Posted on 02/19/2005 11:03:06 AM PST by neverdem
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 1:01 p.m. ET
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton said Saturday a string of attacks killing more than 50 Iraqis in two days were failed attempts to sow sectarian strife and destabilize the country.
Clinton, a New York Democrat, and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., were part of a five-member congressional delegation that met with U.S. officials and members of Iraq's interim government.
Both Clinton and McCain have been strident critics of the Pentagon's planning and management of the war in Iraq. But Clinton said Saturday that Sunni Muslim insurgents were failing in their efforts to destabilize Iraq through sectarian violence.
Her comments came as numerous suicide bombings and other insurgent attacks across Iraq killed dozens of people, Iraqi officials said, as Shiite Muslim worshippers celebrated their holiest day of the year. A U.S. soldier was among those killed in the attacks, the military said.
On Friday, insurgents staged five attacks killing at least 36 people and Shiites blamed radical Sunni Muslim insurgents for attacking them in a string of bombings, shootings and kidnappings.
Authorities had hoped to prevent a repeat of last year's attacks during the Ashoura festival when insurgent blasts killed at least 181 people in Karbala and Baghdad.
Clinton said insurgents had also failed to disrupt Iraq's landmark Jan. 30 elections, won by the Shiite clergy-backed ticket. The United Iraqi Alliance won 140 seats in the 275-seat National Assembly.
``Not one polling place was shut down or overrun and the fact that you have these suicide bombers now, wreaking such hatred and violence while people pray, is to me, an indication of their failure,'' she said.
``The results of the election are a strong rebuke to those who did not believe that the Iraqi people would take this opportunity to demonstrate their own commitment to their own future.''
But Sen. Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, said he did not believe the U.S. military would leave Iraq anytime soon.
``How long I don't know, but to leave too soon would be devastating to stay too long is unnecessary,'' Graham said. ``I ask the American people to be patient, because what happens here will affect our security back home.''
McCain said the U.S. military presence was tied to the numbers of casualties taken by American forces, but he was heartened by the Jan. 30 elections in Iraq.
``We have a long hard difficult struggle ahead of us and I'm far more optimistic now,'' McCain said.
In December, McCain said he had ``no confidence'' in Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, but he added that keeping Rumsfeld in the position was President Bush's choice, not his.
The delegation also was briefed by U.S. Lt. Gen. David Petraeus, who is leading the effort to create an independent Iraqi security force, McCain said.
The group had not left the Green Zone, home to Iraqi government institutions and the American and British embassies, because of the security situation, McCain said. They were expected to meet with U.S. troops stationed elsewhere in Iraq on Sunday.
At least 1,476 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
The five senators that flew into Iraq included Clinton, McCain, Graham, Maine Republican Susan Collins and Wisconsin Democrat Russ Feingold.
McCain still votes with the Repubs 80% of the time according to the 2004 vote record....he may be borderline but he still is primarily Repub....his record is much more conservative than Lieberman
In a national campaign she will not get softball questions.<<
Hell,if she is confronted with just 1/2 of her past statements and beliefs...she will have to adopt the old Kerry line.... "I was for it before I was against it"
I don't see any senatorial ambition. That was part of the reason he backed out of the race against her in 2000. I believe he's smart enough to know he would never make it through the pubbie primaries.
Remember what Bush did and said to beat McCain by going to Bob Jones University, saying he was a compassionate conservative and that his favorite philosopher was Jesus Christ.
If Giuliani is smart, he'll persuade Pataki to take a powder.
Question: If a tree fell in the forest, and Hillary did not announce it, does that mean it did not fall?? Similarly, if the "insurgents" in Iraq are failing, and Hillary did not announce it, would that mean they are not failing?? Hillary makes pronouncements. That's about all she does. And Americans are supposed to long for the sound of her voice telling us things. She sees becoming and being President in just about those terms, folks.
She learned her lesson.
