When even the Los Angeles Times sees through Hillary Clinton's swerve to the left on the Iraq war, you know it will be a rough two years for her. They call the anti-war drift a response to Barack Obama's luxury of not having been in the Senate when the vote to authorize war was taken. They're right, of course. But they aren't trying to dress it up, either.
But she isn't taking it. On Wednesday, freshly returned from Afghanistan and Iraq, Clinton recalibrated her position on the war. She announced that she will support a nonbinding resolution opposing President Bush's planned surge of 21,500 troops to Iraq, as will many other congressional Democrats and some Republicans. The senator from New York also unveiled legislation to cap U.S. forces at Jan. 1, 2007, levels, though she indicated that she wouldn't vote to cut off funding for troops on the ground. (In Afghanistan, by contrast, Clinton proposed an increase in U.S. forces.)
Yes, Clinton has a political need for an orderly retreat from her earlier pro-war stance. But this is an ill-advised approach. As she herself has conceded, the Bush administration already has the necessary appropriations in hand to implement the surge in Iraq. Moreover, even some Democrats see constitutional problems in congressional micromanagement of troop deployments.
Still, Clinton is being forced to burnish her antiwar credentials against a contender who has the luxury of not having been in the Senate in 2002. And so, like many of her fellow Democratic senators, she is scrambling to get on what her party's primary voters deem the right side of history.
The biggest problem, I suspect, is that the old Democratic strategy of running left for the primaries, then back toward the center for the election will be much, much harder to pull off effectively nowadays. The internet, for good or for ill, is going to damage that by making everything a candidate ever said instantly available. It will be harder to hide from past positions - or hide them from the electorate.
Apparently, the Washington Post doesn't see the irony of publishing an article describing Arab criticism of the recent executions of Saddam Hussein and his two fellow convicted war criminals. Especially the condemnations by Saudi journalists and lawyers.
"The barbaric manner in which Saddam Hussein was executed and on the Eid feast was very offensive," said Bassim Alim, an outspoken Saudi lawyer. "It was Shiite retribution not only on Saddam but against all Sunnis. This is proof that Shiites are incapable of incorporating other sects in their rule and that they cannot be a unifying force in Iraq."
He added: "The Iraqi prime minister is acting as if he is prime minister of only Basra and Kufa. Even the Iraqi constitution bars someone from being executed on their religious holiday."
For the past 10 days, Beirut's as-Safir newspaper has run a poll of close to 15,000 respondents: 19 percent said the execution of Hussein was just but the timing was wrong; 19 percent said the execution was unjust because it was carried out under U.S. occupation; and 36 percent said it was deficient because Hussein was not tried for all the crimes committed by his regime. About 25 percent said the execution was mishandled and would create more civil strife.
…..Salman accused the United States of deliberately creating strife in Iraq in an attempt to cover up its expected failure.
The Saudi-owned al-Hayat newspaper, published in London, quoted a former Iraqi judge as saying that during his time in office, people on death row such as Ibrahim, who had cancer, were usually pardoned or given amnesty because of their ailments. Hussein preferred executing opponents of his regime by firing squad.
Mohammed Safa Ben Sheik Ibrahim Hakki, a Saudi academic, wrote at length about "the sterile debate" Hussein's execution will engender between his outraged supporters and his detractors. He described some people who rejoiced at his killing with mock weddings and rose petals, while others wrote poetry eternalizing Hussein's last words and called Hussein a martyr.
Funny how so many outrages are so finely tuned, isn't it? Even the WaPo has to mention the complete silence from these same sources on the murderous behavior of the terrorists in Iraq. Not a word about the internet posting of grisly videos by the jihadi monsters in Iraq. Not a word about their own governments track records on executions. Heck, the official executioner is proud of his finely honed beheading skills. What's interesting is that for all this faux outrage, this time they aren't whipping up a series of "cartoon protests". One wonders if even the organizers of those sorts of events can't quite get the "Arab street" interested in this bit of theater of the outraged.
