Word and deed  

Rice Grad, whom I've just added to the blogroll, jumps on Wesley Clark (also here) for the inconsistencies in his position on the Iraq war. Clark says he would have supported the resolution to authorize the president to use force if necessary, but he takes issue with the way the march to war played out. As Haggai Elitzur and Josh Marshall explain, there is not necessarily an inconsistency here. Authorizing the president to use force was a key negotiating step toward gettng Iraq to disarm - it was meant to bolster the president's hand before war became necssary. That Clark (or any other of the Dems who voted for it) supported a resolution to give the war powers doesn't somehow make him responsible for whatever heinous acts the president later perpetrated, nor should the president's illegal military adventurism have been predictable.