"You can take a tactical success and misread it like we did in Vietnam." -- John F. Kerry
Kerry was alluding to the clear difference between strategic success and tactical success. An example of a tactical change was our decision to encourage Sunni insurgents to fight al Qaeda. An example of a strategic change was Bush's troop surge. The two are completely different from one another. Besides, we are , where that tactical change has been happening.
In other words, don't look at a tactical success and interpret it as a strategic success.
One day after the Youtube debate, Hillary Clinton told a local newspaper that Barack Obama was "" for wanting to talk with world leaders that are US foes. As expected, the Obama Campaign immediately fired back.
Is it just me, or are the top two campaigns forgetting the lessons of 2004? Going into the final three weeks before the Iowa Caucus, it looked like either Howard Dean or Dick Gephardt would win the nomination. Desperate and almost blind to the reality that there were two other formidable candidates in the race, Dean and Gephardt unleashed a barrage of attacks against one another. All that negativity weighted down the two front-runners, while John Kerry and John Edwards went untouched and to the very top in Iowa just in time for the vote. Kerry and Edwards both ended up on the Democratic ticket, while Gephardt and Dean were finished.
Relate this to today. If Dean and Gephardt are like Obama and Clinton, then Kerry and Edwards are -- you guessed it -- like Edwards and Richardson. Hillary and Barack had better be careful to not attack one another too early and too often, because realistically speaking voters will find alternatives.
It's going on 6 AM ET/3 AM PT, and I'm getting tired. But I should note that former Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry has just taken the floor following the 5 AM vote. Even though it's still early, he is full of energy.
Here are some John Kerry excerpts from the speech he is giving at this moment:
"It's easier for al Qaeda to play off" Sunni vs Shia rift than it would be had the US not invaded.
"The 'here' is broadening all around the world" -- Kerry said when responding to the Bush argument that we need to fight the terrorists over there so we don't fight them here.
President Bush "went on the longest vacation in history" in the month before September 11th.
"This is not an Administration that has been correct conceivably about anything."
"Not one expectation has been met. Not one basic political transformation.."
This bill "is also profoundly about the troops."
"They (troops) deserve missions that make sense."
"If you don't learn lessons of history ...you are doomed to repeat mistakes that you made."
"The mission itself I think is as flawed as the mission a few years ago."
Yes, we have been waiting a long time for this. But it finally happened. After John Kerry's presidential hopes were ruined by the attack group, the Massachusetts Senator got his revenge against one of its major funders. This is absolutely priceless!
Less than 24 hours after it was that Joe Lieberman renewed his threat to leave the Democratic Party, word leaked that Democrats will rescind President Bush's war authorization. Maybe they made Lieberman's decision easier! The resolution would include the following:
Restricting Bush's mission in Iraq to combating al-Qaeda in the western part of the country, therefore no longer making the mission about babysitting a civil war.
Training Iraqi military and police forces.
Withdrawing combat forces.
Securing the border regions.
The problem is that this report was rank-and-file Democrats were briefed about it. Hopefully it does not create animosity between the sponsors of this bill and the lawmakers that were left out of the loop. Either way, Senator John Kerry (D-MA) is :
"I've had enough of 'nonbinding,' " said Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), who is helping to draft the new Democratic proposal. The 2002 war resolution, he said, is an obvious target.
"Theauthorization that we gave the president back in 2002 is completely,completely outdated, inappropriate to what we're engaged in today," hesaid.
Although Kerry is definitely one of the key players, it is not his resolution. For now on, it looks like Senators Carl Levin (D-MI) and Joe Biden (D-DE) will be the go-to guys on the Iraq issue. This is their resolution. It will be introduced on Tuesday when the Senate reconvenes.
There appears to be a new "war council" forming in the Democratic Party. Only a small group of lawmakers are involved -- and that does not include Murtha. Each of the key players are from the Senate. Pelosi's House is left out. Meet the new Democratic war council:
Carl Levin (D-MI)
Joe Biden (D-DE)
John Kerry (D-MA)
Russ Feingold (D-WI)
Jack Reed (D-RI)
Chuck Schumer (D-NY)
Harry Reid (D-NV)
No Hillary Clinton. No Barack Obama. No Chris Dodd. The Democrats want to make this as little about the '08 election as possible. Biden, however, is the only presidential candidate on the list. But he has to be included because he chairs the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Even though it was leaked, the resolution has not been finished yet, according to the :
Officials said lawmakers and senior aides were still refining the exactlanguage that would be used and were uncertain whether the new proposalwould explicitly repeal the initial Iraq war resolution, amend it ortake another avenue. “We haven’t crossed that bridge yet,†one officialsaid.
