Clark Stands By Comments About McCain
Wesley Clark is not backing down from the controversy created by his statements about John McCain on Sunday.
In a statement released tonight to reporters, Clark reiterates that he respects McCain's war record, but sticks to his main point that McCain's record does not qualify as the sort of judgment needed to be president:
There are many important issues in this Presidential election, clearly one of the most important issues is national security and keeping the American people safe. In my opinion, protecting the American people is the most important duty of our next President. I have made comments in the past about John McCain's service and I want to reiterate them in order be crystal clear. As I have said before I honor John McCain's service as a prisoner of war and a Vietnam Veteran. He was a hero to me and to hundreds of thousands and millions of others in Armed Forces as a prisoner of war. I would never dishonor the service of someone who chose to wear the uniform for our nation.John McCain is running his campaign on his experience and how his experience would benefit him and our nation as President. That experience shows courage and commitment to our country - but it doesn't include executive experience wrestling with national policy or go-to-war decisions. And in this area his judgment has been flawed - he not only supported going into a war we didn't have to fight in Iraq, but has time and again undervalued other, non-military elements of national power that must be used effectively to protect America. But as an American and former military officer I will not back down if I believe someone doesn't have sound judgment when it comes to our nation's most critical issues.
Clark also put in an appearance tonight on MSNBC, where he stood by his comments. We'll have video shortly.
Late Update: Here's the video:
Where is everybody?
June 30, 2008 11:13 PM | Reply | Permalink
Imperative to watch this which just was on tonight !!
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/06/30/olbermann-special-comment_n_110114.html#postComment
June 30, 2008 11:14 PM | Reply | Permalink
Good for you Gen Clark!
June 30, 2008 11:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
At least someone is standing behind what they say.
I hate to say it, but my disillusionment with Obama is growing by the day. Barack "The Great Conciliator" Obama just doesn't have a nice right to it...
June 30, 2008 11:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
At this point, for Obama, the end of getting elected justifies some degree of compromise in the means. Of course, ideally, I'd like him to trash telecom immunity and get Clark's back on what was certainly a justifiable observation. But I also recognize that I, and most people on this blog, are comfortably to the left of center. What we wish Obama would do is not necessarily politically expedient. I'd rather have a somewhat compromised Obama in the White House than a more purist Obama in the Senate. It is, afterall, a dirty hands business.
July 1, 2008 1:08 AM | Reply | Permalink
"Some degree" of compromise? Is there a single issue on which he hasn't flipped? Iran, Iraq war, "John McCain's service," telecom immunity -- give us a major issue on which he hasn't backed down since becoming the "presumptive" nominee. Oh yeah, "lay off my wife." That's an issue of major national importance.
He has no 'nads of his own and he's obviously taking the advice of the same crowd of eunuchs that advised Kerry in '04. Maybe we should run his wife. At least she knows how to do a "terrorist fist bump."
Thanks.
mp
July 1, 2008 8:36 AM | Reply | Permalink
And who exactly do you support in this election, Powe?
July 1, 2008 9:35 AM | Reply | Permalink
Barack "the Great Appeaser" is more like it.
July 1, 2008 8:16 AM | Reply | Permalink
Barack "The Great Appeaser" Obama is more accurate.
July 1, 2008 8:17 AM | Reply | Permalink
YES, General Clark. This is excellent, and exactly what Obama should have done today in regard to you. I am very proud of you for not backing down to the McCain bully machine, when what you said was neither disrespectful nor untrue.
June 30, 2008 11:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
I agree Amelie. I am very disappointed in Obama's campaign reaction but this might have been planned this way to bring quesitons up about McCain's record but also have Obama look very honorable by saying he doesn't agree and he honors McCains service.
I don't know if that is the case but anything that brings questions to the crazy notion that McCain is qulaified to CIF just because he was in the military is a good thing.
July 1, 2008 8:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
Sorry Wes. This is not a fight we want to engage in.
We can whip McCain on his economic policy, his ham-fisted go-it-alone foreign policy, and on his various flip-flops. The last thing we need is to dredge up the "Commander-in-chief" argument.
Let's talk about McCain's condescending temper, the S&L scandals, Joe Lieberman supports him...
But DON'T bring up the fact that he was a POW, war hero, yada yada yada. We lose that argument every time. It's not in our playbook.
So Wes, I say this with all due respect. SHUT YOUR PIE HOLE!
June 30, 2008 11:18 PM | Reply | Permalink
Disagree, he was right on. Obama constantly brings up John McCain's service to the point of nauseating, General Clark DOES have some bullocks!
