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.
I wonder which one will run as president and which as vice president ? We live in interesting times.
Positioning herself to the right of everyone else in the Democrat party with Presidential aspirations.
It's because New York Democrats are soo much more conservative than their New England brethern
I'm hoping that for every swing/conservative voter she fools, there's a corresponding number of libs that turn away from her...
of course.... she has been slowly changing her tune since the election.
Whatever happened to that lunatic screaming "We should stand up and say we are Americans and we have a right to debate and disagree with ANY administration!"
(By the way, if anyone has the wav or mp3 of that, i would love to have it)
kess@patriotedition.com
Billy Kess
I never believed Hillary was the smartest person in the world, but she isn't stupid enough to follow the Boxer-Kennedy-Kerry-Byrd-Bayh-Dean 'Rat political suicide squad.
(BTW Repair bill for TV being sent today)
At the troop levels we have, McCain carps. If we had double the troops, McCain would have carped. If he was happy about the troops (almost an impossiblity), he'd have found something else to carp about. The guy wants to be commander in chief. It's eating him alive. It's a hoot to watch. He's irrelevent. Someone memo the tuy.
Hillary has never had anything but hatred for our men in the military. Right back at you bitch.
Hillary Clinton is a fat lesbian. We don't need Rosie O'Donnell in the White House.
"Good news from Iraq? It's no thanks to you or your Meet The Hag tour to demoralize the troops! You suck!!"
Strange how Sen. Chappaquiddick says the war is a quagmire when homocide bombings are on the decline, but Hillary says the war is improving when homocide bombings are on the incline.
Here is a brief reference to the comment you were referring to.
Partly correct. She's more devious than most politicians, and is pretending to move toward the center. If anyone with half a brain cell thinks she's abandoned the fervent Marxism of not only her youth but her years as First Lady (e.g., her socialized medicine plan), they are mistaken. This is all part of her "remaking Hillary" tour, whereby she tries to win back the conservative and traditional Dems who rejected Kerry.
The make-over continues.
McCain/Hillary in '08
she should be careful, the last time she "moved toward the right" she passed out at a speech. lol
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