Eugene McCarthy voted for the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution

[Hippo_Tron]

I have great respect for these 23 Senators (in no particular order because I am reciting them from memory)...

Akaka
Inouye
Boxer
Byrd
Conrad
Chafee
Corzine
Durbin
Mikulski
Sarbanaes
Murray
Bingaman
Graham
Feingold
Jeffords
Leahy
Levin
Stabbenow
Reed
Kennedy
Dayton
Wyden
Wellstone

But I think that perhaps Eugene McCarthy is a great example of why some of our Senators and Representatives might actually be telling the truth when they say that they regret voting for the war. Sure, I wish that they had voted against it in 2002, but I'm sure that Gene McCarthy wished that he had voted against the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution in 1964. He voted for it, but having that mark on his record didn't stop him from becoming a huge figure in the anti-war movement.
So while I think that some Senators and Representatives might just be going with whichever way the wind blows, I think that perhaps some might be following McCarthy's example and being truly honest when they say that they regret voting for the Iraq War Resolution.

[bluestateguy]

1. So did George McGovern

Almost everybody did. What is your point?

[emulatorloo]

4. point being that if DU was around back then, there would be endless posts

of "BUT HE VOTED FOR THE WAR!" everytime Gene McCarthy's name was brought up. Despite his sincere renuciation of his vote.

[0007]

5. The point is that Gulf of Tonkin was a lie by Johnson same as

the Iraq WMD lie. And many politicians fell into the same trap.

[Cocoa]

2. and he endorsed Reagan over Carter in 1980

this morning was the first I heard of that, I'm sure this has been discussed at length since 1980...

http://www.theledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051211/ZNYT02/512110435

In his 1968 challenge and for decades thereafter, Mr. McCarthy played the self-outcast of the Democratic Party, even shunning Jimmy Carter to endorse Ronald Reagan, the Republican candidate for president in 1980.

[Fenris]

3. Unlike many Senators of his time, McCarthy was genuinely repentant

A great many of his contemporaries attempted to explain that they were against the war in principle, straddling the issue in a way that seems, to the modern audience, a little too close to the way many Democrats maintain a position on the war that sways with public opinion, but never rejects or accepts either side whole-cloth.

McCarthy made no bones about his opposition to the war and his regret about the Gulf of Tonkin resolution. At a time when the country was starved for leadership in Vietnam, McCarthy's resolute opposition to the conflict resonated with frustrated Americans.

[DeepModem Mom]

6. Excellent reminder, Hippo! nt