A Wes Clark Democrat

What an ungrateful wretch you showed yourself to be this morning on Meet the Press.

How dare you.

How dare you discredit a man who defended you against all comers in 2004. The man who stood at your side without a beat after withdrawing his own candidacy for the Democratic nomination. The man who had your back when the Swiftboating Scum came for you and your own running mate couldn't be convinced to stand up for you.

MR. BROKAW: We’re going to get to all those issues, but I also want to raise what a surrogate for Senator Obama had to say to my friend Bob Schieffer on “Face the Nation.” This is former General Wesley Clark talking about John McCain. He said, “I don’t think riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to be president.” He described him as untested and untried. With all due respect, Senator Kerry, he could have been talking about your qualifications. You’re a Vietnam veteran…

SEN. KERRY: Yeah, I, I don’t agree. I don’t agree with Wes Clark’s comment. I think it was entirely inappropriate. I have nothing but enormous respect for John McCain’s service. I had the privilege of standing with John McCain in the, in the cell in Hanoi when we visited there together, when we worked on the issue of Vietnam together. It was an emotional moment. I, I have awe for John McCain’s experience as a prisoner of war, and he, and he does understand duty and service. But…

Any awe for the four bullets General Clark took in his body in Vietnam while leading his troops in battle?

Some awe for a Supreme Allied Commander who led a war won with zero loss of American soldiers in combat?

How about some freaking awe for the "duty and service" of a Democratic war hero?

One who just about broke his back helping to elect Democrats to Congress in 2006? A little awe for that, maybe?

Okay, forget the awe; how about just a modicum of respect?

Clark answers a question repeating a phrase introduced by an interviewer. The media ignores the question and presents the answer in isolation. (How many times has that happened to you?) Tom Brokaw, this morning, did just that, and you, Senator Kerry, allowed him to misrepresent a fellow Democrat and a fellow war veteran, while you fell over yourself to praise the Republican opposition.

That was unfair to General Clark, who, in the same interview and before Schieffer led with "shot down," had said, "I certainly honor his service as a prisoner of war. He was a hero to me and to hundreds of thousands and millions of others in Armed Forces as a prisoner of war."

Here is what Bob Schieffer said on Face the Nation:

Bob Schieffer: I have to say, Barack Obama has not had any of those experiences either, nor has he ridden in a fighter plane and gotten shot down. I mean-

Here is what General Clark answered:

General Wesley Clark: Well, I don't think riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to be President.

Here is John Kerry, Democrat:

"I don’t agree with Wes Clark’s comment."

What exactly do you disagree with, Senator Kerry?

What exactly does being shot down in a plane have to do with running a country?

Posted by awcd at 11:15 AM | Permalink

Scathing. From Les Payne, Newsday:

-snip

Nothing in McCain's career demonstrates that his bulb has brightened. His vaunted reputation as a maverick and contrarian could just as well be attributed to a short-circuiting of his command of facts and standard operating procedures.

What about his qualifications for commander-in-chief?

As President George W. Bush has proven, any scion of a wealthy, white family can be taught to fly a jet fighter by a patient, long-suffering military flight instructor. As for getting one's plane shot out of the sky, as McCain did over North Vietnam, we need seek no analysis beyond that of Gen. Wesley Clark's.

The general's point was not that McCain isn't a war hero, the counterattack that put Clark on the defensive. It was rather that McCain's heroics have not prepared him, ipso facto, to be commander-in-chief, as the GOP candidate claims. Incidentally, Clark ranked No. 1 in his 1966 class of 579 cadets at West Point. Other knowledgeable war veterans, and I humbly include myself, know that cocky flyboy pilots like McCain, indeed, tend not to have the right stuff to be named commanders.

Furthermore, some actual commanders, Gen. William C. Westmoreland for example - as well as some commanders-in-chief, such as George W. Bush - do not have the winning stuff that makes leaders successful. In the former case, Gen. Westmoreland, who got the U.S. snookered on the battlefield in Vietnam, scored in the middle of his 1936 West Point class of 276.

As for the verbal and scholastic prowess of the current commander-in-chief, perhaps the less said, in these tumultuous times, the better. It suffices that the closer we look at the makeup of McCain, the more we find traces of Bush. Both have been given to waywardness, one born to money, the other marrying into it.

The salient point about this duo that troubles those of us who care deeply about the country is that McCain doggedly insists upon staying the Bush course. Also, it's a sure bet that McCain would continue to offer David Letterman material for his "Great Moments in Presidential History," a nightly spoof of Bush's inarticulate ramble. Can we afford any longer to ponder our sitting president each night and laugh - just to keep from crying?

Posted by awcd at 2:30 PM | Permalink

Hotline On Call

Obama comm. dir. Robert Gibbs, on McCain's ad: "The footage that they used to say, 'We don't visit the troops' was, in fact, footage that was shot by armed forces television with Barack Obama visiting the troops" ("Countdown," MSNBC, 7/28).

-snip

Gen. Wesley Clark: "The truth is that when you're running for office, you don't go to military bases and campaign. ... When I was running for office in 2003, I would have loved to have gone to a military base and met my old friends and made statements, I couldn't do it. And that's pretty much been Pentagon policy forever and ever and ever" ("Verdict," MSNBC, 7/28).

Posted by awcd at 2:42 PM | Permalink

Americablog

Because he's one of the best things the Democratic party has - a general who is on our side. A general who was the Supreme Allied Commander of NATO. What the Republicans know, and we always manage to forget, is that they always go for our strengths. John Kerry is a war hero? Then attack his war record. George Soros is funding Democratic advocacy, then demonize Soros. MoveOn has become a major fundraiser and activist resource for Democrats, then make MoveOn a bad word in the Democratic party. The blogs have become a powerful left-wing noise machine, then demonize and marginalize the blogs.

They always target our strengths. And our problem? We always let them. It's time we stopped shoving our best assets to the side, and started using them. And here, without further ado, is the former Supreme Allied Commander of NATO, General Wesley Clark.

Video and Transcript: General Wesley Clark on Morning Joe, July 23, 2008

Posted by awcd at 8:57 AM | Permalink

New York Observer

Despite all the feigned outrage fanned by the mainstream media and the right-wing noisemakers, Wesley Clark—retired four-star general, former Supreme Commander of NATO, wounded and highly decorated veteran of ground combat in Vietnam, and a military man to his core—assuredly did not denigrate the war record of John McCain when he talked about the Republican candidate on television last Sunday.

Instead, perhaps naïvely, General Clark stated a very simple fact. Mr. McCain’s service in Vietnam doesn’t prove his aptitude or competence to serve in the nation’s highest office. Or as he told Face the Nation host Bob Schieffer on CBS: “I don’t think riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to be president.”

Nor with all due respect is withstanding long captivity and torture by the North Vietnamese. “I certainly honor his service as a prisoner of war. He was a hero to me, and to hundreds of thousands and millions of others in the armed forces, as a prisoner of war,” said General Clark. The reservations he expressed were clear and honest, requiring no apology and no scuttling repudiation by Barack Obama.

Supporters of Mr. McCain insist that his military service should be exempt from discussion, except when they feel like bringing it up to prove some point about national security, terrorism or the presidency that it really doesn’t prove at all. But of course he was not the only soldier, sailor or airman to survive such experiences with courage and nobility. There was once another former POW whose candidacy for high office vindicates the Clark argument.

Or has everyone forgotten Admiral Stockdale?

-snip

Posted by awcd at 11:54 AM | Permalink

June 29 (Bloomberg) -- Retired U.S. Army General Wesley Clark, an adviser to Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama, said Republican contender John McCain has oversold his military and national-security experience.

The Arizona senator ``has been a voice on the Senate Armed Services Committee, and he has traveled all over the world, but he hasn't held executive responsibility,'' Clark, one of Obama's chief foreign policy advisers, said on CBS's ``Face the Nation'' program.

Even the squadron in the Navy that McCain commanded ``wasn't a wartime squadron,'' said Clark, who headed the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and was commander of the NATO bombing campaign during the 1999 Kosovo conflict. ``He hasn't been there and ordered the bombs to fall.''

Clark, who unsuccessfully sought the Democratic presidential nomination in 2004, endorsed Senator Hillary Clinton of New York for the Democratic presidential nomination before Obama, 46, became the party's presumptive nominee. The Illinois senator has better judgment on national security issues than McCain, Clark said today.

