Reply #37: Yep--it was all a set-up, and MoveOn could have [View All]

[TwilightGardener]

wisely avoided it by saying something like, "It's sad that Bush has so little credibility left that he has to rely on the integity and credibility of the military leadership to keep selling his war to the American people." I would not have questioned the integrity of Petraeus before he even spoke to Congress--you can't call someone a liar until he officially lies, and politically, it's dumb to call someone in the military a liar anyway. MoveOn should have left it up to the Senate to highlight the contradictions and problems in GenP's testimony, and they actually did a good job of it, but that's not the story now, is it? No, it's all about the ad. We all might believe that he's a liar, but we have to understand that it probably won't play in Peoria. That's called political smarts, which is sorely lacking on the left. As far as Clark and Hagel goes, I clicked on the link in the OP, and Matt Stoller mischaracterized Hagel's comments on the Bill Maher show, when Hagel said that Bush using Petraeus to sell policy was "dishonest, hypocritical, dangerous, irresponsible"--he was talking about Bush, not Petraeus. Clark probably didn't realize that.