DO NOT BE FOOLED!!!

[Jim Lane]

312. My guess is that she was thinking less of New York politics and more of national.

Yes, there are Jews in New York who are ardently pro-Israel and who on that basis supported the war. There are also plenty of Jews in the ranks of the generally progressive New Yorkers who oppose militarism in general and who opposed the Iraq War in particular. I (a Gentile)was among hundreds of thousands of people marching down Fifth Avenue to oppose the war, and several of my pro-Israel Jewish friends were there, too.

I suspect that Clinton was less concerned about the 2006 election, where she rated to be a strong favorite regardless of how she voted, and more concerned about 2008 and beyond. She had national ambitions. For campaigning outside her liberal adopted state, she didn't want to be open to the charge of being weak on national security. You say that she knew "she could take the larger liberal Jewish vote for granted," but I'd apply that more broadly -- she knew that, in a general election for President, almost all of us who marched against the war would vote for her either way, and she wanted to be competitive in more conservative states.

I'm sure she didn't foresee how much trouble the vote would cause her in a future struggle for the Democratic nomination.