Wes Clark - Proud member in Good standing of the "BUSH LIED" school since early 2003!

[FrenchieCat]

Review of Clark's book written in 2002-2003, "Winning Modern Wars":

Clark is a member in good standing of the "Bush lied" school - an outlook based on the claim that the president and his advisers had intended to invade Iraq from the very beginning, and knowingly deceived Congress and the American people in order to drag them into this unnecessary war. As evidence for this, he cites a 1998 letter from an organization called the Project for a New American Century (PNAC) calling on president Clinton to remove Saddam from power. Those who signed the letter included Donald Rumsfeld and Paul Wolfowitz.
http://www.ashbrook.org/publicat/oped/owens/04/clark.html

[Cha]

1. Oh, calling it like it is!

I like that.. Good for General Clark!

[Donna Zen]

2. Well, Wes did try to warn them

Since the Democrats controlled the Senate at the time, imagine how different today would be if they had listened to him.

[pocoloco]

3. And besides all that he won our democratic Primary!

Wish I'd get to vote for him again!!

[Sparkly]

4. I was JUST saying something similar to H2S

What people are saying now, General Clark has been saying for years. I was remembering that interview with Tweety at a townhall sort of forum in 2003 (in New Hampshire I think -- the one where he took Tweety's cards away). Clark said very clearly that the administration wanted to go into Iraq from the start, 9/11 was their opening, and they intentionally withheld and diverted resources from Afghanistan in order to invade Iraq.

"There's no military solution, only a political solution" -- he said that way back when.

"We need to engage other countries in the region, and talk to Iran and Syria" -- another now-standard point of view, at least among Democrats.

"Rebuild America's legitimacy in the world" -- that's going around now, too.

[FrenchieCat]

10. Alas, I've noticed it as well.........

and his words are never credited to him.....cause he said them so long ago, I suspect......like everyone wants to say it once it is safe to say them! :(

[Sparkly]

11. Yup -- Listen to what he says today...

...'cause everybody else will be saying it tomorrow.

(Which is good, except as you say, he isn't credited.)

[FrenchieCat]

12. Well his stance on Iran has been somewhat adopted as well........that goes back to

early 2005, I believe.

Darfur too. His discussions on this back to 2004!

[Tom Rinaldo]

16. Clark was the first major Democrats who blamed Bush...

...for not doing his job to prevent 9/11. Back in 2003 Clark was willing to hold Bush accountable for letting 9/11 happen because Bush did not take the actions that a responsible Chief Executive should have taken to deal with a known serious threat. I remember at the time how radical that accusation was. Richard Clarke had not spoken up in public yet, there was no 9/11 commission report. It was considered a political taboo to blame 9/11 in any way on Bush because the public still had positive feelings about Bush associated with 9/11 (this was before Morre's F-911 came out also - so no pet goat stories yet). Some Democrats were holding Bush responsible for the mess in Iraq by then, but Clark was the first guy who nailed Bush for being asleep at the wheel. The others were afraid that sounded too extreme; the conventional line was to keep the blame on the terrorists for 9/11, not on our President.

[jenmarie]

5. Always ahead

of the crowd, that one.

My dad told me something I didn't know about Clark. He said that not only did Clark graduate first in his class at West Point, but that he was ahead of all the other people who have graduated first in other years.

(I know there's a better way to put that, but hopefully you get the gist.)

[Auntie Bush]

13. Yes, that's true and he had a lot more competition and larger classes than

General Douglas MacArthur.(I think he's the one who came in second.) Wes got the all time highest grades EVER at West Point. They should rename it Wes Point in his honor. lol

[renate]

28. Wouldn't it be great to have a REALLY SMART president?

It kind of seems like it would be a good thing for the leader of the world's only superpower to be above average.

[Donna Zen]

14. The school ranks every class you take

The seating is organized by your placement within that class. Talk about pressure.

[earthlover]

6. Clark would have won in 04

I have no doubt about that.

This is not to knock Kerry. Actually, look at how hard Clark fought for Kerry!

I feel the same about 08. Yet, as with 04, getting nominated is the hurdle for Clark.

It is with no small amount of sadness that I see a field without Clark so far. Or Gore, for that matter. The two best hopes of greatness are to be religated to the sidelines?

Sad.

[jenmarie]

8. I'm sad, too.

:cry:

[draft_mario_cuomo]

17. I agree. The Republicans could not have swiftboated a 4 star general nt

[Dinger]

7. Clark Is Da Man!

K & R!:patriot: :patriot: :patriot: :patriot:

[Cameron27]

9. Yep, too bad only a few listened to him at the time.

K&R

[TacticalPeek]

15. "Nothing could be a more serious violation of public trust . . .

Bush should face an inquiry over Iraq war, says general

By David Rennie in Washington
Last Updated: 12:10pm BST 04/10/2003

General Wesley Clark, the front-runner in the Democratic race for the White House, launched a high-risk attack on American foreign policy yesterday when he said the Bush administration should face an investigation into possible "criminal" conduct in its drive to war.

Gen Clark, who as Nato supreme commander led the war in Kosovo, accused the Bush administration of entering office already determined to attack Iraq, then seizing on the September 11 attacks as justification.

He called for an independent review of what he called the "possible manipulation of intelligence" to convince the American people that war with Iraq was necessary.

"Nothing could be a more serious violation of public trust than consciously to make a case for war based on false claims," he was due to say in a speech last night. "We need to know if we were intentionally deceived.

