posted
I did some searching on both their websites (not long, but I looked where it should have been) and found a fairly comprehensive speech on a plan from Hillary from a month ago.
Obama's site says his plan for Iraq is a half page speech he gave in October of 2002.
I love a lot of Clinton's plan. I'm not thrilled about troop caps, but they aren't so bad, it just requires that anything above the troop cap requires the consent of Congress to increase. Basically her whole plan is about accountability and Congressional oversight, which is sorely needed. She calls for the disarmament of the militias, something I've been railing about for months on HR. She calls for troops not being allowed into the field until they have adequate training and equipment. I'm not sure how feasible that is, but I just read a story in TIME the other day about an 18 year old boy who enlisted a week after graduating high school. He went through 9 weeks of training, had a quick 3 week course in Iraqi culture and tactics, then he was sent into war. He died in the first five minutes of his first combat experience through what is believed to be friendly fire. He was supposed to have a month of desert combat training in the Mohavi Desert in California, which very closely simulates Iraqi conditions. I'm glad she's at least bringing these issues up.
She calls for more benchmarks from the Iraqi government before we give them more money, and an end to de-baathification so professional administrators and teachers can get back to work and help the country move forward, which might help correct a huge error made years ago.
Frankly it's the kind of speech I would have expected from a Republican. It's incredibly pro-military, but it's also fair, smart, honorable and just a damned good set of ideas. Frankly I think it'll get shot down, and I don't even think she's going to score that many points with it, but it shows she really cares about what the troops are going through, and she's trying to get the senate back on track with its oversight duties.
When Obama comes up with some specifics, I'll read them, until then, Hillary has my full support.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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I did notice when I last checked that Obama's website was thin on details regarding Iraq. Hopefully more is forthcoming.
Posts: 1762 | Registered: Apr 2006
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