. In fact, we have had a red phone moment; it was the decision to invade Iraq.
Senator Clinton gave the wrong answer. George Bush gave the wrong answer. John McCain gave the wrong answer. I stood up and I said that a war in Iraq would be unwise. It cost us thousands of lives and billions of dollars. I said that it would distract us from the real threat that we face, and that we should take the fight to al Qaeda in Afghanistan. That’s the judgment I made on the most important foreign policy decision of our generation.

I will never see the threat of terrorism as a way to scare up votes, because it's a threat that should rally the country around our common enemies. That is the judgment we need at 3:00 a.m., and that's the judgment that I am running for as president of the United States of America.

dismantling Al Qaeda as primarily a police/intelligence operation, and not a military one.

Absolutely what it always should've been... and an idea ridiculed by the MSM and all of Washington for 6-1/2 years. And particularly given his historic ascent to the White House, Obama will be expected to do plaenty of bombing to show he's really a president. To take that as anything but a given is Pollyannish.

Obama will be expected to do plaenty of bombing to show he's really a president.

What will he bomb that isn't already being bombed? Do you mean Pakistan or what? Because I don't think anyone would jump the gun like that.

I dunno Morbz I don't see him doing a lot of military chest-thumping

He'll do it with a heavy sigh and "great reluctance," as befits a good self-described Chicago politician.

As for where, a good opportunity always knocks.

Obama's candidacy indicates an exhaustion with military chest-thumping, yes? I've thought it's weird that no one in the MSM says that the "hope" message is basically a sublimated anti-war theme. O's the only candidate with even marginal antiwar cred.

Dr Morbius, I'm all for heavy doses of cynicism when it comes to U.S. politics, but this is just blustering.

Maybe "plenty of bombing" is the wrong phrase; not as much as his predecessor. And that will satisfy the "left."

morbius would you like to actually stake anything on this prediction? right now you sound like don weiner saying he'll bet his balls that giuliani get the nom

is anybody laying claims to Don's balls, btw? does ILX have a trophy room?

whats a wiener without its balls

banned

He'll do it with a heavy sigh and "great reluctance," as befits a good self-described Chicago politician.

What Chicago politicans, machine or otherwise, have done this?

what don't you remember when Mayor Daley bombed Cuba

now we're gettin' somewhere!

Dynastic entitlement, policies that build personal wealth and power, a populism that still negotiates for titans of industry: yeah, Obama is just another cog in that machine.

Sounds like the Clintons to me.

WP: Possible GOP Lines of Attack Against Obama

To me, the standout quote is from HRC's chief strategist, Mark Penn:

"But the truth is, if he is ever in a general election, a lot of positions he took in 2003 and 2004 will come back to haunt him in a big way and a lot of the vetting that didn’t happen will happen. The independent and Republican support that he has had will evaporate really quickly.”

yeah Penn's been real OTM so far hasn't he

no surprise here but I think Penn is full of shit - lol xpost

much rather have Axelrod running the ship

“They will try to rerun old races and battles and divide along traditional lines,” Mr. Axelrod said. “I think the country is eager for something else. And I think the country is not going to be so easily distracted. We are prepared to deal with whatever they offer.”

“I understand very, very well how facts can be manipulated,” he said. “I’m not going to get into specifics, but I know his record well, we know his record well, and we understand the areas that they might try to exploit. But I also am very, very confident that we can parry those kind of tactics effectively and show the same appeal with independent voters and some Republican voters that he has in Illinois.”

If Mark Penn was a doctor he would have been sued for malpractice by now.

So, if this "vetting" he refers to would be so disasterous among independents, why wouldn't it help HRC for her campaign to do it now? Enquiring minds want to know.

I agree with all that about Mark Penn. I also agree that Obama's the much better nominee. Doesn't change my uneasiness about the GE, tho.

AUSTIN -- The Texas Democratic Party is warning that its March 4 caucuses could be delayed or disrupted after aides to White House hopeful Hillary Clinton raised the specter of an "imminent" lawsuit over its complicated delegate selection process, officials said Thursday night.

http://www.star-telegram.com/news/story/502662.html

apparently the clinton campaign is already denying that like crazy

xposts Uneasiness is good. Complacency will bite on the ass every time.

Just got off a call with DC friend whose ex-Clinton staffer hubby thinks HRC needs to get out ASAP for reasons of 'legacy preservation' - the campaign has done nothing so much as remind people about what was wrong with Clintons rather than what was right. Friend has voted across spectrum and thinks McCain = OLD whenever people see him and she hasn't had a look at that Popeye photo yet.

Oh and what a great LGBT policy statement - I agree with him on the whole 'civil union not actual marriage' thing - perhaps from Constitutional law perspective it can be argued that marriage = religion and civil unions = state? Keep it separated, yo?

from Constitutional law perspective it can be argued that marriage = religion and civil unions = state

this has always seemed like the logical solution to me and I don't understand why its never really clearly spelled out this way (apart from homophobes demand to conflate the two, which goes hand-in-hand with their gay marriage will lead to me marrying a box turtle claims, etc.)

I think it would be kind of funny if Shakey married a box turtle, so I support gay marriage.

Dan Lacey could make the invite.

all these years the law has been holding me back

OBAMA '08: He'll let Shakey shack up with Myrtle.

Sad face on Yertle.

http://zenandjuice.com/word/wp-content/uploads/2007/01/drawme.jpg

I now pronounce you...

lolposts, esp THOSE LIL GUYS.

Yeah, here in YURP you can't even invoke your deity remix at the town hall or bring God into the proceedings at all. Even in Britain with its state religion angle!

Another thing to do is to get God off the money and the Pledge of Allegiance for the same Constitutional reasons; these were only sprinkled with religious pixie dust during McCarthy. And in my aggressively secular high school with its even split of Catholics, Jews and Protestants we were always 'one nation, indivisible' without recourse to God. 90 per cent of students were believers and nobody had a cow, amazing...

But suzy people FOUGHT and DIED for that money.