``I don't think riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to be president,'' Clark said, referring to the incident that led to McCain's being taken prisoner of war in Vietnam. He also said McCain's service as a prisoner made him ``a hero.''

Obama is ``running on his strength of character, on the strengths of his communication skills, on the strengths of his judgment,'' Clark said.

Continue reading "Gen. Clark: McCain Oversold Navy Experience" »

Posted by awcd at 5:16 PM | Permalink

RenewableEnergyWorld.com talked with General Wesley Clark (Ret.), Director of Emergya Wind Technologies at WINDPOWER 2008 in Houston.

Gen. Clark said that wind energy is at the forefront of renewable energy techonolgies and is ready to not only produce a major share of the U.S. electricity supply but also to help the U.S. become a more secure nation.

Renewable Energy World

Posted by awcd at 8:28 AM | Permalink

Stephen Colbert: My guest tonight says we should never have gone into Iraq. I guess he's here tonight to promote the concept of hindsight. Please welcome General Wesley Clark.

General, thank you so much. At ease.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Thank you.

Stephen Colbert: Is it tough when you get to be a general and no one gets to say that to you, you have to say that to other people?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: There's always someone in charge no matter how big a general you are, there's always someone up there.

Stephen Colbert: Really? You're a 4-star general, right?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: That's right. I was a 4-star general. I'm retired now.

Stephen Colbert: You were a 4-star general.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I'm a retired 4-star general.

Stephen Colbert: A retired 4-star general. Do you think if you'd put a little more effort into your career, you could have made 5-stars and really made something of yourself?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Every young cadet sees those statues of Eisenhower and MacArthur at West Point, but they don't make 5-stars anymore.

Stephen Colbert: They don't?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: They don't. No, they don't do it.

Stephen Colbert: Can't they make an exception?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: It was a mistake, I think, in hindsight. You were talking about hindsight. You know, the thing about a 5-star was they stayed on duty forever.

Stephen Colbert: Are you saying 5-stars is inflation? That we've got to keep it at 4-stars to keep the value of each star up?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Actually, that's exactly what happened.

Stephen Colbert: Really?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: It did. Because we went to 5-stars because the Europeans went to 5-stars and we have to keep up

Stephen Colbert: We don't care what they do.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Really. This started in World War I.

Stephen Colbert: They went to 5-étoiles.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Exactly. It was the French.

Stephen Colbert: It's always the French!

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: It is. That's the way it works.

Continue reading "Almost 5-star general Wesley Clark with Stephen Colbert" »

Posted by awcd at 11:09 AM | Permalink

At Open Left, Matt Stoller has posted as a series parts of a wide-ranging interview he had recently with General Clark. Stoller was a supporter of the General's 2004 primary campaign. He tells Clark at the end of the final installment, "You make me proud of my country."

Part One: The Petraeus Ad

Matt Stoller: So how do the millions of people who feel lied to by General Petraeus express themselves? What's the appropriate way to express themselves?

Wes Clark: Send emails, write editorials, call Senators, write Op-Eds, letters to the editors, but make them substantive, serious letters. If you feel like he has lied to you say so, but don't make the pun on his name. Show it with facts and let people draw the conclusion. It's inflammatory rhetoric to hurl out accusations of lying, that's a conclusion that has to be drawn by a careful review and examination of the evidence and it has to be used with great circumspection. That kind of reckless language, especially the use of puns and so forth, people don't like it, it doesn't change peoples' minds, it alienates support, and this is a democracy. We've got to convince moderate middle of the road Americans to come our way. We won't do it with those kinds of ads.

Matt Stoller: Ok, thanks a..

Wes Clark: I'm sorry, you're asking my straight up opinion, I know there are a lot of people who will disagree, but I'm gonna tell it to you straight, that's what I feel.

Continue reading "Matt Stoller Interviews the General" »

Posted by awcd at 1:46 PM | Permalink

RADIO ALERT: 10/1/07 - KPAM-AM 860, Monday, Oct 1, 2007 at 9:05 AM EDT / 8:05 AM CDT

Start: 08:05 CDT

description:
General Clark will appear live on "Bob Miller in the Morning" from Portland, OR on KPAM-AM 860, Monday, Oct 1, 2007

9:05 AM EDT | 8:05 AM CDT | 7:05 AM MDT | 6:05 AM PDT

Listen live here: http://www.kpam.com/programming/bob_miller.shtml

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RADIO ALERT: 10/1/07 - KPOJ-AM, Monday, Oct 1, 2007 at 10:00 AM EDT / 9:00 AM CDT

Start: 09:00 CDT

description:
General Clark will appear live on KPOJ-AM from Portland, OR Monday, Oct 1, 2007

10:00 AM EDT | 9:00 AM CDT | 8:00 AM MDT | 7:00 AM PDT

Listen live here: http://www.620kpoj.com/main.html

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RADIO ALERT: 10/1/07 - KKZN-AM760 in Denver CO, Monday, Oct 1, 2007 at 10:15 AM EDT / 9:15 AM CDT

Start: 09:15 CDT

description:
General Clark will appear live on KKZN-AM760 from Denver, CO Monday, Oct 1, 2007

10:15 AM EDT | 9:15 AM CDT | 8:15 AM MDT | 7:15 AM PDT

Listen live here: http://www.am760.net/main.html

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RADIO ALERT: 10/1/07 - KFNX-FX in Phoenix AZ, Monday, Oct 1, 2007 at 10:30 AM EDT / 9:30 AM CDT

Start: 09:30 CDT

description:
General Clark will call in to "The Charles Goyette Show" on KFNX-FX in Phoenix AZ, Monday, Oct 1, 2007

10:30 AM EDT | 9:30 AM CDT | 8:30 AM MDT | 7:30 AM PDT

Listen live here: http://www.1100kfnx.com/goyette.php

more info

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RADIO ALERT: 10/1/07 - Wisconsin Public Radio in Milwaukee, WI, Monday, Oct 1, 2007 at 11:00 AM EDT / 10:00 AM CDT

Start: 10:00 CDT

description:
General Clark will call in to "Kathleen Dunn Show" on Wisconsin Public Radio in Milwaukee, WI, Monday, Oct 1, 2007

11:00 AM EDT | 10:00 AM CDT | 9:00 AM MDT | 8:00 AM PDT

Listen live here: http://www.wpr.org/kathleendunn/

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MEDIA ALERT: 10/1/07 - TV Interview KATU Portland, OR, Monday October 1 @ 12:00 PM EDT / 11:00 AM CDT

Start: 11:00 CDT

description:
TV Interview KATU Portland, OR, Monday October 1

12:00 PM EDT | 11:00 AM CDT | 10:00 AM MDT | 9:00 AM PDT

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RADIO ALERT: 10/1/07 - KGO-FM in San Francisco, CA, Monday, Oct 1, 2007 at 12:30 PM EDT / 11:30 AM CDT

Start: 11:30 CDT

description:
General Clark will call in to "The Ronn Owens Show" on KGO-FM in San Francisco, CA Monday, Oct 1, 2007

12:30 PM EDT | 11:30 AM CDT | 10:30 AM MDT | 9:30 AM PDT

Listen live here: http://www.kgoam810.com/listenlive.asp

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RADIO ALERT: 10/1/07 - Air America's "Thom Hartmann Program", Portland OR, Monday, Oct 1, 2007 at 1:00 PM EDT / 12:00 PM CDT

Start: 13:00 CDT

description:
General Clark will call in to Air America's "The Thom Hartmann Program" in Portland, OR Monday, Oct 1, 2007

1:00 PM EDT | 12:00 PM CDT | 11:00 AM MDT | 10:00 AM PDT

Listen live here: http://www.thomhartmann.com/

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RADIO ALERT: 10/1/07 - KINK-FM with Sheila Hamilton, Portland OR, Monday, Oct 1, 2007 at 2:00 PM EDT / 1:00 PM CDT

Start: 13:00 CDT

description:
General Clark will be live in the studio with Sheila Hamilton on KINK-FM in Portland, OR Monday, Oct 1, 2007

2:00 PM EDT | 1:00 PM CDT | 12:00 PM MDT | 11:00 AM PDT

Listen live here: http://www.kink.fm/pages/416484.php

Posted by awcd at 8:05 AM | Permalink

Sam Seder Show

Sam Seder: Listen, I-I mean, I-I think no one listening to this program would disagree on that, and do you feel, I mean, do you feel that we're making any strides in that way? I mean, i-i-it- You know, after a week when the Senate refuses to restore Habeas Corpus- after a week where it refuses to pass the Webb Amendment or even allow for a vote on the Webb Amendment, I mean, are, are, have we taken any steps, positive steps?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: No, I don't think we have in terms of restoring U.S. legitimacy. I think this administration has, has got enough control of the Senate to force its plans and force its programs onto the American Congress and onto the American people. And the administration just wants to slide out of office without really coming to grips with the problems.