I probably speak for all Democrats when I say that the resolution needs to completely repeal, not just amend, the 2002 war resolution. No more baby steps. It's time for action. It's time to stop refereeing a civil war. And it's time to stop letting ourselves be pushed around by the Republican Party. Voters spoke last November. They want new leadership, not pretender-ship.
When members of Congress take a step outside the closed off shell known as Capitol Hill -- whether for meetings with constituents or tours overseas -- they tend to re-develop their human side. Last week, the outrage by senators Chris Dodd (D-CT) and John Kerry (D-MA) over President Bush's troop escalation turned very personal. They were informed about the that they met in Iraq over the holidays, who warned the senators what what troops were going through now that the military is over-extended to a breaking point:
Just before Christmas, an Army captain named Brian Freeman corneredSens. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.) and John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) at aBaghdad helicopter landing zone. The war was going badly, he told them.Troops were stretched so thin they were doing tasks they never dreamedof, let alone trained for.
Freeman, 31, took a short holiday leave to see his 14-month-old daughter and 2-year-old son, returned to his base in Karbala, Iraq,and less than two weeks ago died in a hail of bullets and grenades.Insurgents, dressed in U.S. military uniforms, speaking English anddriving black American SUVs, got through a checkpoint and attacked,kidnapped four soldiers and later shot them. Freeman died in theassault, the fifth casualty of the brazen attack.
The death of the West Point graduate -- a star athlete from Temecula,Calif., who ran bobsleds and skeletons with Winter Olympians -- hasradicalized Dodd, energized Kerry and girded the ever-moreconfrontational stance of Democrats in the Senate. Freeman's death hasreverberated on the Senate floor, in committee deliberations and ontelevision talk shows.
You have to wonder why it takes something like this to happen for some senators to wake up and take a bold position on the war? The answer is that we are all human, and most human concerns are local. Sure, most of us are outraged by the war, and would like to see it end. But the people that are internally depressed because of Bush's failed policy are the ones that actually knew someone who lost their life in battle.
In other words, if all of the victims in this war were the family, friends and acquaintances of lawmakers, then we would not be in Iraq today. I guess it goes to show how removed the Washington establishment currently is from all the military communities that deal with this tragic reality on a daily basis.
Whenever anyone even brings up the idea of election fraud in 2004, the common response is that Bush won Ohio handedly in the statewide recount. More than two years have passed since the election and the recount that followed. Now, for the first time, two poll workers have been the 2004 Ohio recount:
Two election workers wereconvicted Wednesday of rigging a recount of the 2004 presidentialelection to avoid a more thorough review in Ohio’s most populous county. Jacqueline Maiden,elections coordinator of the Cuyahoga County Elections Board, andballot manager Kathleen Dreamer each were convicted of a felony countof negligent misconduct of an elections employee. They also wereconvicted of one misdemeanor count each of failure of electionsemployees to perform their duty.
Prosecutors accused Maiden and Dreamer of secretly reviewingpreselected ballots before a public recount on Dec. 16, 2004. Theyworked behind closed doors for three days to pick ballots they knewwould not cause discrepancies when checked by hand, prosecutors said.
Just two days ago, Senator John Kerry (D-MA) nearly broke down in tears on the Senate floor while announcing that he would not run for president in 2008. He started choking up after acknowledging how close he came to the presidency in '04.
Last year, Robert Kennedy Jr. wrote a column in that detailed most of the election day flaws in Ohio. Had the recount been conducted properly, maybe it would have led to an even larger investigation that could have overturned the results. Or, maybe Bush still would have won Ohio. Nonetheless, the 2004 vote marked the second straight presidential election where there were voting irregularities in the most decisive state.
One day after John Kerry that he would not enter the 2008 presidential race, a number of the Massachusetts Senator's key advisers are all the Barack Obama bandwagon:
So far, at least, the list includes: Bob Farmer, who was Mr. Kerry’schief fundraiser; Mark Gorenberg, Mr. Kerry’s top money man inCalifornia; and Alan Solomont, a major fundraiser in New England forMr. Kerry and a former national finance chairman of the DemocraticNational Committee.