"This administration is trying to do something that ought to be politically impossible to do in a democracy, and that is to govern against the will of the majority," he said. "That requires twisted facts, silence, secrecy and very poor lighting."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2003/10/04/wclark04.xml

This is three weeks after the invasion, when the rahrahrah was in full throat and the MSM saw only quick glory and an invincible 'war president'. I found coverage of these remarks by the former Supreme Allied Commander of NATO and victorious leader of KFOR only in the foreign press, shame shame.

The guy ought to be President. I deserve it, dammit!

[FrenchieCat]

19. Instead, we get to choose from a pool of candidates who were mostly wrong

wayyyy before they were right...

of course they became right when it cost nothing to do so.....and it is obvious to me more than ever that it also cost them nothing to be wrong as well..... :shrug:

FYI: Kuch and Obama are the exception in the current pool, cause they too were right when it wasn't cool......

[draft_mario_cuomo]

22. Wrong. Kucinich was right; Obama was wrong from 2005-2007

Obama was against a timetable for withdrawal before it was cool (like Hillary); Obama stood with the Hillary wing of the party and against Rep. Murtha's call to end the war in 2005; Obama voted and spoke against Kerry-Feingold in 2006, which would have ended the war today (like Hillary); Obama opposed cutting off funds for the surge in 2007 (like Hillary); Obama consistently voted to fund the war from 2005-spring of 2007 (like Hillary. They both switched when the political winds forced them to do so).

Obama was right in 2002 but wrong in 2005-2007. Kucinich was right in 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, and 2007. To conflate the two is misleading. The only time Obama was right was when it cost nothing to do so. In fact, it helped his political position (it gave a man fresh off being crushed in a House race who was planning to run in a Democratic primary statewide an issue to run on and an instant statewide base, plus allegedly also the high-priced David Axlerod, his top strategist, and a key liberal Chicago patron). When opposing the war became contrary to his political interests he became Hillary-lite.

[draft_mario_cuomo]

18. Recommended

[sandnsea]

20. That's important too

Hillary is the key reason we don't hear about Bush and his war lies because she's already on record saying his intelligence was the same as what they got in the Clinton years.

[autorank]

21. Clark has been calling these guys out from day 1. K*R

[bling bling]

23. Good judgement about waging war is a valuable thing to have in a leader.

I can't imagine a more tragic mistake than to intentionally nominate a leader to this party who has demonstrated that they DO NOT have that type of good judgment, considering we know there are people like Clark who DO.

Wes Clark can be sure of having secured a place in the history books as a rare voice of opposition to the insane march to war. I'm sure future historians will be relieved to uncover that not every American politician at the turn of the 21st century was fooled into supporting an outrageous war. It gives me some solace to know that at least the few who did get it right when it came to this war were Democrats.

[draft_mario_cuomo]

24. Ron Paul, Pat Buchanan are two prominent Republicans who opposed the war

There were some Republicans who opposed the war in 2002. Maybe we could run a "unity" ticket to foster a new kind of post-partisan politics with Paul on it since he obviously has the "judgment" to be president.

[FrenchieCat]

27. I believe that many of us had "good" judgment on this same issue.....

which is why it is so ridiculous that we should have to choose between so many running for President today who didn't have "good" judgment to lead us in the right direction on such an important issue! That's the irony of it all. There are more than one great leaders who should be running, but aren't. It is a travesty!

[draft_mario_cuomo]

29. Well, if you believe you have better judgment than Senator Clinton why don't you run?

Give us another choice. ;)

Paul is running. So you have three candidates with the "judgment" (using the self-serving criteria set forth by one camp) to be president. Paul, I believe, is also one of two candidates to be consistent on the war from 2002 to today.

The IWR simply is not as big a deal to voters as Obama supporters are hoping (or dreaming?) it is. If it were, we would be talking about the re-election bid of President Dean and Vice President Clark tonight.

[FrenchieCat]

30. I'm not an American born Citizen......or I just would!

But don't you worry, My Black Harvard educated Daughter certainly will! That's the magic, beauty, and hope of an Obama candidacy! :toast:

[draft_mario_cuomo]

33. Fantastic

I can understand that feeling. I am a minority and even though Obama is not at the top of my list in the current field, I, and I believe 99% of minorities in America feel a sense of pride in what this "skinny kid with a funny name" (not a bash. I know exactly how Obama felt!) has achieved.

Kudos to you. I am sure you must be very proud. :toast:

[HootieMcBoob]

25. It's been great to see him on Olberman lately

It's still my belief that he would make a great President, though it doesn't appear that he'll be running this time around.

Hopefully, whoever is nominated will see the wisdom in selecting him as their running mate.

[IndianaJones]

26. Clark is a true patriot...we need more guys like him out there spreading the truth. nt.

[Tom Rinaldo]

31. Frenchie, with all of your tons of spare time

Is there any chance you could update your prior thread series on the theme of "Clark got it right the first time", or however it was you framed it originally, pulling together an overview of how often Clark has been ahead of the curve in understanding exactly what was coming down, and what should be said and done about it?

The reason I thought of asking is I would love it if you could add a post like that to my "The Case for Clark 08" thread here, or at least some links to that sort of thing.

It is a damn impressive track record Clark has in that regard, which discussion on this here thread already indicates.

[FrenchieCat]

32. My "ton" of "spare" time.....haha!

I'll try.

But "spare" time........is "sparse"...which is why you only see me with the hits and kinda runs these days. Tell you more another day! :)