Sam Seder: And one of those problems of course is Iraq. I want to get your take on the Petreaus report, the Crocker report. Was it even relevant? I mean, it does appear to have made any difference whatsoever in terms of the way that this war is being waged.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I don't think the report changed American public opinion, but I think we have to be very careful in thinking about this. Iraq is dynamic. The situation in 2006 is not the same situation that we have today, and the situation in 2008 won't be the same as it was in 2007. What's happening is ethnic cleansing has continued. The militias have gained a tighter grip on all of the activities in the South, and the Sunni tribes have banded together with some encouragement from allies like Saudi Arabia and Jordan to be prepared to put up a strong resistance should the Iranian-backed Shia militia encroach on their areas. So, what we're seeing is the preparation for more profound a civil conflict.

Sam Seder: A-and so what do you think- I mean, let's assume for the moment that there will be no substantial change in policy as long as George Bush is President. What do you believe the next President should do?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I think we're going to have to go over there and talk to all of the countries in the region. Much of the mischief here is driven by Iran's desires to get a grip on Iraq, and they've adroitly played off all sides against the other. And of course all sides are using Iran. Iran's a source of, of financial assistance. It's a sort of, a source of cultural support. It's a source of military assistance and training. Iran is there and Iran wants a friendly Iraq. Iran's been happy to have the United States intervene to destroy Saddam Hussein, to take out the Ba'athists, to eliminate the old Iraqi military, but Iran wants to make sure that the new Iraq that emerges is a very close and dependent ally on Iran. That's what's going on.

Continue reading "Iran" »

Posted by awcd at 7:20 PM | Permalink

MSNBC Morning Joe:

Willie Geist: Well, I'm doing well. I'm doing well. The President says this was not just an attack on General Petreaus but an attack on the military at large. Did you take the ad that way, Sir?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I didn't like the play on General Petreaus' name, but I will tell you this that it's certainly within the purview of any organization to question U.S. policy. And so, I felt the tactics were wrong, but I felt their intent was perfectly fine. They should be asking questions about the policy. (clears throat) I very much regret the fact that all of this has distracted America and enabled some people to escape the consequences of a policy that's just not very effective. The surge is not working, and it was designed so that military improvements and military security could lead to political compromise. There'd been no political compromise. Of course, if you put in troops, you're going to get some improved security for a while at least, but we don't know what's going on underneath the veneer of security, and we certainly have seen no evidence of any political compromise coming out of it. So, I think President Bush's policy's wrong. I think the surge is failing. I think MoveOn's correct to point that out. I think they were incorrect to make the pot on General Petreaus' name. General Petreaus is, he's in the chain of command. He's doing the best he can to support his President, his Commander In Chief, and that's the way it should be. That's what we expect of the men and women in uniform. We expect loyalty up the chain of command. So, I think the, the, the issue is to attack the substance of the policy, which has shown that it's not effective rather than going after the man.

Willie Geist: Yesterday, General Clark, the Senate overwhelmingly passed a measure condemning that MoveOn ad. Senator Clinton voted against condemning the ad. You've come out and endorsed Sen- Senator Clinton. Can you speak to why she wouldn't, she wouldn't condemn the ad?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I-I think the, the whole, this whole debate is nothing but a distraction. We should be focusing on what is wrong with the policy. And the Republican Party has, and President Bush, have seized the ad as a way of escaping the responsibility for the consequences of a failing policy. That's the issue. So, let's get back on the issue. Forget about the ad. Let's talk about the policy.

Transcript, audio and video

Posted by awcd at 8:18 AM | Permalink

"Congress has a very important role to raise and maintain an army. Congress is asserting its authority under the Constitution. I say it's high time it did so."

Hardball

Chris Matthews: Welcome back to Hardball. Well, the Democrats have found a way to shift war policy in Iraq. Their strategy is an amendment by Democratic Senator Jim Webb that would require troops returning from combat in Iraq to get the same amount of rest time at home before they're redeployed to the battlefield. The Senate's debating the bill right now, but the Bush administration says the measure is unconstitutional and would amount to a backdoor troops withdrawal. Would the Webb Amendment protect our troops or cause even greater harm to them on the ground in Iraq and should the bill be passed? General Wesley Clark is the former NATO Supreme Allied Commander. He's also author of a great new book, A Time To Lead. And Pete Hegseth is a Iraq war veteran and Executive Director of Vets For Freedom. General Clark, make the case for the Webb Amendment.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: The case is very simple. We have for over four years kept our troops deployed or redeploying back and forth to Iraq and Afghanistan. The number of troops is finite. They're limited. These are the same troops that have been there two, sometimes three times previously. The families are getting tired. They need recovery time if we're going to sustain this into the future. I think the Webb Amendment is a prudent way of getting that recovery time. It's no more than what the Army committed to several years ago in saying that the troops would have at least a year at home after they'd been gone for a year, and we found we were unable to do it. So, this is Congress' responsibility. It's responsible for raising and maintaining an army. It's in the Constitution, and Congress is asserting its authority. I think it's time to do it.

Continue reading "High time Congress asserted constitutional authority" »

Posted by awcd at 9:44 AM | Permalink

Fox and Friends

Brian Kilmeade: I want to talk about- Yeah, and I do want to talk about Iran. But when you were, when you were running things over at NATO, when you were a General, were you ever called out by a U.S. Senator and used terms like "suspension of disbelief" to agree with you?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I don't remember that specific term, but when I was testifying during the Kosova campaign and when I had press releases, when I visited, when Congressional delegations visited me and so forth, there was a lot of skepticism about what we were doing in Kosova. And you may remember that Tom Delay led the House to vote against the support of American pilots during the time we were actually flying combat missions over Belgrade.

Brian Kilmeade: Did President Bill Clinton dismiss you when, when you were Supreme Allied Commander of NATO?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I was given, after the war was successfully concluded and all the agreements had been done, then I received a telephone call. And, and they, from the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who said that I was going to retire a little early.

Brian Kilmeade: So, did that bother you that, that Bill Clinton could've stopped it, and that now you're endorsing Senator Hillary Clinton. So, I guess you're over it?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I think that it was actually a sort of a, a power play inside the Pentagon. I talked to President Clinton about it at the time, and it, it's worked out great. (laughs)

Brian Kilmeade: Right.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I'm very happy. I won a war, and I was recognized for all kinds of service by the governments in Europe and by the American people. I'm very happy with my military career.

Transcript, audio and video

Posted by awcd at 10:20 AM | Permalink

Leonard Lopate of WNYC in New York conducted a splendid interview with Clark. The General has been making the rounds on the release of his new book, A Time To Lead.

Here is a taste:

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I always wanted to- I-I wanted a career of service, and I, I-I'd, I wanted to be an engineer. I wanted to be i-in space or aeronautics in some way, and I had a, had a National Honor Society scholarship to Georgia Tech, and I had a, a National Merit Society scholarship, I think it was to Duke, and- But I wasn't satisfied. I couldn't see that, and I was at American Legion Boys State at Camp Robinson in the summer of 1961. It was after the eleventh grade. And they always encouraged us, there were 20 or 30 of us who were obviously college-bound they encouraged to go to Boys State and spend five days with the American Legion learning citizenship and how to be elected and leadership and all that. And a West Point cadet came and spoke to us, and I was just totally moved by the vision of the Military Academy. I walked out. I told my friends, "That's it. I'm going to West Point."

