Hillary on both sides of the Iraq issue?
Clinton Camp Hedges, Then Backpedals, On Troop Withdrawal
HP-Ever since former aide Samantha Power admitted to the BBC that Sen. Barack Obama’s Iraq withdrawal plan could change depending on conditions on the ground, the Clinton campaign has been unrelenting in its criticism.
“Out campaigning Senator Obama tells voters that as president he’d withdraw combat brigades from Iraq within 16 months, but one of his top foreign policy advisers told a different story,” Sen. Clinton herself declared in a speech today. “Giving speeches alone won’t end the war and making campaign promises you might not keep certainly won’t end it. In the end, the true test is not the speeches a president delivers, it’s whether the president delivers on the speeches.”
On a conference call later that day, however, aides to the New York senator fumbled a bit, giving the impression that their Iraq plans could also change depending on circumstance — and then abruptly back-peddling.
In a rapid back-and-forth exchange at the end of the session, Michael Dobbs, of the Washington Post, asked repeatedly whether Clinton would stick to withdrawing one to two brigades of troops a month even if there is a massive spike of violence as U.S. troops departed.
Trying his best to keep the campaign line, Lee Feinstein, Clinton’s National Security Director, nevertheless acknowledged: “There are, in the world, contingencies.”
Hillary is smart. She can promise anything to anyone, even if some promises contradict one another. A person hears what they want to hear and, once they have gotten their promise, they’ll turn everything out.
Once she becomes CINC she might keep some promises but probably not. She’ll have her power and that’s all she’s really after, so we can all kiss her grits.