June 30, 2008 11:23 PM | Reply | Permalink
So, is Clark a shill for Senator Clinton? Doing this kind of ridiculous attack will only bolster McCain's chances.
June 30, 2008 11:26 PM | Reply | Permalink
He didn't attack, Clinton is so last month, he said McCain is not qualified to be a Commander in Chief because he was in the Vietnam war. All true.
June 30, 2008 11:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
This was not an attack. Clark was responding to a question. The issue is valid, and Clark is dead on: McCain's tenure as a POW did not help prepare him to be commander-in-chief.
I salute Gen. Clark for making this point firmly and for not backing away from it.
Obama played it right by distancing himself from the controversy. Obama is not making the point; GENERAL Wes Clark is.
Well played.
July 1, 2008 9:43 AM | Reply | Permalink
Go General Clark!!!
I love it. Beating the GOP at their own game.
Raise the issue and make the pundits address the substance of it with Clark.
Repeat, McCain does not have the judgment to be President.
Until every single Sunday talk show and weeknight news broadcast this statement.
Turn General Clark into Rev. Wright...play it over and over and over.
June 30, 2008 11:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
The problem is, the media will talk about POW, war hero, and every other McCain talking point and it will piss people off because they'll think he's being "picked on" unfairly. Yeah, right...I know. But just watch.
This is not a good strategy. Hit him on the issues where we have strength.
June 30, 2008 11:22 PM | Reply | Permalink
Who gives a shit? Obama cannot win with the MSM ever, so talk and deal with us, the voters. Obama has acted like a wimp for two weeks now, even Olbermann indicated the same tonight. Enough of the politician, it is SO obvious what he is doing, and it is pissing a lot of us off!
June 30, 2008 11:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
You fight the battles that need fighting and that you can win.
This is not a battle that needs to be fought and not one we can win.
What about that do you not understand?
June 30, 2008 11:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
That you, like Obama, worry about games when you should be worried about truthiness (Courtesy Colbert)
June 30, 2008 11:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
You need to learn some strategery. The media talking even more than they already do about McCain being a war hero doesn't help. Even if you think Clark is scoring some points with the more discerning media consumers it isn't good message control for Obama, which is why he doesn't want to touch it.
Why not just focus on taking down the McCain is a maverick meme and attack his whack domestic and foreign policies without even engaging in a debate about whether his POW status makes him a better candidate?
July 1, 2008 1:20 AM | Reply | Permalink
Clark has been arguing this point for the last week at least, and doing a damn good job of it. Here he is on Morning Joe a week or so ago http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c5bYzL2y7xQ
I don't think anyone on the campaign has been criticizing him on it. But now since McCain is crying and the media is turning this into something it's not Obama must make a statement.
It's just not an argument Obama should have with McCain. It's an argument that someone with serious military cred, like Clark, can make though. Which is why he's been doing it. Obama is wise to distance himself from it.
July 1, 2008 3:27 AM | Reply | Permalink
jed757,
Wouldn't Obama be better served by strategically "honoring the service of both McCain and Clark, who have each earned the right to discuss this matter in our public discourse," or words to that effect, instead of throwing Clark under the proverbial bus?
July 1, 2008 8:53 AM | Reply | Permalink
Bar Kafka,
Excellent point. There is such a quantum difference between Clark's lifetime military service in which he handled global responsibilities and McCain's that, if McCain is being lauded by Obama, Clark is owed not only a simultaneous tribute, but one that details his contribution.
July 1, 2008 9:08 AM | Reply | Permalink
Robby, look at the hundreds of comments on Huffington Post. They are thrilled with Clark and the fact he has some balls. That is what people want.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/06/30/wesley-clark-stands-by-mc_n_110105.html
June 30, 2008 11:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, of course. Because they want a flame war not a true discussion of the issues. Again, there is NO upside to this line of attack.
June 30, 2008 11:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
Zero upside and major downside. Mcbush would be happy to talk about this stuff all the way til november. It diverts attention from important issues that should be discussed and concentrate on the only thing mcbush has going for him. His pow experience. Huge mistake to keep this in the news cycle. The sooner its over, the better.
June 30, 2008 11:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
No upside? Hardly.
The upside is the bluff gets called. The upside is a new crack in the veneer of his untouchable status as a result of his time spent as a prisoner. Just look at the hysterical media reaction to all this. Clark touched a nerve and for a reason. It's the only thing McCain has going for him. You diminish that and he's done.
Another upside for voters, though to some extent a downside for Obama, is people are getting to see more of Obama's thinking now that he doesn't have to pander to libruls.
