The past week marked the fifth anniversary of the Iraq War and the milestone of the 4,000th American soldier killed in that disastrous adventure.

Commemorating and underscoring the urgent need for a new policy direction, Senator Clinton delivered a serious and detailed address clearly setting out her vision for and commitment to ending the conflict. Her approach includes a direct critique of the most glaring failures of the Bush administration: its unwillingness to use political pressure and intense international diplomacy to effect a resolution of the outstanding differences that have driven the region into a proxy war within Iraq with the United States manning and supporting combatants on all sides.

For years American generals have been telling the administration, the Congress, and the public that Iraq is not a situation that lends itself to a military solution and will only be resolved politically. While the focus of American opprobrium has been on the Iraqi government for its failure to find those solutions, Senator Clinton, in her speech, is the first presidential candidate to spell out in a precise plan the elements required for an international effort, including co-opting and controlling the enablers of the ongoing violence in Iraq, to promote political reconciliation and reform.

My wife, former CIA agent, Valerie, and I accompanied Senator Clinton to Philadelphia the day after her speech.

(more…)

The interviewer asked McPeak: “So where’s the problem? State? White House?”

McPeak replied: “New York City. Miami. We have a large vote — vote, here in favor of Israel. And no politician wants to run against it.”

Translation (as if it’s needed): Jews — who put Israel over every American interest — control America’s policy on the Middle East. And McPeak has the audacity to accuse Bill Clinton of McCarthyism.

For more on Gen. McPeak, read Larry Johnson’s post, “Senator Obama, Have You No Decency?” [The photo above comes from Saturday’s rally in Medford, Oregon. Larry quotes from their speeches at that rally.]

Below, “Obama church published Hamas terror manifesto: Compares charter calling for murder of Jews to Declaration of Independence,” along with the PDF of the actual Obama church bulletin:

(more…)

My, Barack Obama’s advisers and officials are contributing quite a little heap of embarrassments to his campaign, aren’t they? 

First, there was Austan Goolsbee’s little chat with the Canadians about NAFTA (Obama didn’t mean it) that the bad Canadians totally misunderstood and twisted out of context.  Then Samantha Power told a far right British paper that Hillary Clinton is a ‘monster‘ before remembering to add (too late, said the reporter) that it was "off the record."  In all the outcry over the insult, Obama’s supporters seemed not to have noticed or to have cared that she also announced that his firm commitment to prompt troop withdrawals wasn’t nearly as firm as progressives assume. 

Then intelligence adviser/former Bush Administration official John O. Brennan announced that he was afraid he just didn’t  agree with Obama on telecom immunity.   And I don’t even need to mention the Rev. Wright.

(more…)

But back to the McCarthy charge.  It is the Obama campaign that is pushing the bizarre interpretation of Bill Clinton’s innocuous remark. Bill Clinton : (more…)

Let’s take a look at what Bill said, shall we?

Now sadly, BO’s playing the victim here - again.  Even though Bill never once mentioned his name in that part of his talk, this is (as usual) all about him.  Suddenly, this is being twisted into something it’s not - an attack on Obama’s patriotism. My goodness but he’ll try to use anything to deflect attention from his troubles this week won’t he?

Now here’s what one of BO’s surrogates had to say about Bill’s remarks.  First Read has some of what McPeak said about Bill here…

(more…)