I just saw an absolutely brutal post over at the ABC News blog by Jake Tapper taking Hillary to task for lying about her opposition to Iraq being "before Obama". As we know, she was attempting to use the metric of "starting in 2005" but he very usefully digs up some quotes and comments from around that time in early 2005 that show, of course, that Hillary was supporting the war and Obama wasn't. Best of all, he places this latest lie in the context of her fibs on health care and Bosnia, and calls it the latest attempt in revising her history on the war.
Some excerpts below the fold, but you should go read the whole thing.
Clinton on Saturday told Oregonians, "when Sen. Obama came to the Senate he and I have voted exactly the same except for one vote. And that happens to be the facts. We both voted against early deadlines. I actually starting criticizing the war in Iraq before he did."
It's an odd way to measure opposition to the war -- comparing who gave the first criticism of the war in Iraq starting in January 2005, ignoring Obama's opposition to the war throughout 2003 and 2004.
But even if one were to employ this "Start Counting in January 2005" measurement, Clinton did not criticize the war in Iraq first.
The Clinton campaign scraped around to try to justify this claim and found an obscure policy paper in which Hillary says, on Jan 26, 2005.
"The Administration and Defense Department's Iraq policy has been, by any reasonable measure, riddled with errors, misstatements and misjudgments. From the beginning of the Iraqi war, we were inadequately prepared for the aftermath of the invasion with too few troops and an inadequate plan to stabilize Iraq."
Oh yes. Because that's exactly the same as Obama's consistent, nuanced critique of having entered the war in the first place. Regardless, Barack forcefully criticized the war eight days earlier, directly to Condoleeza Rice herself. Here is a full excerpt of what he said:
Obama pushed Rice on her answers to previous questioners regarding the effectiveness of Iraqi troops, and he criticized the administration for conveying a never-ending commitment to a US troop presence in Iraq.
"I am concerned about this notion that was pursued by Senator Biden and others that we've made significant progress in training troops," Obama told Rice "Because it seems to me that in your response to Senator Alexander that we will not be able to get our troops out absent the Iraqi forces being able to secure their own country, or at least this administration would not be willing to define success in the absence of such security. I never got quite a clear answer to Senator Biden's question as to how many troops -- Iraqi troops -- don't just have a uniform and aren't just drawing a paycheck, but are effective enough and committed enough that we would willingly have our own troops fighting side-by- side with them. The number of 120,000 you gave, I suspect, does not meet those fairly stringent criteria that Senator Biden was alluding to. I just want to make sure, on the record, that you give me some sense of where we're at now."
Obama concluded his brief q&a by saying "if our measure is bring our troops home and success is measured by whether Iraqis can secure their own circumstances, and if our best troops in the world are having trouble controlling the situation with 150,000 or so, it sounds like we've got a long way to go. And I think part of what the American people are going to need is some certainty, not an absolute timetable, but a little more certainty than is being provided, because right now, it appears to be an entirely open-ended commitment."
Meanwhile, besides that random policy paper, what was Hillary actually saying when she was in front of the press, able to shape public opinion? She was supporting the war in very clear terms. Please tell me that any of these comments couldn't have been made by Lieberman or Mccain
On Timelines:
"I don’t think it’s useful to set a deadline because I think it sends a signal to the terrorists and the insurgents that they just have to wait us out," she said.
On Progress"
Describing her trip to Iraq, she said, "It’s regrettable that the security needs have increased so much. On the other hand, I think you can look at the country as a whole and see that there are many parts of Iraq that are functioning quite well."
And.....on Suicide Attacks
She also interpreted a series of suicide bomb attacks as an indication that the insurgency was failing.
"The concerted effort to disrupt the elections was an abject failure," she said. "Not one polling place was shut down or overrun. The fact that you have these suicide bombers now, wreaking such hatred and violence while people pray, is to me, an indication of their failure."
Yes Hillary...that makes perfect sense. Jake Tapper has more of her comments--she was most certainly a cheerleader for the war. ALL of her statements about the war were repeating the Bush talking points.
Meanwhile...what is Obama saying around this same time?
The Bloomington, Ill., Pantagraph reported that during a town hall meeting, asked about the Iraq war, "Obama said poor planning by the Bush administration has left Iraq woefully incapable of handling its own security. He expressed hope that more intensive training will be provided for Iraqi forces, saying such measures could allow most American troops to return home next year. While Obama said the recent Iraqi election is an encouraging sign for democracy, he questioned Bush’s rationale for the Iraq invasion. ’I didn’t see the weapons of mass destruction at the time, I didn’t think there was an imminent threat from Saddam Hussein.'"
So, those are the facts. As much as Hillary would like to revise history she was hawking all throughout 2005 and most of 2006, while Barack was consistently opposed. Meanwhile, this isn't going unnoticed. If she has any credibility left (does she??) surely this latest whopper will be the end of it.
Go read the full thing--seeing their comments from around that time is very revealing.