NYT blog: Iraq Vote Dogs Clinton (Again)

[Pirate Smile]

Iraq Vote Dogs Clinton (Again)

PLAISTOW, N.H. – After weeks of political discussion about domestic issues like health care, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton was confronted Saturday afternoon with one of the issues that dogged her as a new candidate last winter: Her voting record on issues of war.

While critics of Mrs. Clinton used to denounce her for voting to authorize the Iraq war in 2002, today the challenge came from an otherwise enthusiastic supporter of Mrs. Clinton, Barbara Dennett, a math teacher and field hockey coach.

-snip-
“My concern is your voting record on war,” Ms. Dennett said. “The friends I talk to, to get them on board, they don’t trust you because of your voting issue on war.” She added that she and her friends did not want Mrs. Clinton to be “a war president.”

-snip-
Ms. Dennett eventually piped up and mentioned Iran – a reference to Mrs. Clinton’s vote this year to label the Iranian Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization, which Mr. Obama and Mr. Edwards criticized with the suggestion that it could embolden President Bush to go to war.
“It seems like a pattern, that’s my concern,” Ms. Dennett said.

“I don’t think it’s a pattern, I just have a fundamental disagreement with my colleagues who are running,” Mrs. Clinton said. “I think the facts are indisputable – they support Hezbollah, they support Hamas.”
“I do not favor war,” she added. “I also believe that we have to get tough in a diplomatic, pressured way with Iran, and I think that helped them do it.”

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/12/16/war-vote-dogs-clinton-again/#more-3328

[ccpup]

1. very important to recognize

that she's referring to Iran supporting Hezbollah and Hamas, not the other Dem candidates. Not saying there are those on DU who would take a quote out-of-context and beat someone bloody with it, but ...

[Pirate Smile]

2. I noticed that too but know she obviously was referring to Iran.

[ccpup]

3. what's obvious to you and me

may not be as obvious to those who are ready, willing and able to jump on her for anything and use it to somehow defeat her or something.

Oh well. One does what one can to help people be as informed as possible. What they accept or do with it is up to them. :shrug:

[Pirate Smile]

4. True. I noticed the ambiguity when I read it but that is just the way people

speak extemporaneously. Most people know that and when people try to distort things, most people see through it.