Leonard Lopate: And it was a hard school to get into, and it's a hard school to survive in.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: It's a challenge, and it was tougher then, I think, to get in, because the school was a little bit smaller than it is today, and the nomination process was strictly political. I wrote to the - the most prominent Senator in the state I thought was Senator Bill Fulbright - and I wrote to, to Senator Fulbright, and I got back a postcard that was, in essence said, 'Thanks for your interest in national security, but there's no vacancies.' It didn't say, 'Apply again.' It said, you know, 'That's it.' I got interviewed by Senator McClellan, and it was one of those funny moments that you remember a long time. You knock on the door. You report in. I'd been at this military high school. So, I kind of knew how to deal with senior people, and so, I knocked on the door and said, "Sir, this is Wesley Clark." And he was sitting behind this huge desk, and McClellan wasn't a big man. He was like four, five-four or five-five I guess, but I didn't know that then. I just saw an older man behind a desk, and he looked me up and down. And it was September of my senior year in high school. And he looked at me, and I was, I was wearing chinos and a, and a short-sleeved shirt. He say, "Boy," he said, "How old are you?" I said, "Well, Sir, I'm 16 years old." He said, "How much do you weigh?" I said, "Sir, I weigh 137 and a half pounds. I, I'd weighed myself at the Boy's Club the night before, and I don't know why I said that, but- He said- So, he put, put on his best investigatory stance. He said, "So, I guess you make good grades, huh?" And he gave me one of these hard looks that you'd give one of his witnesses before his racketeering committee in the Senate. And, and I said, "Yes, Sir." And he said, "All A's?" And (laughs), and, and I said, "Yes, Sir." And then I realized well, not exactly and I tried to explain that I'd taken Honors Math and in my junior year, and it was pre-calculus, and it was a, one of these first advance placement courses. So you got five points for an A and that, even though an A was only four points. So, if you got a B, it counted as an A, and the guidance councillor said it would count as an A. And I'm, and I'm trying to explain all this, and he's looking at me just sort of, you know, watching me shrivel under his, under his intense prosecutorial gaze. And he just, he finally just said, he said, "Son," he said, "you're not old enough, and you're not big enough, and you're not smart enough to go to West Point. So, if you still want it next year, you come back and see me then." And (laughs) that was all.

Leonard Lopate: And you did.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: No, I didn't go back and see him. I found one other way.

Leonard Lopate: (laughs)

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: We had a Congressman. (laughs) I wrote the Congressman. The Congressman had several other people who'd wanted it, and he let us take a test. So, I took the U.S. Civil Service Test in December, and I got the highest score, and I got the test- I got the appointment to West Point.

Leonard Lopate: And you call West Point an 'achievement training factory.' So, obviously you think that it was, it really was a good education.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Tremendous education. It was like, it was like-

Leonard Lopate: Would you like to see all of our schools teach that way?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: If you had the right faculty, and you could teach that way, I think it does some remarkable things. I was lucky though, because I balanced it with Oxford later. West Point was a, it was recitation every day, we called it - six days a week of math plebe year for an hour and 15 minutes. You roared through the math book. And they didn't teach in class. When you went into class, they said, they took attendance. There were 15 of us in the class. And then they said, "Gentlemen, take boards." And you left your seat. You stood up, faced a blackboard. And they hand out a little mimeographed list of problems, normally three or four problems. You took a ruler and chalk. You marked off your blackboard. You solved each problem. And after 20 minutes or thirty minutes, the professor would say, "Cease work," and you'd face about. If you looked to the side during the time you were supposed to be facing that blackboard, that was an honor violation, you'd be kicked out. And then you had to give the recitation, how you solved the problem.

Leonard Lopate: Well, I'm not s-

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: And that was the end of the class.

Leonard Lopate: I'm not sure that's the best preparation for life.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: (laughs)

Leonard Lopate: But it did get you-

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: That's a good one.

But be sure to read the entire transcript.

And buy the book: A Time To Lead.

Posted by awcd at 8:43 AM | Permalink

Raw Story

The Washington Post reported on Thursday that the leaked draft of a Governmental Accountability Office progress report on Iraq concludes that "Iraq has failed to meet all but three of 18 congressionally mandated benchmarks."

-snip

Keith Olbermann also discussed the draft GAO report, on Thursday's Countdown, suggesting that President Bush is already seeking to water it down before its official release and that someone at GAO might have leaked the it to the Post out of fear it would be "neutered."

Olbermann further cited an internal White House memo, obtained by the Associated Press, which suggests the administration is preparing to downplay the meaningfulness of the Iraq benchmarks. He pointed out, however, that President Bush himself had called those benchmarks "a clear roadmap to help the Iraqis secure their country and strengthen their young democracy" when he agreed to them last May.

"Does that not make it difficult for the White House to argue now that this GAO report will not present a true picture of the situation in Iraq?" Olbermann asked MSNBC analyst General Wesley Clark

"Exactly right," replied Clark. "They should not be able to squirm out from underneath these standards. ... The American people are making a judgment every day as they see the results of the war. The benchmarks confirm that judgment, and this is a huge problem for the White House."

Clark concluded by calling on the administration to come up with a political and diplomatic strategy for the region and "stop hiding behind General Petraeus."

Posted by awcd at 1:16 PM | Permalink

"The Great Bogeyman for Democrats, because Democrats can't oppose Generals"

Ben Mankiewicz: We're talking to General Wesley Clark here on The Young Turks. General, let's talk politics and American politics and how it relates to Iraq. There was a story earlier this week. The House Majority Whip, Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, he was saying that he was hearing that that Petraeus-Crocker report in September is likely to be more positive than initially thought, and he said that those 47 conservative Democrats in the House, the Blue Dog Caucus, he thought that the Petraeus report, a positive report in his words would carry significant weight with them and that there would be enough support in that group to want to stay the course if the Republicans stay united, and that would be a big problem for us, and then followed that up by saying so we should just wait for the Petraeus report. That sounds like a strategy designed to lose that battle in September and once again be ineffective in attempting to get a reasonable timetable for withdrawing forces.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I think we're fighting on the wrong playing field in the Democratic Party on this issue, and I've said this from the beginning. It was the Republican strategy, political strategy to direct the discussion to troops and tactics, to make Petraeus the point man and to make anyone who opposes Petraeus, it's like opposing, I don't know, the, the, the, the, the, the Good Witch of the West or something. I mean, you can't quite get your hands around it.

Ben Mankiewicz: Right.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: It's this mystical character who somehow knows everything. And I mean, it's, it's the Great Bogeyman for Democrats, because Democrats can't oppose Generals. And so, it's the perfect weapon to use against the Blue Dogs. It's the wrong playing field. Look, Petraeus is a fine officer, and we've always needed more troops in Iraq. And when you put troops out on the street, they do have a positive impact. That's not the issue. The issue is: how does the presence of the troops connect to resolving the political problems in the region - conundrum number whatever it was, 4013.

Ben Mankiewicz:: (chuckles)

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: And the answer is that if you don't connect the troops presence to the right political strategy in Iraq and the right diplomatic strategy in the recent, region, you lose. The right line of argumentation for the Democrats is to go after the strategies and policies of the Bush administration.

Cenk Uygur: And so, you would say if you were leading the Democratic Caucus, 'Hey, ignore the Petraeus report. No matter what it says, it doesn't address the real issue here, which is that the Iraq politicians won't make a deal, and without that deal, our presence there, no matter how lovely, is irrelevant.'

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: It doesn't address the real issue in that if the, the administration won't talk seriously to Iran and Syria, we'll never move forward to addressing the problems in the region, including our mission in Iraq.

Cenk Uygur: General Clark-

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: So, what I said in my Congressional testimony three weeks ago is two brigades out by Christmas, the administration gets 60 days to revise its strategy and policy, otherwise consequences will follow, and that revised strategy has to include dialog with Iran and Syria - serious dialog, not, not going in and accusing Iran of, of arming and giving improvised explosive device warheads to the, to the militias, but actual dialog about what are your aims and purposes in the region, what would you like to see, where do you see it in ten years, and going at a mul- on it, on it on multiple fronts.

Cenk Uygur: Gen-

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: To crack through the facade of the hardline anti-Israeli rhetoric of Ahmadinejad, which doesn't have the support of the majority of the Iranian people.

Cenk Uygur: General Clark, I want to talk to you one last time on the Petreaus report though. Do you put much stock in it? For whatever it's worth in relevance or or not relevant, do you take a look at the Petraeus report and say this is a rough semblance of the truth or do you think that there is heavy pressure to spin that report favorably for the administration?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I think there's both. Look, (clears throat) the presence of those troops is going to do some good, and it's inevitable that if you put great American soldiers out on the ground, they will intimidate the enemy. They will drive him away. They will in, if they've got the intelligence, take action and run them out. It's also inevitable that the enemy will duck away from these forces and hold it's strength elsewhere, try to wait them out, try to be strong where, where we're weak and so forth, and go after collaborators. That's also happening. So, I take the Petraeus report at face value. It's a military report in a situation where every military man has said the military's not the answer.