He likes illegal spying. He likes official cover-ups of corporate crimes. As a former law professor, he doesn't even like the constitution very much, it seems.
Now he disses a man that actually saw combat on the ground (as opposed to dropping bombs from 7,000 feet) and has vastly more leadership experience than a pilot that had the misfortune of being shot down and has milked that status ever since, a la Duke Cunningham.
Obama is positively stupid to become spineless on this one. He's not displaying leadership, he's displaying the kind of feculant timidity that makes him look genuinely craven and fundamentally weak. That's his mistake, not Clark's.
June 30, 2008 11:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ok, let me see if I understand the argument. The argument is that whether or not someone shot down defending our country over vietnam is irrelevant as to whether or not they served their country sufficiently to be considered for president. Add on top of that that the person suffered horribly in a prisoner of war camp for 5 years based on his service to our country, however, that should be dismissed as being an insufficient exhibition of service to his country to be considered for president.
This debate makes alot of sense to me. Maybe we can argue the nuances of how many prisoners were released while he stayed in the prison until all prisoners were released. Is that sufficient to be considered for president? Or how about we argue the nuances of how many days he served at sea on an aircraft carrier flying missions in a hazardous manner for years. Is that sufficient service to be considered for president? Maybe we should argue about how many times mcbush put his life on the line flying missions over nam. Anybody have any idea about how many?
Wow, I can see a whole dialogue on these issues. I think we should attack whether it was ten missions over nam or five missions before he got shot down. Let's go into detail over his service to our country and try to pick it apart. That makes alot of sense. Brilliant idea. Now I see why clark should get out there every day and pick apart his service in nam and his time in a pow camp.
By the way, what was the spread between mcgovern and nixon. I bet we can beat that. Brilliant idea.
July 1, 2008 12:00 AM | Reply | Permalink
MichaelA
you are missing a key point. The argument is not whether the service to country was sufficient to be President.
The argument is that service to country is not the same as decision making and judgment essential to create and set policy to govern.
Just as being a good fighter is not the same as being a leader.
No one questions that McCain was a great warrior the question is can he be a leader with the judgement to govern?
Does he have the temperment for diplomacy rather than sending a missile to bomb the country when things don't go as he wishes?
Questions about his temperment, leadership and judgement are not questions about service to country, courage to fight and the tenacity to survive POW camp.
In fact the overarching point is that mcCain has that skill set in par excellence, what he has not demonstrated is organizational, diplomatic and the patience to work assisudously towards the common good in terms of America's standing in the eyes of the world.
Let McCain have all the accolades he has earned for service as a warrior veteran, but when it comes to his ability to lead this country as President that is an entirely different skill set and as Wes Clark aptly put it...he is untested and untried.
July 1, 2008 1:19 AM | Reply | Permalink
I understand Clark's point, agree with it, but think it is too subtle to advantage Obama. Lets take as a given that McCain's military service is not germane to whether he would be an effective CIC. Fine. The media debate is never going to catch the nuance, which will be lost in an echo chamber that reverberates with nausiating McCain hero worship. Why not take down his CIC cred by crushing him on his 100 years of war, who cares when our troops come home positions, as well as a constant looping of the Bush McCain on-stage hug?
July 1, 2008 1:31 AM | Reply | Permalink
I agree with you about nuance. The media may not get it. However, by it coming from a General it may create just the pause needed for Americans to get it.
I think Obama is moving away from the 100 year war lines because he suspects that getting our troops out as carefully as we were careless about getting them in is going to be a drawn out process.
Particularly, with the Kyl-Lieberman amendment tying troop levels in Iraq to violence levels in Iran. Bush is again saber rattling about going to war with Iran. We are getting articles about covert operations in Pakistan and inter government squabbles about strategies to capture Osama bin Laden. All of which suggests that there are problems in Iraq that he is not aware of that will call for different tactics.
Obama also is now getting intelligence briefings he did not have previously. Whenever Obama shifts directions or sets new direction, we can be assured that he has a new data set and is adjusting his statements accordingly.
I give him the benefit of the doubt, he understood the Sunni, Shia and Kurds and could envision what would result by going to war, I beleive he also knows what the new intelligent reports mean in terms of the actions he will be able to take.
It is not unforeseeable that GWBush has tied this nation up already for 25 years with his actions yet unknown to the nation until we have a new President.
We all need to pray for America because Dubya only cares about corporate intersts and not the lives and wellbeing of our troops in the Middle East.
July 1, 2008 1:40 AM | Reply | Permalink
I agree with every single point that you made. None of those points are what the dispute was over. The dispute was over dismissing his service, not how that impacted on your other arguments.
