Oops George Stephanopoulos played a clip from Stern interviewing Trump

[malaise]

while Trump was on the phone live. There is Trump supporting the invasion of Iraq. The Ugliest Americal squirmed like a worm saying that was long before the war ........Bwaaaaaaaaaah that was fun - caught you fucker

[oberliner]

1. Beware the downfall of Trump

As it will result in the rise of a Republican candidate who can actually win (like Rubio, whom I fear greatly).

[Kilgore]

2. Totally agree

But think it will be Cruz instead.
Jebby and the rest are toast by the end of the month.

[karynnj]

3. however, that was when the IWR was being debated

The Republicans have long conflated the October 2002 vote with the March 2003 decision to go to war. In this, they have had help from the left by people furious about the vote.

I posted many many years ago that Bush could have used the inspectors and set up a process to monitor Iraq going forward and ended the decade of harmful sanctions. I argued then it would have been a masterstroke contrasting well with the Clinton years where Albright claimed the thousands of kids dying was collateral damage. Politically, he would have been golden.

Now, consider what Obama did both with Syrian chemical weapons, where a potential targeted strike was the lever to get Syria to surrender them, and Iran, which agreed to extensive monitoring designed by a team of people led by Moniz.

I think the Democrats should have all voted against the IWR and then voted for a bill, with many of the same provisions, that did not take the set of authorizing war in the future. However, that was not an option they had.

Trump here is advocating for war. Most of the Democrats, when they voted, did not advocate for war. At that point, they hoped inspections and diplomatic efforts could avoid it. This does not make their votes "right", but it shows that Trump was more hawkish than people like Clinton.

[malaise]

4. Interesting post

I have some problems with the way in which it gives HC an out. Most of them were and are hawks

[karynnj]

5. thanks

It doesn't completely give HRC an out. She did not speak out as W moved towards war. She was very moderately supporative.

I remember in 2004 that one of the many things Kerry said was that, as President, he would want the Congress to trust him if he thought a resolution was needed as a lever for diplomacy. It is also true, that he like most Democrats voted for a resolution against Saddam in 1998. It did not autorize war, but it put the US Congress on record calling for regime change - Bill Clinton asked for that resolution.

The Iraq War was a fiasco, immoral and wrong, but in retrospect much of the US foreign policy establishment had promoted policies that, in some way or another, led to that war. You could argue good motives of many and the forces behind that move were great, but anything any powerful person did to allow it to happen or didn't do to stop it is something they will likely always regret.

[malaise]

8. Agree re HRC

said so on another thread

[maveric]

6. George did a great job of calling him out on his bullshit.

I'm not a big GS fan but he did his job today.

[malaise]

7. +1,000

I was pleasantly surprised