Full transcript at Securing America

Posted by awcd at 5:37 PM | Permalink

Keith Olbermann: General Clark, let me turn from this story. We expected to spend all of our time with you tonight talking about this, but there have been two developments in the Pat Tillman story - a fiasco,here's not other word for it now - and this awful report tonight. Parsing through these documents obtained by the Associated Press that indicate that Army investigators were denied permission to see whether or not Pat Tillman's death in Afghanistan as an Army Ranger was a deliberate fragging, was a case of murder, even though the shots were seemingly so close together in his head that they, they looked to the doctors on the scene that they might've been fired from only ten yards away. Not only was there access denied here, but the Army lawyers were congratulating themselves in e-mail traffic from keeping this from becoming a criminal investigation. Do you think this case is still wide open?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Absolutely, and it should be. The, the evidence of some problems is very, very clear. Mary Tillman and the Tillman family have been incredibly courageous in pursuing the truth in this, and the truth is not yet out. If there's even a hint that there was something like a homicide or a murder in this case, it should've been fully investigated and proved or disproved, and we don't really know how far up- Was it the Secretary of Defense's office? Was it the White House? Where did the idea that you shouldn't give any indication of what happened to Tillman. 'Just go ahead and go through with the burial ceremony. Give him the Silver Star.' Where did that- where was that idea blessed? You can be sure that that idea did not originate or stop at the Two- or Three-Star level. That was- someone approved that all the way to the top, because Pat Tillman was a political symbol used by the administration when it suited their purposes.

Keith Olbermann: Well, we have assumed from the beginning that that was exactly the scenario that this possibility that his, his death from friendly fire would, would somehow effect, in some way that neither of us able- ever been able to understand, somehow effect people's appreciation for his patriotism and sacrifice. Does it not begin to look more and more like that, that we were going the wrong direction in this, that they were not trying to protect something, something slightly negative from coming out, but in fact coming- protecting the accusation that his mother has made and has not gotten a lot of attention to that, that perhaps he was indeed murdered? Were we, were, were we actually underestimating what was being covered up here?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: It's very possible. We, we just don't know, Keith. I think the responsible thing for the Pentagon to do and for the Congress to do is to demand that the investigation be reopened and people all the way up the chain of command to the very top discuss what happened, when, why, we get to the facts about why the, the murder charge wasn't fully investigated. I looked at some of the investigations. I looked at the tape. I looked at the rerun of the scene. I've met with the Tillman family. And honestly, the distance, even in- the investigators said that the shots were fired at less than a hundred meters, and okay the light was failing, but he had a clearly recognizable silhouette. His weapon was clearly visible - the type of weapon. It, it ,it's, it's really hard for people to understand this. The investigation needs to be reopened and followed through to its conclusion.

Keith Olbermann: As opposed to the ruling today that a Three-Star General is likely to be demoted, and other officers will be admonished. And that's it so far.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Yeah.

Transcript

Posted by awcd at 3:18 PM | Permalink

Q-As a decorated leader yourself who served as NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander during the war in Kosovo, how would you assess the threat that Al Qaeda poses to this country?

A-Al Qaeda is not an existential threat to the United States the way the Soviet Union was. You have to understand that the Soviet Union was a country of more than 200 million people. Al Qaeda is maybe 50,000 angry and destructive individuals.

Q-You make Al Qaeda sound as unthreatening as a schoolyard gang.

A-Al Qaeda is unpredictable and dangerous and has an unknown number of sympathizers. But the Soviets had thousands of nuclear warheads, nuclear bombs, biological and chemical warheads and specially trained assassination teams aimed at us, and all of it was on a hair-trigger status that could have been set off by accident or miscalculation.

Q-Neoconservatives generally argue just the opposite, claiming that the fight against terrorism is no less daunting than the cold war and in fact constitutes “World War IV,” to borrow the title of Norman Podhoretz’s forthcoming book.

A-Thus far, we don’t have an opposing superpower against us, no matter how much the neoconservatives long for this. Perhaps the neoconservatives believe that we can only be defined by having an enemy.

New York Times Magazine

Posted by awcd at 12:33 PM | Permalink

After two years in service to the Democratic Party and the 50-State Strategy, bringing good common sense and outright brilliance to Fox News, Clark has signed on as an MSNBC news analyst. This morning, at the station attending a meeting, MSNBC put him straight on the air, twice. I guess they are glad to have him. This makes the third cable station for Clark: CNN, Fox and now MSNBC. His stint at Fox, combined with his campaigning for 94 Democratic candidates, helped turn several Red districts Blue in 2006. One of Politico's bubbleheads broke the story yesterday, or thought she did, in the smarmy Politico style. Apparently the gossip monger neglected to confirm her sources and got it wrong. Clark's ending his contract at Fox in favor of MSNBC and Harold Ford's beginning his own Fox contract a few months ago are unrelated. Besides, who knew Harold Ford was a military expert? Somebody should tell Fox, quick, they've been had. Then somebody else tell the Politico before they get it wrong ... again.

From Hotline:

A More Candidate-Friendly Audience?

Retired Gen. Wesley Clark will now be exclusively on MSNBC as a military analyst, sources have confirmed to the Hotline. Clark has still not ruled out a possible White House bid and MSNBC would be a much more Dem-friendly audience than his old gig -- Fox News Channel [EMILY GOODIN].

Now we're talking.

Posted by awcd at 11:12 AM | Permalink

AMY GOODMAN: If Congress cut off funds for the prison there, it would be closed. Should they?

GEN. WESLEY CLARK: Well, I think the first thing Congress should do is repeal the Military Commissions Act. I’m very disturbed that a number of people who are looking at the highest office in the land have supported an act which advertently or inadvertently authorizes the admission into evidence of information gained through torture. That's not the America that I believe in. And the America that I believe in doesn't detain people indefinitely without charges. So I’d start with the Military Commissions Act.

Then I’d get our NATO allies into the act. They've said they don't like Guantanamo either. So I’d like to create an international tribunal, not a kangaroo court of military commissions. And let's go back through the evidence. And let's lay it out. Who are these people that have been held down there? And what have they been held for? And which ones can be released? And which ones should be tried in court and convicted?

You see, essentially, you cannot win the war on terror by military force. It is first and foremost a battle of ideas. It is secondly a law enforcement effort and a cooperative effort among nations. And only as a last resort do you use military force. This president has distorted the capabilities of the United States Armed Forces. He's used our men and women in uniform improperly in Guantanamo and engaged in actions that I think are totally against the Uniform Code of Military Justice and against what we stand for as the American people.

Democracy Now!

Posted by awcd at 11:05 AM | Permalink

And I do mean fascinating. A very strong interviewer in Amy Goodman, who respectfully gives no quarter, and an equally strong showing by the General. They're not exactly adversaries here, but it is still a match and one worth watching.

Today we spend the hour with General Wesley Clark, the retired four-star general. He was the Supreme Allied Commander of NATO during the Kosovo War. In 2004 he unsuccessfully ran for the Democratic presidential nomination. He recently edited a series of books about famous U.S. generals including Dwight Eisenhower and Ulysses Grant – both of whom became president after their military careers ended.

Well for the rest of the hour we are going to hear General Wesley Clark on the possibility of a U.S. attack on Iran, the impeachment of President Bush, the use of cluster bombs, the bombing of Radio Television Serbia during the Kosovo War and much more. I interviewed Wesley Clark on Tuesday at the 92nd Street Y in New York.

Video

Transcript

- - - - - -

To order stopIranWar buttons to pass out, go here.

Posted by awcd at 4:05 PM | Permalink

By Carol Kilyanek, A Wes Clark Democrat

I was fortunate enough to see Wes Clark interviewed by Amy Goodman at the 92nd St Y in NYC last night. He was, as usual, wonderful, knowledgeable and brutally honest.

He and his lovely wife Gert met with a small group of supporters before the event. Wes spoke to us and answered questions for about half an hour. He told us how much we all meant to him. He took questions, of course, about a potential ’08 run but said nothing committal, only that he’s trying to turn the conversation to a discussion of the issues and doesn’t know if it can be done. Running for President was too much about celebrity, he said.

Someone asked about his trip to Saudi Arabia and he said that there’s a lot of anger toward Americans, not just the Bush Administration as before but now toward Americans. He spoke of how he’d talked to people before the ‘04 election who said they did not hold all Americans accountable for what Bush was doing because we didn’t all elect him but things would be different if he put him back in office...and he won "an uncontested election", I think that’s the way he put it. Someone suggested he hadn’t won and Wes didn’t discount that but noted that, for whatever their reasons, the Democratic leadership chose not to contest the election at the time when it would have mattered....It was an interesting little exchange. Take from it what you will.

