“Iraq Withdrawal Date Would Be Mistake-Sen. Clinton,” Reuters, http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=domesticNews&storyID=7682004&src=rss/domesticNews, 20 February 2005 (from DU).

The news itself merely continues the saga Hillary the Sane in the American Tory Party:

Setting a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq would offer a “green light” to the insurgency there and could undermine the fledgling Iraqi government, U.S. Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton said on Sunday.

“I think it would be a mistake,” she said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” program. “We don’t want to send a signal to the insurgents, to the terrorists, that we are going to be out of here at some date certain.”

“I think that would be like a green light to go ahead and just bide your time,” the New York Democrat said.

Aside from the strange use of “date certain,” instead of “certain date,” nothing else is new. I won’t be voting for Madame Clinton, but she is a basically good persona and basically good politican.

But considering some Democratic Underground comments, Hil is my kind of gal!

First, the most coherent reply:

she’s not the messiah folks…she’s a DLC centrist establishment Democratic socialite of the upper-class rich of this nation.

She’s not with the people…she’s not concerned with doing “the right thing”…and people should stop placing faith in her to “lead us out of the wilderness”.

and Mrs. Clinton forgets that those insurgents will be there when they do leave…it’s not like by not announcing the date, they are going to give up because they never know when the U.S. is leaving.

Clinton, in a circular way, is actually revealing the unassailable logic of the Iraq War (which dictates that the insurgency will win). Sooner or later, the U.S. will have to leave…the patience of the Shiites has worn thin..and only through their moderation has the United States even been able to stay in Iraq. If Sen. Clinton thinks that the U.S. will have a comfortable stay in Iraq until the time to leave…she’s crazy.

And some funnier ones:

Why look, she took money from the PACs of both General Electric and Northrop Grumman.

Gee, there couldn’t be any conflict of interest between those wanting to continue the war and receiving “defense” contractor money at the same time, right?

and

Hillary Clinton: war criminal.

Her whole-hearted embrace of the slaughter in Iraq places her on equal moral footing with Powell, Rice, Rumsfeld, Cheney, Bush.

It is one thing to have been grotesquely wrong about Iraq, as Hillary was from the start. But to compound that failure by continuing, in the face of all evidence, to support this murderous war…

…well, Hillary, you’re simply a collaborator.

and

Referring to insurgent strategy concerning a date for U.S. withdrawal:

“I think that would be like a green light to go ahead and just bide your time,” the New York Democrat said.

What, exactly, would it mean for the insurgents to “bide their time”?

Does that mean they would hold off making major attacks until after U.S. troops left? If so, wouldn’t that give reconstruction efforts and the fledgling Iraqi government the opportunity to make some progress?

The last thing the insurgents want is to let up and give their foes a chance to establish stability or something approaching security and normality.

The “bide your time” argument is a transparently illogical excuse for keeping a permanent U.S. presence there. What Miz Clinton and others are trying to establish is a conventional wisdom that rejects any firm committment to exit Iraq.

and

Sad but true

Future of world peace lies with US empire collapsing ASAP. And the future of American people lies with progressive anti-corporate forces left of the corrupt two-party system.