Bottom line, like I pointed out in my post, why on earth would a sane person want to get into any aspects or details of his service and then attack that detail. It makes absolutely no sense.
Bottom line, acknowledge he was a war hero and move on from there.
July 1, 2008 1:35 AM | Reply | Permalink
George McGovern was a war hero running against a Navy desk-jockey.
Bob Dole was a war hero running against a draft dodger.
John Kerry was a war hero running against a chickenhawk whose daddy moved him to the head of the line for a hiding place in the National Guard.
I have no problem with the media dwelling on McCain's service. The image is of a wounded man lying on his back grimacing in pain. McCain was a victim, not a leader, in the Vietnam War ... a war we lost.
Victim of a Lost Cause. Doesn't exactly stir patriotic fervor.
July 1, 2008 9:54 AM | Reply | Permalink
MichaelA is, I think, deliberately missing the point. His writings have shown him to be quite obtuse, almost unnaturally so.
July 1, 2008 12:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
I disagree that Clark should be quiet.
Yes, we need to talk about other issues and this isn't a strength for Obama necessarily BUT there are 4 months to the election. This will go away as a controversy, it might gin up some sympathy for McCain in the short term but in the long run...the seed has been planted and whenever they have conversations about CIC and Nat'l security that Obama will be on much better footing.
Additionally polls show Obama beating McCain on almost every issue except for Nat'l security. By going after McCains one strength, you take away a big reason to vote for him.
Besides, the MSM will never expose this myth about McCain - in this case the emporer has no clothes. IMO McCain's military experience makes him LESS qualified not more. He may have a better understanding of the nuts & bolts but it shapes his point of view that everything has a military component.
June 30, 2008 11:36 PM | Reply | Permalink
Agree, also, Obama cannot and will not ever win with MSM, so I am glad General Clark is speaking the truth about how being a veteran doesn't make you Commander-in-Chief material. Also, I backed Obama because he appeared real and honest, he met issues like Rev. Wright right in the face, now he decides to play politics, and it is not working. The right still calls him on everything, the left is totally pissed off at him, (see KO tonight) and those that vote for McCain over this were going to anyway. Since when are we afraid to discuss real issues in this country, and this is a very real issue on a man that suffered as a POW and now is suffering from dementia. The MSM will never say sh*t about McCain, so someone else has to.
June 30, 2008 11:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
Reminding people of Kerry's Vietnam service with the Swift Boat attacks certainly didn't help him. If you're not on offense you're on defense.
June 30, 2008 11:38 PM | Reply | Permalink
Major, major difference with kerry. Mcbush was in a freaking pow camp for 5 years and rightly or wrongly is perceived by the american people as a hero. Kerry was in nam for like 90 or 120 days. Kerry was perceived to have insulted the troops with his conduct and he tried to manufacture himself into a hero. Many vets were pissed at kerry for his conduct. I think kerry made a huge mistake trying to play up the military angle with his baggage. Major difference between the two scenarios.
June 30, 2008 11:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
The point, Michael, is that McCain is not a hero. He endured a great deal, true, still, that makes him a victim, not a hero. And he's obviously been unhinged by it - his explosive temper is quite well-documented, and makes him extremely dangerous as the leader of a nuclear power. Dangerous to the outside world, and dangerous to the citizens of that power.
That point, and others related to it, need making over and over again.
McCain is no hero, he's a victim who's been unhinged and is therefore perhaps to be pitied but never, ever to be trusted with a position of responsibility greater than...say...county commissioner. If that.
July 1, 2008 12:30 AM | Reply | Permalink
Ok, you explain that and defend that to the 80% of the country that believe he is a war hero. Start with explaining that to the right-wing media. You can go through in detail all the things that he did in the military and pick it apart trying to prove that he is not a hero. Start with the number of missions over nam and continue through the number of prisoners released before him and after he was offered to be released from the pow camp. Yeah, I think this stuff should be repeated over and over again, day after day until november. Sure we will be able to prove to the country that he is no war hero and he was unhinged from his 5 years in a pow camp. Yeah, that will work.
July 1, 2008 12:34 AM | Reply | Permalink
No one is trying to prove McCain was not a war hero. Point of fact, he is being acknowledged for exemplary service to country and extraordinary courage in the face of tremendous odds.
However, does that perserverance while tortured qualify as judgement to lead?
McCain is a war hero...he has not set policy nor ever demonstrated leadership as a leader of a squadron during war time.
Before you said neither has Obama, the point is that Obama is not presenting himself as having the judgment to lead based on military service and being a POW.