Continue reading "Wes Clark: "Trust Me"" »

Posted by awcd at 12:23 PM | Permalink

"Heading Left" on Blog Talk Radio:

James Boyce: Thank you so much for joining us. You know, General, what's interesting is, is that somebody said that, you know, if, if we talk to Iran, that the Bush administration loses their boogieman, and they lose the fear factor. Do you think that's true? I mean, do you think that's part of- because, I mean, certainly, I mean, you know better than I, but the United States has tens of thousands of nuclear weapons. I mean, we- If there was a serious threat from Iran and it was immediate, we could take action. Right?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Absolutely.

James Boyce: I mean, they don't really threaten us. Do they?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: (inaudible) and that we could deter- There's no question the we have the military force that should rationally deter Iran. You, you know, deterrence is in the mind of the participant. So, you can never speak for the, for the mind of somebody else, but the record of Iran is that they're pretty calculating. They're pretty rational. They're pretty careful before they step on people's toes. They're not reckless. They are, they are pushy, and right now they've been in a triumphalist mood. And so, we've got options in dealing with Iran, but we won't find those options if we won't talk to them.

Nate Wilcox: General, this is Nate. One, one question that came to mind, a lot of people have been pointing out that almost all of Iran's neighbors have become nuclear powers in the last decade - You know, Pakistan, India, Israel. What, what do you say to the Iranians in that regard? I mean, it seems like the Bush administration has a policy of rewarding bad behavior. Witness, you know, the discussions with North Korea. What do, what do we say to Iran when they say they're being punished for obeying the rules?

Continue reading "Gen. Clark and John Soltz interviewed on Stop Iran War" »

Posted by awcd at 7:17 PM | Permalink

From Daily Kos thanks to plant's diary

Corey Renzella: General Clark, you were in the military for over thirty years; practically your entire adult life. It's obvious, therefore, that you have foreign policy credentials, but what in your career has prepared you for the domestic challenges that you will surely face if elected President.

Wesley Clark: Well, I was responsible in every stage of the military for the people that served under me, and for the families that were there. And what we discovered in the volunteer army was that you couldn't ignore these people. The army's sixty percent or more married. And so, their housing, the schools the children went to, the availability of health care, the time off they had with their families, the ability to get the children babysitters or later child development center spaces, all that was very important to being able to build a unit and a team. And so, like every other leader in the army, I was very concerned with it.

When I was the Supreme Allied Commander in Europe I had forty-four thousand schoolchildren located in England, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Germany, Italy and Turkey. And we worried about those schools. They were funded by the Department of Defense. They were my responsibility. And the students that were there were children of the people that worked for me. And so we had to make sure the curriculum was right, the funding was right, the administration for it was right, the parent teacher student associations were right. We changed the curriculum, we changed the leadership in some of the schools. We put in new procedures. We tried to give greater local control. We got rid of Mathland. We fought to get Headstart in those schools and so forth. But I worried equally about health care. The doctors, the hours the clinics were open.

When I was the commander at Fort Irwin out in the Mojave destert, we were a complete isolated community. I held Town Hall meetings. I owned everything on that post. I remember driving down post one day and my wife said "You see that big pothole?!". I said "Yes dear". She said "That's your pothole!". She said "Your engineers, they've been threatening to fix that pothole for a week and it's still there! When are you going to do something about it?". I said "Yes dear". And she said "By the way", she said, "Do you know that your commissary is out of Pampers?!". I said "No dear, but I'll fix that too."

-more

Posted by awcd at 5:19 PM | Permalink

MEDIA ALERT: 1/23/07 - Hannity & Colmes , Tuesday, 1/23/07 after the State of the Union address in the 11PM EST/ 10PM CST hour

Start: Jan 23 2007 - 11:00pm EST

description:
General Clark will be on the Hannity & Colmes , Tuesday, 1/23/07 after the State of the Union address in the 11PM EST/ 10PM CST hour

11:00 PM EST | 10:00 PM CST | 9:00 PM MST | 8:00 PM PST

All times of scheduled programs on Fox are subject to change. We recommend tuning in a little early.

Posted by awcd at 6:47 AM | Permalink

Bloomberg TV, 1/2/07

Peter Cook: This weekend saw two major milestones in Iraq: first the former dictator Saddam Hussein executed in Baghdad, and then it was confirmed the Iraq war has now claimed the lives of 3,000 US service members. The news, of course, comes as President Bush prepares to address the nation, possibly within days, on his new strategy for winning the war in Iraq. Retired General Wesley Clark was one of the war's earliest critics. The former NATO Supreme Allied Commander, of course, ran for President himself as a Democrat in 2004. He's also contemplating a second run for the top job. General Clark joins me now from Little Rock, Arkansas to discuss the situation in Iraq and the way forward. General Clark, thank you for the time.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Good to be with you, Peter.

Peter Cook: Let me ask you, first of all, your reaction to what transpired over the weekend with regard to Saddam Hussein - his execution, and the fact that a video tape of that execution has now been out on the internet, and at least the latest word from Iraq, causing more unrest in that country. Your reaction?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I think his execution was inevitable, but I think the manner in which it was done - the haste, the lack of control of the execution site, the taunting and so forth - were provocative. I think they were designed to be provocative, that they were designed to, by, by the people who did it, to, to demonstrate their power. They knew it would provoke a Sunni reaction, and the way it works in societies is one form of extremism promotes the extremism of the other side. And there are those who are profiting from the division of Iraq, and they want to see it continue.

Continue reading "General Wesley Clark on war in Iraq" »

Posted by awcd at 7:20 AM | Permalink

The Brown University newspaper interviewed General Clark before he gave a speech yesterday in Providence, RI. I encourage you to read the entire interview. Clark answers questions about Iraq, the draft, and whether or not he will run in 2008.

A separate report in The Brown Daily Herald had a title I really like: "Potential 2008 presidential contender Wesley Clark to speak today." The co-president of the lecture board said they "chose to bring Clark over former Attorney General John Ashcroft at a recent general body meeting with about two-thirds of the vote." That would have been a no brainer for me, but interestingly, one of the reasons Daniel Fombonne gave for the choice was that they were always accused of having too many speakers who were "liberal." Fombonne said that despite Clark's Democratic affiliation, most of his stances are moderate. "He tends to be pretty neutral on most issues. ... That's why we chose him. Though Clark ran for the Democratic nomination in 2004, his stances on the issues may appeal to both sides of the Brown community."

It's diabolical how Clark appeals to moderates, liberals and leftists, but he does. Both sides of the Brown community probably represents Democrats and Republicans, and Independents, too. That's a constituency that can win a presidential, no?

Continue reading "Clark: "I haven't said I won't run for president" - (with a twist)" »

Posted by awcd at 12:24 PM | Permalink

Wes doesn't correct Maddow in this interview when she says, "Back in May of '04, you said you thought it would be the patriotic thing for Donald Rumsfeld to resign." Actually, Clark called for Rumsfeld to be fired as early as September 2003.

The Rachel Maddow Show, 11/8/06

Rachel Maddow: What do you think about - and you hear this a lot from, from the Republicans who had not called for his, him, his resignation - people like John Boehner have said that he's done so much for the military in terms of transforming the military. What do you think about that?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I don't actually think he's done much in the way of transforming the military. The truth is he hasn't made the hard decisions. The military's still much, very much on glide path from where we left it when I took off my uniform in 2000.

Rachel Maddow: Do you think that he has to, that, that, I mean, one of the things that it, he's credited for is the idea that the military needs to have a smaller ground force and more advanced-

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, that's absurd!

Rachel Maddow: -more advanced weaponry. And that seems- I mean, has, has that been bought as an idea, or with Rumsfeld leaving is that idea also gone?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: How s- Let me tell you how stupid this was. This was the Republican idea in 1991-

Rachel Maddow: Hm.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: -after the Gulf War. So, we went from twelve U.S Army divisions to ten. Those were the ten that were maintained throughout the Clinton administration, because we knew we couldn't do it with any fewer.

