I continue to be utterly mystified.

[Nonhlanhla]

200. It was a bad vote

I was terribly disappointed to see Congress voting for that war, and to see how the media was beating the drums of war made me sick. I supported Obama in 2007 largely because he opposed it and Hillary voted for it. In hindsight, though, I'm not sure that Obama would have voted against it if he had actually been in Congress at the time - who knows.

Regarding Hilary's vote, it seems that she got some edited intel from the administration and was also assured by people in the administration that they would let the UN inspectors do their job, and would use the power to go to war judiciously and only if needed. It is possible she voted for the war for cold political reasons, but somehow I don't think so: she's a Democrat and surely she knew that many Democrats would hold it against her. My sense is that her biggest mistake was actually trusting the people in the Bush administration. Hillary always strikes me as that nerdy girl who overthinks everything and does not work with simple equations. In this case that led her into a serious misreading of what was going on, because she assumed that the people in the administration would also think before they go ahead.

I don't like her vote, but to simply attribute naked ruthless ambition to her as the reason for the vote, makes no sense to me. It seems that she voted to give the president the power to act IF WMD were found in Iraq, thinking that a war resolution would force Saddam to cooperate and paradoxically avoid war. What she did not reckon with is the reality that BushCo. wanted to go to war no matter what. Her biggest mistake was trusting the Bush administration. How she could trust them baffles me, but I think it is rooted in her nerdy overly nuanced way of thinking. Ironically that same nuanced way of thinking would also make her a more thoughtful president. The biggest reason her vote backfired was because the president she voted to give authority to was not thoughtful and not honest (and neither were his advisers, the real movers and shakers).

Some quotes from her speech:
"Because bipartisan support for this resolution makes success in the United Nations more likely, and therefore, war less likely, and because a good faith effort by the United States, even if it fails, will bring more allies and legitimacy to our cause, I have concluded, after careful and serious consideration, that a vote for the resolution best serves the security of our nation.

My vote is not, however, a vote for any new doctrine of preemption, or for unilateralism, or for the arrogance of American power or purpose -- all of which carry grave dangers for our nation, for the rule of international law and for the peace and security of people throughout the world.
...

it is with conviction that I support this resolution as being in the best interests of our nation. A vote for it is not a vote to rush to war; it is a vote that puts awesome responsibility in the hands of our President and we say to him - use these powers wisely and as a last resort."