Hillary Clinton's Acceptance of Responsibility

I have no axe to grind with Hillary Clinton. Indeed I perceive her to be extremely intelligent and in possession of a high degree of political acumen and savvy. I respect and admire the way she carried herself when she was subjected to public humiliation as a consequence of her husband’s indiscretion.

One can only imagine the amount of courage it would take to survive such high profile disgrace produced by that vast right wing conspiracy which does indeed exist based on the factual evidence if truth matters anymore in George W. Bush’s America.

And one can only imagine the intestinal fortitude it took to be submitted to daily taunts from media figures some of whom are sexual perverts, pedophiles, convicted criminals and overweight drug addicts with too much air time to spread their venom while claiming some pathological connection to patriotism.

Yet when Sen. Hillary Clinton voted for H.J.Res 114 giving George W. Bush the power to wage war she lost my support for any office higher than the one she now holds. She should have known that members of al Qaeda were not in Iraq. She should have known that Iraq was not harboring international terrorist organizations that threatened United States citizens. She should have known that Iraq did not possess WMD which threatened the national security of the United States because Hans Blix knew it and she should have known just based on common sense that Iraq could not launch a surprise attack against the United States

And she damn well should have known that when George W Bush refused to secure a second resolution by the U.N. Security Council he was violating the intent of H.J. Res 114 requiring him to pursue diplomatic efforts at the U.N. In fact such an intelligence person as Senator Clinton should have known that he was violating the U.N. Charter. Above all she should have know that George W Bush was not defending the national security of the United States by using military force against a country which did not pose such a threat.

While on the campaign trail in Iowa Hillary Clinton said that she “has taken responsibility” for her vote. But what does that mean? What action reflects Hillary Clinton taking responsibility for a vote that resulted in the carnage and chaos of Iraq? When she states that if Congress knew in 2002 what it knows now there would not have been a war in Iraq thus implying she and the rest of Congress were deceived however this ignores the 23 senators none of whom has presidential ambitions all of whom made the right vote based on reason and not politically motivated by fear of looking weak on terrorism. They knew what she knew and now we all know that the irony is that her vote to invade Iraq increased the threat of global terrorism.

This same Hillary Clinton wants to become president and expects the public to support her because she’s “taking responsibility for her vote” while blaming Bush for misusing his authority to which she consented and now claims “I said this was not a vote for preemptive war”. Indeed George Bush misused his authority the day he invaded Iraq and violated the Constitution ever since yet Senator Clinton remained silent until her sincerity was exposed when she claimed she was “in it to win” and winning is everything even at the expense of upholding the rule of law.

“Taking responsibility for her vote” is but empty rhetoric when it is qualified by blaming someone else or providing a disingenuous rationalization for that vote. If Hillary Clinton really wants to take responsibility for her vote authorizing a pathological liar to wage war on Iraq she should remain in the Senate and make right that which she made so terribly wrong by supporting legislation which would remove George Bush and Dick Cheney from office for committing high crimes and misdemeanors including but not limited to unauthorized wiretapping of thousands of fellow citizens in order to wage an unjust war based on a faith based predatory foreign policy.