Posted on 02/19/2016 12:16:11 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Donald Trump, who has made his opposition to the Iraq invasion one of the bedrocks of his campaign, was left scrambling during a CNN town hall when confronted with a newly uncovered interview in which he supported the conflict.
The interview, reported by Buzzfeed, was from 2002 when the real estate mogul sat down with radio shock jock Howard Stern and was directly asked whether he advocated invading Saddam Hussein's country.
Trump replied: "Yeah I guess so. I wish the first time it was done correctly."
Asked by CNN moderator Anderson Cooper about the statement, the Republican frontrunner simply responded:"I could have said that."
Trump then insisted that his past support for the war did not matter because "by the time the war started I was against it".
His comments came during the second of a two-part town hall in Columbia featuring the remaining candidates in the Republican field. Ohio governor John Kasich and former Florida governor Jeb Bush preceded Trump in Thursday night's instalment, whereas Ben Carson and Senators Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz participated the prior evening.
Trump stumbled when asked if he thought George W Bush had deliberately lied to the country about Iraq possessing weapons of mass destruction. Both a voter and Cooper repeatedly asked him if he stood by his comments in the last Republican presidential debate when he insisted that was the case.
"They said there were weapons of mass destruction, there were none. And they knew there were none," Trump said in the debate, held in Charleston on Saturday.
During Thursday's town hall, just five days later, he backtracked, saying:"There are a lot of people that think that. Bottom line is there were no weapons of mass destruction."
Pressed further, Trump said of Bush, "I don't know what he did". Trump added that he would have to "look at some documents."
(Excerpt) Read more at theguardian.com ...
No, the logical outcome of my comment was that Trump is beating your flunkie two to one.
Okay, so you think Reagan’s platform was that of a Leftist.
Wow, who knew?
You have just uttered words That make you seem as if you have melted down into a blob of reverberating jello.
The race between Hillary or Bernie and Trump hasn’t even started yet.
Please get a grip.
The Gulf War was in 1990-91...is that what you're referring to?
Once again, my candidate got twice the votes your candidate got.
Which one had higher negatives?
Take your time.
Yep, once Bush and Cruz got us in the Iraq war, Trump supported the troops. Mr. Trump tried to warn them ahead of time of the long term consequences, but the politicians needed to distract from their failures.
The man lied about his own history. Sounds like an Alinsky tactic.
May your nation be blessed with honorable politicians since Australia allows our Marines to train with your wonderful military.
Have a blessed day!
I don’t intend to defend Trump here, but we could have gone after their weapons without doing an all-out war. I supported the Iraq war because Bush did and I trusted him. He was trustworthy but looking back the all-out war seems to have been a mistake.
Your candidate is making it extremely difficult for the party to unify around him should he be the nominee. I have cast reluctant votes for the Republican more than once, but I have always recognized these candidates as honorable men, struggling to do a tough job, with whom I had some disagreement. I have never yet cast a vote for someone who is simply an embarrassment, and a fool.
Oh, right, he gets to use nothing but hind sight which is based on facts and results that happened well after the event turned South.
If I had to guess right now, pre-South Carolina, I think Bush and Carson will be out. Trump is somehow still holding a lot of conservative voters who would otherwise go to Cruz. Trump right now is probably electing Rubio.
Then stay home and let others do the heavy lifting.
“Trump right now is probably electing Rubio.”
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Rubio just can’t get out of his own way.
http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/02/18/3080616/
Trump has a deep bench of executives for his administration.
Okay, so you at least now admit he isn’t electing Hillary, so I guess we are making some progress.
Trump is getting more than twice Rubio’s votes, but somehow that translates to you that he is getting Rubio elected, and cheating Cruz out of his rightful position as the nominee.
Well done. /s
It begs nothing, Trump is exposed.
The question is, what is wrong with backtracking on an issue? Please favor me with a reply. Thanks.
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There is a couple of things, you smear a (bad president) a good man for doing something you once advocated and now lie about having held the same position.
If it were just this one topic that would be one thing but it isn’t Trump has flipped flopped on EVERYTHING, Abortion, Guns, Immigration. We know his history of supporting dems with his $$$$. The only thing he hasn’t flipped flopped on is his support for crony capitalism. Support for the TARP, Auto bailout, Obama’s stimulus, Ethanol, Kelo, and his use of cronyism to get him special breaks in his projects.
When you are 69 your record matters Trump’s track record is horrible. Sad to see many mislead by his smoke and mirrors show.
Cruz was a full fledged member of the Republican establishment then, having participated in the legal effort to get Bush into office, so you can be pretty sure Cruz would have rubber stamped anything Bush wanted to do.
I'll have to admit you've got a point there, particularly with the plural of the word 'position'. He comes down on so many sides of every issue that' he's sure to please everyone. That is, unless you can't ignore his duplicity.
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