Political Snapshot

Don’t Concede Issues of National Security to McCain

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(Via MyDD.) I’ve said this before in the context of clean government and ethics reform, but the Democrats simply must not concede the issue of national security to John McCain. First of all, it’s fairly clear that either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama would be better stewards of America’s foreign policy and national security than McCain, who wants to leave American forces mired down in Iraq for a century and who continues to use hawkish language that could get us involved in an outright conflict with Iran. Secondly, and more important in the short run, giving McCain a pass on national security makes it a whole lot harder to beat him in a general election.With this all in mind, compare these two messages coming out of the Clinton and Obama campaigns just one day after McCain all but admitted he has no idea what’s going on in Iraq. First, here’s Reuters: 

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama belittled Republican John McCain on Wednesday for misidentifying Iraqi extremists, saying he fails to understand the war has emboldened U.S. enemies.   

First Read: 

Bill Clinton told voters in Northeastern Pennsylvania today that his wife is the only Democratic candidate “who can stack up against Sen. McCain on the national security issues,” and that a victory in this state could pave the way to her winning the nomination.  

Notice how one campaign goes directly after McCain and the other goes and directly backs up McCain on the issue of national security at the very time when McCain’s credentials on national security are being called into question. Remind me again which campaign is supposed to be the one that understands how to run an extended hardened effort against the GOP?Don’t think for a second that the comments from the Clinton campaign — from the former President and the candidate herself — suggesting that McCain is strong on national security, conceding the issue to him, aren’t going to hamper Democratic efforts up and down the ballot come November. It’s at times like these that you really have to ask, is it really worth it?