Rachel Maddow: Mm hm.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Rumsfeld comes in and says, "Oh, well since you've already got, since you've already gone from twelve to ten, let's see if we can take a couple more." He gave no credit to the transformation that actually was done by Bill Clinton-

-transcript and audio here

Posted by awcd at 12:38 PM | Permalink

From Newshounds

Former NATO Commander Gen. Wesley Clark provided a few minutes of sanity on Fox News Monday (July 24, 2006), but the hosts of "Dayside" did their best to undermine him while he spoke and then followed Clark's appearance with a blood-thirsty guest of the type that has dominated Fox News coverage of the crisis along the Israeli-Lebanese border.

Clark, who is a Fox News military analyst, has been a rare guest on "Dayside." The "Dayside" crew is unlikely to invite him back after Clark delivered an articulate, well-thought-out appeal for an approach to the Israeli-Lebanese crisis that reduces civilian casualties, avoids direct U.S. ground troop involvement, and tries to permanently remove Hezbollah from the area along Isral's border. Clark was callling for a NATO force of 10,000 non-U.S. troops that would have the authority to police the area.

Clark followed Dan Gillerman, Israeli ambassador to the U.N., who has almost been a regular on the show since the fighting started. This time, Gillerman pushed the "World War III" rhetoric and had the "Dayside" audience in a fighting mood by the time Clark arrived.

While Gillerman said the U.S. should isolate Syria and Iran, Clark said isolation is the wrong strategy for the U.S. (as opposed to Israel) because it causes the U.S. to lose influence on the countries. When a member of the audience asked if the U.S. was considered a serious threat by Syria and Iran after the Iraq war and the lack of public support for it, Clark said those countries do still fear American power, even if operations in Iraq have not made the U.S. look stronger or given the U.S. more influence in the region.

-more

Posted by awcd at 10:34 AM | Permalink

Newshounds analyzes General Clark's appearance on O'Reilly last night and contrasts it with follow-on guest, Lt.-Col Ralph Peters.

Calls for diplomacy, negotiation in Middle East promptly rebutted and dismissed on The O'Reilly Factor

On The Factor tonight 7/17/06, consecutive guests General Wes Clark and Lt. Col. Ralph Peters had different takes on what to do about the escalation of violence in the Middle East. Peters followed Clark and had the opportunity to dismiss Clark's more measured calls for less violent options.

Clark says that we must link Israel's military action, measured by it's effectiveness in dismantling Hezbollah, with sufficient diplomatic pressure and support to the government of Lebanon to force Hezbollah out of south Lebanon and discredit the organization.

What Israel needs to do is better targeting - fill the sky with unmanned surveillance vehicles, put special forces scouts on the ground, and relay the information to the pilots. O'Reilly protests that there will be civilian deaths, and Clark acknowledges there will be some but not too many. Sunni Arabs are not generally supporters of Hezbollah because they know that Hezbollah is a proxy for Iran and Syria. Israel has a good window of opportunity if they can deliver the military goods. Meanwhile the US should be working behind the scenes to draw the international community together to support the Lebanese government in any way they can. Lebanon needs to demonstrate political resolve by calling on Hezbollah to evacuate; they need to call for an investigation and hold the leaders of Hezbollah accountable; then have Lebanese troops go in to enforce the evacuation.

O'Reilly finds fault with all of it - Syria will authorize Hezbollah terrorists to turn on the Lebanese government. The UN won't enforce resolutions. France and Russia won't help. The world still tolerates Saddam, Iran, Syria, Hamas, Hezbollah... (he ticks them off on his fingers, those designated enemies of the Bush administration.)

Clark replies that we've got to take the openings that are offered, and ths is an opportunity to deepen democracy in Lebanon if we (the US) does it right. Working behind the scenes we can strengthen Israel's security and deal a blow to Iran and Syria without ever putting a US soldier, airman, or Marine in danger.

Comment: I hope we are smart enough to follow his advice and not the loons who cry for more war, more death. Speaking of loons, the next guest is Peters, who shares O'Reilly's negative view of diplomacy and world co-operation. O'Reilly lauds Peters' new book, "Never Quit the Fight," (there's a clue) calling it "one of the best books you can get if you want to know about the terror fight." (Another Peters title yields another clue: "New Glory: Expanding America's Global Supremacy.")

-more

Posted by awcd at 10:17 AM | Permalink

Young Turks 6/9/06

The Young Turks are broadcasting live from The Yearly Kos convention in Las Vegas. We interviewed General Wesley Clark this morning. He spoke very frankly (must run in the family) about the failures of the Bush administration in Iraq. He also talked about the neo-conservative plan to invade Iraq going back to more than a decade.

Finally, he discussed the failures that led up to 9/11, which was refreshing because the neglect the Bush administration showed to addressing Al Qaeda before 9/11 is almost never mentioned.

Transcript from Securing America - and video

Ben Mankiewicz: ...why you're traveling around the country talking to people, what was that first, sort of, motivation to not just be a retired General and make millions of dollars, but actually, sort of, continue with the public service?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I found when I was in uniform, and I had to go through all the pain and challenges I had trying to motivate and lead NATO and stopping Serb ethnic cleansing, I found that the most, actually the most wonderful thing in life is when you're placed in a position where you can stand up and talk about what you believe in and fight for what you believe in. And so, I got out of the military, and, and the plan was to go into business and then, and make some money, and then go into university teaching and then reduce my golf handicap to where I could be a golf pro.

Ben Mankiewicz: Noble goal.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Yeah, well I mean, it's a normal goal.

Ben Mankiewicz: Sure.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Not just noble but normal. And, because I, we'd had 34 years in the public sector, you know. And so, and, and my wife said, "Now look," she said, " now you be very careful." She said, "Don't you get used by people politically. You, you got to keep on both sides of this." So, I thought, 'Yeah, that's good advice. I'll call Condeleeza Rice. I've never met her.'

Continue reading "Wes Clark: "A war is something ugly"" »

Posted by awcd at 8:26 AM | Permalink

Here is Keith Olbermann in full battle for the honor of our WWII dead at Malmédy. O'Reilly repeated the same slur he used last October in an interview with General Clark on Tuesday, where he accuses US troops of a massacre during the Battle of the Bulge in which US troops were the victims.

2005

O'Reilly: General! You need to look at the Malmedy massacre in World War Two, and the 82nd Airborne who did it!

2006

Bill O'Reilly: In Malmedy, as you know, US forces captured SS forces who had their hands in the air, and they were unarmed, and they shot them down.

Damn, Fox, unfair, unbalanced, and just plain wrong.

Bill O'Reilly, let Bill Moyers tell the story, please.

Bill Moyers, Aaron Brown, Christiane Amanpour, Keith Olbermann, and the honorable like, please start a news network of our own. I had hoped Al Gore was taking care of this problem, but apparently not.

In the meantime, please sign this petition demanding Bill O'Reilly retract and apologize.

Posted by awcd at 7:51 AM | Permalink

Sampsonblk on Democratic Underground caught a remarkable exchange between a strong Democratic spokesman, ours, and Fox's Bill O'Reilly. O'Reilly didn't know what hit him.

Unlike real news hosts, O'Reilly played the story as being about John's Murtha's assault on the Marines. He hates the military, of course.

After O'Reilly set that all up, he brought on Gen Clark who promptly turned the conversation back to the real subject - which is the massacre and the cover-up.

What really struck me about Gen Clark's appearance was that he continued to stand by Rep Murtha, despite O'Reilly's attempts to smear the congressman.

Gen Clark's key points:

- You won't find any officer in uniform who thinks this is good. No one in the know supports this behavior.

- This was an optional war that the pResident chose, and congressman Murtha is concerned about what its done to our troops, "and so am I."

- Congressman Murtha isn't making this up. He is well respected and the top brass talk to him all the time. He's passing on what he's been told from real sources in the Pentagon.

- Its a legitimate legislative function that he's performing by raising questions about what's going on. Thas his job.

- There was a previous President under investigation, and many in the media didn't feel it was important to wait until the entire investigation was completed. So there precedent for getting involved early on.

O'Reilly tried to imply that US troops killed civilians at Iwo Jima and the Battle of the Bulge. Gen Clark told him to prove it. O'Reilly said its well known that US troops shot SS troops who were trying to surrender. Gen Clark (wisely) pointed out if a man is shooting at you and suddenly drops his gun and says "Ha! Now you can't kill me," that's one thing. But that's NOT what happened in Haditha.

O'Reilly gave up: Well, I could be wrong, but... Well why doesn't Murtha come on my show, then??

NewsBusters commenters are flummoxed, poor babies.