Orin Kramer, a prominent New York Democratic fundraiser, has also signed on with Mr. Obama.
If consultants make a difference in this upcoming race, then it will definitely be a battle between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. The Democratic establishment is divided between the two, even though the slight edge goes to Clinton. Her campaign is stronger in terms of finances, as well as its edge in traditionally blue coastal states like Florida and California. According to , it is possible that New Jersey, Florida and California will move their primaries up to early February. If Hillary were already winning going into those larger states, then the race would be all but over for Obama.
The Illinois Senator must win Iowa and New Hampshire in order to have any shot. Nevada favors Clinton a bit more because its geography makes traveling more costly. If money becomes a factor, then the New York Senator will have the advantage. But it is conceivable that if Obama can successfully brand himself as the anti-Hillary candidate, then the grassroots on the internet would raise a lot of money for him, therefore giving him a better shot at the nomination.
John Kerry knows he would have joined a very crowded field, and faced slim odds that his campaign would have fiscally survived past this fall. The Massachusetts Senator has decided for president in 2008, and instead will focus on winning Senate reelection that year:
Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, theDemocrats' losing presidential candidate in 2004, does not intend torun again in 2008, a Democratic official said Wednesday.
This official said Kerry intends to seek a new six-year term in the Senate.
It will be interesting to see who he endorses.
Interestingly, Hillary's people were preparing for Kerry to run. In his new book, , Hillary's senior strategist Terry McAuliffe John Kerry for raising too much money in 2004, and not donating it to Senate candidates.
I will write more on how Kerry's decision against running impacts the strategy for the field of '08 candidates.
Today, released a poll that was conducted among New Hampshire Democrats between January 15 - 17. Barack Obama leads the field, with Clinton and Edwards close behind:
New Hampshire Poll Barack Obama - 23% Hillary Clinton - 19% John Edwards - 19% John Kerry - 5% Wesley Clark - 3% Joe Biden - 3% Dennis Kucinich - 1% Bill Richardson - 1% Tom Vilsack - 1% Not Sure - 22%
That poll is definitely not a surprise. New Hampshire voters, no matter what party they are, like to vote for the Washington outsider. Therefore, the fact that Clinton is currently behind is fairly reasonable. Also, Edwards trails as well because he is more popular among South-to-Midwest Democrats. In 2004, the only primary Edwards won was South Carolina. He currently leads in Iowa, and has notably strong local support among hotel workers and community politicians in Nevada, the other early voting state.
Still, regardless of her Washington establishment status, Clinton must do better in New Hampshire if she has any shot of winning the nomination. Putting it simply, the Democrats' primary schedule is not made for her. She is more popular in the traditionally blue coastal states like New York, Connecticut and California -- none of which vote until later in the primary season. New Hampshire went red in 2000, therefore cannot be included in that category. Still, it is a northern state. Voters in Iowa don't like her. She might be perceived as 'too east coast' for Nevada. The chances of her winning in South Carolina are even slimmer. Clinton needs to make the top-two in Iowa and Nevada, and then win in New Hampshire -- keeping her alive for the bluer primary states that come later.
For Edwards, Iowa is really make or break. He has been campaigning there since 2004, and knows the terrain better than anyone. A victory there would give him the extra media buzz to possibly take Nevada just three days later. No one thinks Edwards can win New Hampshire. But if he finishes in the top-two, he will have put himself in great shape to win South Carolina, like he did in '04. However, if Edwards cannot win Iowa, he will have a difficult time getting attention in the final days before the Nevada caucus. And remember, the primary schedule is red-heavy in the beginning two weeks. If after South Carolina he does not have more than two victories already, then you can kiss his chances good-bye.
As far as the other candidates go, they will need to find a way to take news time away from the big-three. Joe Biden is suited to finish well in South Carolina. He has a lot of support down there. Bill Richardson, geographically speaking, could make a strong showing in Nevada. Tom Vilsack will have to win Iowa, where he is Governor, in order to have any shot. Lastly, if Kerry did run, it would be like watching a train-wreck. He would have little shot in any state except for maybe New Hampshire.
Right now, Barack Obama definitely has the momentum. Although, Hillary Clinton is expected to make an announcement either next week or the week after, which could shake things up a bit.
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