Obama's judgment is based on analytic decision making about key events and being able to deduce how those events will result in catastrophic circumstances and fall out.
McCain has nothing of a similiar nature in his background. In fact, McCain supports further war and continuing war, possibly because he lacks the diplomacy skills to end the war, to set a new strategic mission.
That is the role of the CinChief...he sets the mission...he doesn't carry it out. McCain was a soldier who carried out a mission that does not qualify him to be a leader due to his high pain tolerance. Nor does his record in the Senate demonstrate leadership when he continually has supported Bush's war policy, escalation and surges and worst of all even torture.
For someone tortured to support tortured shows you just how inadequate their decision making skills are.
It is analogous to recognizing that most child abusers were abused children.
McCain lacks the emotional temperament and judgment to lead.
Unless you want the nation to be in a perpetual state of kamikaze missions.
July 1, 2008 1:29 AM | Reply | Permalink
Again I virtually agree with all your points, but this one:
Before you said neither has Obama, the point is that Obama is not presenting himself as having the judgment to lead based on military service and being a POW.
Several people have said this and I just don't see it. Mcbush is not presenting himself either as having the judgment to lead based solely on military service and being a POW. I don't recall mcbush ever making that leap. I wonder where that is coming from. It obviously must be coming from somewhere.
I haven't even heard the fox fools on sunday say such a thing. I always see the military stuff used to wrap mcbush in the flag and pretty much nothing more. I see mcbush using his senate experience more concerning the judgment criteria that you point out, not his nam experience.
July 1, 2008 1:44 AM | Reply | Permalink
To me it comes across as having military service gives you better national security judgment when our country is fighting a war.
That's how I hear the message.
July 1, 2008 1:47 AM | Reply | Permalink
I just don't hear that or see mcbush saying that. For example on the stupid "surge," mcbush claims that he was right and that more troops were needed. He doesn't say, gee I was in nam or I was in a pow camp and based on that experience I know that we should have had the surge. See I was right based on my nam experience. I really don't see it.
July 1, 2008 2:02 AM | Reply | Permalink
It is implied.
McCain gets national security credibility based on his military service. It is implied that he will have the ability to decide what is best when our nation is at war.
What then does Obama have to show for national security experience if the reference bar is military service?
Military service has to be shown not to be indicative of the ability to govern and set policy. It has to be highlighted and revered for it's warrior prowess, not diplomacy.
It is a distinction not a disminishing of the attributes.
Clark is saying look at the difference in what the 2 jobs demand a individual be able to do.
July 1, 2008 2:12 AM | Reply | Permalink
Kudos to General Clark; he said nothing wrong and, in fact, has the truth on his side.
As a man with a far superior military service record and judgment on Iraq than John McCain or any of the hyperventilating right-wing Republicans, Clark should remain a prominent public face of the Democratic cause.
June 30, 2008 11:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
By the time Obama finishes his tour of abroad, McCain's CIC meme will be fading.
Obama is going for the diplomacy.
McCain is playing all his cards too early.
June 30, 2008 11:44 PM | Reply | Permalink
Perhaps most of you are missing the point. I am a veteran, and a committed Democrat who has voted for every Democratic Presidential candidate from McGovern in 1972 to the present, and will vote for Obama this year.
It's true that there is nothing offensive about Gen. Clark's opinion that John McCain's military service is not necessarily a qualification to be president. The part of Clark's comment that rubbed me the wrong way was the reference to McCain having been "shot down", as if that somehow implied that his service was incompetent or something else less than admirable. Drop those two words and there is no controversy.
I'm pleased to see that NBC News was able of understand this and I certainly hope that most of you are as well.
June 30, 2008 11:45 PM | Reply | Permalink
Actually, no, that is not the point of Clark's comment. The "shot down" is most likely in reference to McCain's POW time, which many believe imparts some sort of angelic status about which we can not criticize, but also at the same time imparts some sort of ability to lead the country on foreign policy matters.
Clark's inarticulate statement hits this point- why aren't we able to denounce McCain's argument that his service to the country makes him able to lead because he was "shot down" (aka POW)?
Of course, your comment is representative of those who would be offended by the comment. So the point really isn't about what Clark meant, but how people would react...
June 30, 2008 11:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
That is true, it was poorly worded. But in truth, the interviewer said those words first, put it to Clark in that frame, so I can't just say that was Clark's fault.
And how many ways can Clark say what a hero McCain was for him and many others, over and over, which he has?
June 30, 2008 11:54 PM | Reply | Permalink
"Shot down" was Schieffer's phrase. Clark just repeated it back to him.