Video, audio and transcript on Securing America.

Posted by awcd at 9:01 AM | Permalink

Fox News Live

-snip

Gretchen Carlson: Hm mm. Well, I do want to ask you about immigration since it's just been announced this morning that the President has asked for network time for 8 PM Monday night to introduce and propose his immigration reform plan. What do you think about this, and was it the Democrats that, that pushed him to finally take a stand and make an announcement on Monday?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I think the immigration issue's something that's of immediate concern to, you know, hundreds of millions of people in this country and abroad. I think it really has to be dealt with. I think it's very appropriate for the President to make that announcement. I do hope that we'll be able to deal effectively with the issue. I don't believe that people who are here should be given amnesty, but I do believe they should be given a way to earn citizenship based on good performance and contributing to the American economy and the American way of life.

-more

Transcript, audio and video here.

Posted by awcd at 7:42 AM | Permalink

General Clark interviewed Barbara Boxer on this week's ClarkCast. Senator Boxer can expect to head the Environment and Public Works Committee, should the Dems take a majority in November. She blasted Bush's appointment of former big timber lobbyist Bill Wehrum as an Assistant Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency scheduled for Senate consideration on Wednesday.

From Grist last summer when Wehrum was only a "temporary" appointment to cover Jeffrey Holmstead's old job:

Instrumental indeed, says Frank O'Donnell, president of Clean Air Watch: "Wehrum has been Holmstead's Rasputin -- the behind-the-scenes architect of all the most controversial initiatives that Holmstead took credit for." Wehrum was a lead author of the doomed "Clear Skies" legislation, O'Donnell says, and played key roles in making changes to new-source review and designing the rules governing the administration's market-based trading program for mercury emissions, which are now being challenged in federal court. "You mention his name to career staffers at EPA and they groan as if they have an abdominal problem," said O'Donnell.

Boxer cautioned in today's ClarkCast, "Mr. Wehrum has been involved in almost all the rollbacks. We have proof that he sat down with industry, more of the same where industry is writing regulations and they are really, really endangering the health of the people." She said, "Watch it when they name things 'Healthy Forest' and 'Clean Skies,' look behind the names. You know it's not true."

mp3 download

On iTunes

Discussion thread on Securing America

Very important, this Senate committee review on Wednesday of William Wehrum as Assistant Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. As Boxer says, this is a very bad guy. As Wes says, this is an enemy of environmental protection.

Write to the media.

Write to Boxer. Back her up on this. eMail Barbara Boxer

Posted by awcd at 8:08 AM | Permalink

NPR: News & Notes with Ed Gordon

Ferai Chideya's full interview this morning with General Clark can be listened to or read here.

Here are some clips:

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: First, for humanitarian reasons and secondly, for reasons of regional stability and ultimately, even for matters of energy. What we don't need is, we don't need another crisis where the West stands by as hundreds of thousands of people have died. Already the casualty toll from Darfur is estimated to be 300,000 and rather than the instability easing off, it's actually deepened with longer cross-border operations back and forth across the border between Sudan and Chad and greater challenges throughout the region for stability.

Ferai Chideya: By energy, you mean that we have a stake in the region's fossil fuels.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Well, I think the whole world has a stake in this. Where we are right now is in a worldwide energy, integrated energy market. Oil that's taken from one place and consumed in another place is, in economic terms, fungible, and not technically maybe, every oil's a little bit different, but it's a world market. So, a shortage that results from a supply interruption in, in Nigeria or somewhere in Africa is just as significant as a supply interruption, let's say, in the Middle East or off the coast of Texas, because the whole market is ultimately affected by this.

-snip

Ferai Chideya: You mentioned humanitarian tragedy. We recently had on Paul Rusesabagina who is the gentleman whose life is portrayed in the movie, 'Hotel Rwanda', and he said that in Darfur, what was called during the Holocaust "genocide, never again" has become "again and again and again". That's a pretty grim warning.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I think it's a very grim warning, and in every case, there are specific matters that are different than every other case. There are always competing explanations. There are always assurances that it is different this time, that for some reason it's not going to expand or whatever. But the point it, these episodes have a lot in common. This is war by proxy. It's war underneath the visibility of the major powers. If they had formed up an army and moved in with tanks and artillery and 200,000 troops, it would've gotten worldwide attention in all probability. They don't have those kinds of resources, and they proved they don't need them, the Sudanese I'm talking about. What they are able to do is move out populations, intimidate whole regions of a country and throw a neighboring country into turmoil by supporting groups of irregular fighters, the so-called Janjaweed. And these, assisted by helicopters and other assets from the Sudanese forces, have been very effective in carrying out a policy of ethnic cleansing.

Ferai Chideya: But the Khartoum government says, or claims, that it is not endorsing the actions of the Janjaweed.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Yes, it, it claims that, but the fact is that we know that Khartoum's military assets have been engaged. We know that these people are connected to the government in Khartoum. It's that simple and clear-cut.

-snip

Ferai Chideya: Now the US has a complicated relationship with Sudan. We have mentioned energy, but also we've received valuable information from their Intelligence Minister, who was once Bin Ladin's personal handler and is considered an architect of the campaign in Darfur. Are we, as some reports would allege, a long Los Angeles Times series for example, enabling a genocide in exchange for intelligence in the war on terror?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I suspect that the intelligence is of some utility, but I also believe that we've got to be very careful not to buy off on and endorse regimes like this just because they'll provide intelligence. There's no telling how valuable the intelligence really is. We don't know what part of it is accurate, what's inaccurate, and more importantly, we don't know that we're getting all that could be gotten. So, in this case I think the intelligence is, is certainly useful, but if the government of Sudan wants to remain a government in the world in good standing, then it's got to obey international law. It hasn't done that.

Ferai Chideya: International law often comes down to the United Nations. Now Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice recently called for an increased UN presence in Sudan, Particularly in Darfur, and the House, here in the US, recently passed a bill calling for action in Darfur and economic sanctions. Is that enough, are these rumblings enough, to make something happen?

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: No, I don't think it is enough, because without a stronger international presence along the border, without US troops there to bring this mission home to world opinion, we won't have the leverage to stop the government of Sudan.

-more

Posted by awcd at 7:15 AM | Permalink

The intrepid Nick Lampson, who is trying to run the indicted Tom DeLay out of Texas's gerrymandered 22nd CD, joined General Clark for a conversation yesterday on Securing America's third podcast.

Here are clips from the transcript, but listen to the whole thing at Securing America.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: You put up a great defense but I don't think the people of America really understood then exactly what was going on in the country and I don't think people understood exactly what Tom DeLay's role was. I think it's more clear now, isn't it?

Nick Lampson: Sure it is. Absolutely. People are understanding that it was about control, it was about directing the nation into something that has given him a legacy of debt, corruption and neglect and it's not just in his district where there's been neglect, it's been across this nation. We're not…the Republican party under his leadership has seen the highest deficits and the highest debt in the history of our nation and that's what it has become.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: Basically he tried to run…he tried to run anybody that was associated with the Democrats out of Washington as I understand it, right? By denying them an opportunity to earn a living there in dealing with issues of public policy…

Nick Lampson: …which made the special interests driving the policy of the nation and it's what happened with the Medicare bill, as an example on November 22nd of 2003. If you remember, they kept the vote open for 3 hours. They were actually offering bribes on the floor of the House of Representatives.

-snip

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: These guys like Tom DeLay, they thrived on scaring the American people. Am I right that I haven't seen an elevated terrorist threat alert color-coded warning since John Kerry lost to George Bush in November of 2004?

Nick Lampson: Well we certainly hope that it doesn't start happening again, but who knows, maybe that's the politics at the time that it is important for them.

GENERAL WESLEY CLARK: I think that the greatest threat to the American people, what they really have to be worried about is the threat to liberty and democracy here in America and Nick we're real proud of you. You're running hard, you've got a great campaign organization. You've got people that really believe in you and yours is a race to see who can best take care and meet the needs, represent the feelings and the interests of the people of the 22nd Congressional District in Texas. This is a contest of national significance. This is Nick Lampson, 4-term US Congressman, fighting to regain the right to represent his people in Texas and our people across America. Nick, we're really proud of you. Now you've got a website, right?

Nick Lampson: I do indeed. It's www.lampson.com and Lampson is spelled L-a-m-p-s-o-n. We'd be honored if people would come and visit it, share the link with as many of their friends as they possibly can.

Posted by awcd at 4:00 PM |