By the time Hillary runs in 2008 she may run as the GOP candidate. she is a frickin Chameleon.
Hey Sgt,
That's the kind of down home intellegence that ought to put you at the top of some ticket somewhere in your state!!! So right on the mark that it's frightening.
I agree about the power lust, but I do believe that she is true to her convictions.
I think that she wants to preside over an American make-over in which we become a Utopian collective. She has already shown that she wants to separate us from our choice family doctors, and that she hates the military (and they know it, BTW).
I believe that Hillary indeed has a hidden core (albeit a far left one) and that she likely has carefully prepared plans. I'd love to know the contents of her Wellesley thesis, for her true convictions just might be outlined right there.
.
"Her heinous got quite the smackdown when she got back home after her last trip. She told the troops that winning was not certain and that people back home were questioning the Bush decision to go to Iraq. She learned her lesson [after Bush won the election by over 3 million votes]."
Is it okay if I add something?
"I think an exit strategy, unfortunately, is being driven by our political calendar, not necessarily what's in the best interest of a long-term, stable Iraq."
"I applaud the president. [on his visit to Iraq] It sends a message of support. But on the other hand it isn't a substitute for a plan to increase security or to eventually create more independence for Iraqis."
"Americans are wholeheartedly proud of what you are doing, but there are many questions at home about the administration's policies."
--Hillary Clinton to American troops in Baghdad, November 2003.
IMO, McCain outted himself as one of the Enemy when he insisted that HE had a mandate and that he'd thwart President Bush at every turn - and that was BEFORE the results of the 2000 election were certified.
Sen. Clinton says Iraq insurgents failing, "but I can help them succeed back in the US," she added.
The Democrats policies are untenable - abortion, higher taxes, anti-privacy, bigger government, cradle-to-grave health care, and so forth. Maybe reality is beginning to hit home? Maybe, but not likely - they have been known to wander in the wilderness for decades on end.
My Hillary! What BIG, ROUND, UNBLINKING EYES you have! Good lord, what incredibly large JOWLS you have! You better put some Botox on that.
Hitlery on War & Peace:
Urged president to bomb Serbians
On March 21, 1999, Hillary expressed her views by phone to the President: “I urged him to bomb.” The Clintons argued the issue over the next few days. [The President expressed] what-ifs: What if bombing promoted more executions? What if it took apart the NATO alliance? Hillary responded, “You cannot let this go on at the end of a century that has seen the major holocaust of our time. What do we have NATO for if not to defend our way of life?” The next day the President declared that force was necessary.
Source: Hillary’s Choice by Gail Sheehy, p.345 Dec 9, 1999
Agrees with Newt Gingrich that Iraq policy is a mess
Newt Gingrich said the administration has failed "to put the Iraqis at the center of this equation. The key to defeating the bad guys is having enough good guys who are Iraqis," he said. The administration did not send enough Iraqi Americans there after the war, Gingrich said.
Hillary Clinton, who recently returned from Iraq and Afghanistan, said she agreed with Gingrich. She blamed the administration for "miscalculation" and "inept planning" in Iraq. "I do think we need more troops" in Iraq, Clinton said. She said she believes in giving the chief executive the authority to wage war, as her husband did in Bosnia and Kosovo. "But I regret the way the president has used the authority." Clinton dismissed complaints that she should not have criticized President Bush while in Iraq and blamed a "right-wing apparatus." Clinton said she was merely responding to questions from U.S. troops. "I'm not going to lie to an American soldier," she said on CBS.
Source: Howard Kurtz, Washington Post, Page A07 Dec 8, 2003
http://ontheissues.org/International/Hillary_Clinton_War_+_Peace.htm
It's necessary to call another FReeper stupid for making a pun now? I see why Jim's concerned about the level of flames around here lately.
Who is the do nothing senator Clinton?
Nope...she is clearly a devious, say anything, do anything...Marxist.
FWIW-
Wanna bet?
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