It's getting to be crunch time.
After ten minutes as a food fight, the Democratic debate settled into an edgy pep rally after Hillary Clinton stopped John Edwards with the magic word, mud. The rest was more or less collegial self-puffery, not Obama's best medium--he needs more time to get on an inspirational roll.
Once again, Joe Biden made a good case for becoming Secretary of State in what's beginning to look more and more like another Clinton Administration, especially if the Republicans end up with a Giuliani-Huckabee ticket.
There are a multitude of good choices for running mate--Obama, if she dares, but more likely someone who has managerial experience, former Gen. Wesley Clark or an ex-governor like Tom Vilsack or Mark Warner, if he wants to preside over rather than become a member of the Senate.
Unless a few thousand voters in Iowa or New Hampshire say otherwise, inevitability is in the air.
Showing posts with label Gen. Wesley Clark. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Gen. Wesley Clark. Show all posts
Friday, November 16, 2007
Thursday, September 20, 2007
Wesley Clark for V.P. ?
When the 2004 Presidential candidate announced his support for Hillary Clinton this month, Gen. Wesley Clark seemed destined to become a Cabinet member if she were to win the White House next year. But he is beginning to look more like a potential running mate.
If Rudy Giuliani’s rabid attacks on Clinton and the Democrats as soft on defense against terrorists foreshadow the Republican ’08 strategy, Clark’s military experience and strategic credentials would be an effective counterweight to Gen. Giuliani’s experience as commander of the TV cameras in the wake of 9/11 or Fred Thompson’s laid-back war talk.
On the Daily Show last night, Clark artfully defended Gen. David Petraeus, who served under him when they were both junior officers, on a personal level while noting that the Surge was “too late” to solve our problems in Iraq.
Clark’s experience, not only as Supreme Commander in Europe during the Kosovo war but in the jungles of Washington intrigue with the likes of Paul Wolfowitz, would be useful not only as campaign window dressing but in the realities of a new Clinton Administration elected to clean up Bush’s military and diplomatic mess around the world.
As he makes the TV rounds promoting his new book, “A Time to Lead,” and arguing for diplomatic rather than military engagement with Iran, Gen. Clark may be working his way up more than the best-seller list.
If Rudy Giuliani’s rabid attacks on Clinton and the Democrats as soft on defense against terrorists foreshadow the Republican ’08 strategy, Clark’s military experience and strategic credentials would be an effective counterweight to Gen. Giuliani’s experience as commander of the TV cameras in the wake of 9/11 or Fred Thompson’s laid-back war talk.
On the Daily Show last night, Clark artfully defended Gen. David Petraeus, who served under him when they were both junior officers, on a personal level while noting that the Surge was “too late” to solve our problems in Iraq.
Clark’s experience, not only as Supreme Commander in Europe during the Kosovo war but in the jungles of Washington intrigue with the likes of Paul Wolfowitz, would be useful not only as campaign window dressing but in the realities of a new Clinton Administration elected to clean up Bush’s military and diplomatic mess around the world.
As he makes the TV rounds promoting his new book, “A Time to Lead,” and arguing for diplomatic rather than military engagement with Iran, Gen. Clark may be working his way up more than the best-seller list.
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
Warriors for Peace
Children are supposed to be guileless enough to speak truths that adults are too compromised to tell. But on going to war with Iran, retired soldiers are taking the lead.
Last weekend, Gen. Wesley Clark wrote a Washington Post OpEd warning against the folly of attacking Iran, as the Bush Administration is clearly preparing to do.
Now another retired military leader, Gen. John Abizaid, who headed Central Command for almost four years, speaks out.
"There are ways to live with a nuclear Iran," Abizaid yesterday told the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a think tank. "Let's face it, we lived with a nuclear Soviet Union, we've lived with a nuclear China, and we're living with (other) nuclear powers as well."
The General was referring to such countries as “axis of evil” member North Korea and unstable ally Pakistan. But the Bush-Cheney Neo-Cons are beating the drums for an urgent war against Iran just as they did against Iraq five years ago.
Some years ago, someone I knew was planning a picture book titled “They Must Know What They’re Doing or They Wouldn’t Be Where They Are,” featuring the designer of the Edsel, LBJ directing the war in Vietnam and other perpetrators of huge follies.
The Bushies have earned their place in that volume and, before they can repeat their performance in Iran, Gen. Abizaid has some common sense to impart:
“I believe the United States, with our great military power, can contain Iran...can deliver clear messages to the Iranians that...while they may develop one or two nuclear weapons they'll never be able to compete with us in our true military might and power.”
What we need now are politicians who are as dedicated to peacekeeping as the men who were trained to make war.
Last weekend, Gen. Wesley Clark wrote a Washington Post OpEd warning against the folly of attacking Iran, as the Bush Administration is clearly preparing to do.
Now another retired military leader, Gen. John Abizaid, who headed Central Command for almost four years, speaks out.
"There are ways to live with a nuclear Iran," Abizaid yesterday told the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a think tank. "Let's face it, we lived with a nuclear Soviet Union, we've lived with a nuclear China, and we're living with (other) nuclear powers as well."
The General was referring to such countries as “axis of evil” member North Korea and unstable ally Pakistan. But the Bush-Cheney Neo-Cons are beating the drums for an urgent war against Iran just as they did against Iraq five years ago.
