In Oregon, Clinton Makes False Claim About Her Iraq Record Vs. Obama's
April 06, 2008 9:49 AM
http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/04/in-oregon-clint.html
In Eugene, Ore., Saturday. Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., attempted to
change
the measure by which
anyone might *****s who criticized the Iraq war first, her or Sen. Barack
Obama, D-Ill., by
saying those keeping records should start in January 2005, when Obama
joined
the Senate. (A
measure that conveniently avoids her October 2002 vote to authorize use of
force against Iraq at
a time that Obama was speaking out against the war.) She claimed that
using
that measure, she
criticized the war in Iraq before Obama did.
But Clinton's claim was false.
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. (And Clinton's vote for it.)
But even if one were to employ this "Start Counting in January 2005"
measurement, Clinton did not
criticize the war in Iraq first.
Scrambling to sup****t their boss's claim, Clinton campaign officials
pointed
to a paper statement
Clinton issued on Jan. 26, 2005, explaining her vote to confirm
Condoleezza
Rice as Secretary of
State.
"The Administration and Defense Department's Iraq policy has been, by any
reasonable measure,
riddled with errors, misstatements and misjudgments," the January 2005
Clinton statement said.
"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."
But Obama offered criticisms of the war in Iraq eight days before that,
directly to Rice, in his
very first meeting as a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee
on
Jan. 18.
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 cir***stances, 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."
**
The misrepresentation of the record is symbolic of the re-writing of
history
Clinton has
attempted on her record regarding the war in Iraq.
Because the larger context is more im****tant. And Clinton's written
criticism of the war in a
press statement in January 2005 received little attention compared to the
press surrounding her
trip to Iraq the next month, in February 2005.
Upon returning she argued that setting a deadline for the withdrawal of
U.S.
troops would aid the
enemy.
“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.
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."
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.”
In an interview with NBC's Meet the Press on Feb. 20, 2005, Clinton said
that withdrawing some
troops or setting a date for withdrawal would be a "mistake."
"I don't believe we should tie our hands or the hands of the new Iraqi
government," Clinton said.
"We don't want to send a signal to the insurgents, to the terrorists that
we
are going to be out
of here at some, you know, date certain."
"We have just finished meeting with the current prime minister, the deputy
prime minister and the
finance minister, and in our meetings, we posed the question to each of
them
as to whether they
believed that we should set a firm deadline for the withdrawal of American
troops," Clinton said.
"To a person, and they are of different political parties in this
election,
but each of them said
that would be a big mistake, that we needed to make clear that there is a
transition now going on
to the Iraqi government. When it is formed, which we hope will be shortly,
it will assume
responsibility for much of the security, with the assistance and
cooperation
of the coalition
forces, primarily U.S. forces."
Clinton said that "what the American people need to know is, number one,
we
are very proud of our
young men and women who are here," and second, "there can be no doubt that
it is not in America's
interests for the Iraqi government, the experiment in freedom and
democracy,
to fail. So I hope
that Americans understand that and that we will have as united a front as
is
possible in our
country at this time to keep our troops safe, make sure they have
everything
they need and try to
sup****t this new Iraqi government."
She soon told New York Daily News editors and re****ters that it was
im****tant for Democrats to
combat the idea that they're soft on national security issues like Iraq.
"If you can't persuade a majority of people that you're going to be strong
and tough where we
need to protect America and our [national] interests, you can't cross the
[electoral] threshold,"
she said.
**
That same month, while Clinton was talking up the need for Democrats to
project strength, and
claiming a withdrawal deadline would be sending a signal to the
terrorists,
Obama was meeting
with his constituents, sounding quite skeptical about the war and
reiterating his opposition to
the decision to go to war to begin with.
The Bloomington, Ill., Pantagraph re****ted 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.'"
Clinton made this latest questionable claim the same day that she came
under
fire for repeatedly
telling a story that turned out not to be true about a poor pregnant woman
losing her baby and
her own life after being denied hospital treatment because she couldn't
afford a $100 fee. The
New York Times discovered that the woman in question was never denied
treatment, and that she did
have insurance. “We implore the Clinton campaign to immediately desist
from
repeating this
story,” said a representative of the hospital.
The Clinton campaign said that the senator had been told the story by a
sheriff's deputy, and had
not been able to fully check its accuracy. "We did try but were not able
to
fully vet it,”
Clinton campaign spokesman Mo Elleithee said. “If the hospital claims it
did
not happen that way,
we respect that."
This latest incident also comes less than two weeks after Clinton had to
back off a description
of a plane landing during a 1996 trip to Bosnia that she had claimed was
under sniper fire. Video
evidence surfaced proving that claim false and Clinton admitted that she
"misspoke."
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