"It's not my fault I was mislead, I didn't ask any questions"
I have to start this post by saying I have no idea who Richard Cohen is, could be a hack, could be a genius no clue have I.
However, I found this article interesting. I've often wondered why Kerry didn't make more of a "I was mislead" argument for his vote on the war. I get it now. He and all Dems in the race for the big gig have to answer one very troubling follow-up, "How come, Senator, you didn't ask more questions?" There was a lively debate among the people about the necessity of the war and the resolutions authorizing it, but in the Senate? Not so much. Especially from senators with Presidential aspirations who stood quietly and tried to read the public polling tea leaves. Not wanting to "look" cowardly on terrorism, the became cowardly on terrorism by not doing their job. It forces one to wonder what kind of President any (Obama gets a pass) would be seeing how they hid from their conscious out of fear and/or for the sake of votes.
It is one thing to be mislead when you're asking questions and probing for answers, its another to let yourself be mislead because you're not asking questions and probing for answers. The former is genuine, the latter is a convenient mutual deception.
And I have to add, Hillary complaining that she was "deceived" by W is very much liker her "shock" that Bill had an affair with Monica. At some point you have to question her ability to ask questions and understand what's going on.
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Richard Cohen is a hack, but he can turn a phrase:
*"In Clinton's case, she is dead center in American public opinion, foursquare for what's popular and courageously opposed to what's not."
And he gets credit for what seems to be sincere in his analysis of his own initial support for the war:
"If I were running for the presidency, I might call my position 'a mistake' and bray about being misled. But it was really a lapse in judgment . . . I thought the war would do wonders for the Middle East and that it would last, at the most, a week or two."
It's that last sentence that for many of us made the most outrageous of the administration's WMD claims easier to swallow, as hard as it is now to believe anyone ever thought our war with Iraq would be a short one.
There's little to add, other than that fear without the facts--in this case, about our rationale for invading Iraq and our strategy for occupying it--is no defense for our troops in Iraq and the Iraqis for which we ostensibly fight or, here at home, for our support for starting this war.
Our invasion of Iraq did not begin as a war on terror, but as a war of the terrorized. Whatever terror follows us home is ours for which to answer. For my part--all but meaningless, but mine nonetheless--I will do so with a skepticism that is intellectually vigorous and with a courage of what I charitably will call my convictions: Oh, wait, I have none. I'm working on it.
Pragmatism without principle: not pretty.
"Well, listen, I read Hillary's book, because like I said, I like to see all sides. And all I remember is I got to that chapter where she said she had no idea her old man was running around on her, and I remember thinking, Really? I'm pretty sure you're not smart enough to be my president. Because that is a massive Macy's balloon sized tea leaf that you failed to read there, honey." --Dennis Miller
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