Some years ago, someone I knew was planning a picture book titled “They Must Know What They’re Doing or They Wouldn’t Be Where They Are,” featuring the designer of the Edsel, LBJ directing the war in Vietnam and other perpetrators of huge follies.
The Bushies have earned their place in that volume and, before they can repeat their performance in Iran, Gen. Abizaid has some common sense to impart:
“I believe the United States, with our great military power, can contain Iran...can deliver clear messages to the Iranians that...while they may develop one or two nuclear weapons they'll never be able to compete with us in our true military might and power.”
What we need now are politicians who are as dedicated to peacekeeping as the men who were trained to make war.
Monday, September 17, 2007
Cheney's New, Improved War
The Vice-President of the United States is packaging his attack on Iran.
Unfazed by the disaster in Iraq, Cheney’s Neo-Cons are “rolling out” a “new product” exactly as they did in 2002 and, as then, over the resistance of the State Department.
The New York Times reports “Condoleezza Rice has been arguing for a continuation of a diplomatic approach, while officials in Vice President Dick Cheney’s office have advocated a much tougher view. They seek to isolate and contain Iran, and to include greater consideration of a military strike.”
In the Washington Post, retired Gen. Wesley Clark writes, “Think another war can't happen? Think again. Unchastened by the Iraq fiasco, hawks in Vice President Cheney's office have been pushing the use of force...And what would we do with Iran after the bombs stopped falling? We certainly could not occupy the nation with the limited ground forces we have left.”
In the U.K., the Telegraph reports “Pentagon planners have developed a list of up to 2,000 bombing targets in Iran” and a senior intelligence officer warns “that public denunciation of Iranian meddling in Iraq--arming and training militants--would lead to cross border raids on Iranian training camps and bomb factories” to “provoke a major Iranian response, perhaps in the form of moves to cut off Gulf oil supplies, providing a trigger for air strikes against Iran's nuclear facilities and even its armed forces.”
This follows a U.K. Times story about a speech by a conservative think tank expert saying “military planners were not preparing for ‘pinprick strikes’ against Iran’s nuclear facilities. ‘They’re about taking out the entire Iranian military,’ he said.”
The President started the campaign rolling here with an echo of the warnings about Saddam’s WMD in a recent speech to the American Legion: “Iran's active pursuit of technology that could lead to nuclear weapons threatens to put a region already known for instability and violence under the shadow of a nuclear holocaust...We will confront this danger before it is too late.”
Back in May, our bellicose former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton was telling the British, ”We must attack Iran before it gets the bomb” and that “senior White House officials” share his thinking.
So even before the Surge and in the face of public clamor to get out of Iraq, Cheney and his crowd were covertly planning a war against Iran.
About all this, Sen. Bernie Sanders has been warning: "We have got to put pressure on the mass media not to play the same craven role that they played in Iraq, where they essentially collapsed and became a megaphone for Bush's policies.”
He should be telling that to his Congressional colleagues and reminding them that another botched Bush war could create an unprecedented crisis for American democracy.
Unfazed by the disaster in Iraq, Cheney’s Neo-Cons are “rolling out” a “new product” exactly as they did in 2002 and, as then, over the resistance of the State Department.
The New York Times reports “Condoleezza Rice has been arguing for a continuation of a diplomatic approach, while officials in Vice President Dick Cheney’s office have advocated a much tougher view. They seek to isolate and contain Iran, and to include greater consideration of a military strike.”
In the Washington Post, retired Gen. Wesley Clark writes, “Think another war can't happen? Think again. Unchastened by the Iraq fiasco, hawks in Vice President Cheney's office have been pushing the use of force...And what would we do with Iran after the bombs stopped falling? We certainly could not occupy the nation with the limited ground forces we have left.”
In the U.K., the Telegraph reports “Pentagon planners have developed a list of up to 2,000 bombing targets in Iran” and a senior intelligence officer warns “that public denunciation of Iranian meddling in Iraq--arming and training militants--would lead to cross border raids on Iranian training camps and bomb factories” to “provoke a major Iranian response, perhaps in the form of moves to cut off Gulf oil supplies, providing a trigger for air strikes against Iran's nuclear facilities and even its armed forces.”
This follows a U.K. Times story about a speech by a conservative think tank expert saying “military planners were not preparing for ‘pinprick strikes’ against Iran’s nuclear facilities. ‘They’re about taking out the entire Iranian military,’ he said.”
The President started the campaign rolling here with an echo of the warnings about Saddam’s WMD in a recent speech to the American Legion: “Iran's active pursuit of technology that could lead to nuclear weapons threatens to put a region already known for instability and violence under the shadow of a nuclear holocaust...We will confront this danger before it is too late.”
Back in May, our bellicose former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton was telling the British, ”We must attack Iran before it gets the bomb” and that “senior White House officials” share his thinking.
So even before the Surge and in the face of public clamor to get out of Iraq, Cheney and his crowd were covertly planning a war against Iran.
About all this, Sen. Bernie Sanders has been warning: "We have got to put pressure on the mass media not to play the same craven role that they played in Iraq, where they essentially collapsed and became a megaphone for Bush's policies.”
He should be telling that to his Congressional colleagues and reminding them that another botched Bush war could create an unprecedented crisis for American democracy.
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