Reid - Incompetent
Filed under: Democratic party, Duncan Hunter, Harry Reid, Iraq, Republican Party, Senate, War — Michael van der Galien, Editor-in-Chief on April 26, 2007 @ 11:30 am CEST
David Broder wrote a very interesting column for the Washington Post about… Harry Reid. Broder’s thesis: Reid is just as incompetent as Alberto Gonzales.
Here’s a Washington political riddle where you fill in the blanks: As Alberto Gonzales is to the Republicans, Blank Blank is to the Democrats — a continuing embarrassment thanks to his amateurish performance.
If you answered ” Harry Reid,” give yourself an A. And join the long list of senators of both parties who are ready for these two springtime exhibitions of ineptitude to end.
President Bush’s highly developed tolerance for egregious incompetence in his administration may have met its supreme test in Attorney General Gonzales, who at various times has taken complete responsibility for the firing of eight U.S. attorneys and professed complete ignorance of the reasons for their dismissal. This demonstration of serial obfuscation so impressed the president that he rushed out to declare that Gonzales had “increased my confidence in his ability to do the job.”
[…]
On “Fox News Sunday,” Schumer offered this clarification of Reid’s off-the-cuff comment. “What Harry Reid is saying is that this war is lost — in other words, a war where we mainly spend our time policing a civil war between Shiites and Sunnis. We are not going to solve that problem. . . . The war is not lost. And Harry Reid believes this — we Democrats believe it. . . . So the bottom line is if the war continues on this path, if we continue to try to police and settle a civil war that’s been going on for hundreds of years in Iraq, we can’t win. But on the other hand, if we change the mission and have that mission focus on the more narrow goal of counterterrorism, we sure can win.”
Wait - so the war is lost but can still be won? That means that it’s not lost then, is it? If something is lost, one cannot possibly win it anymore.
Broder:
Everyone got that? This war is lost. But the war can be won. Not since Bill Clinton famously pondered the meaning of the word “is” has a Democratic leader confused things as much as Harry Reid did with his inept discussion of the alternatives in Iraq.
Broder then gives some examples of other, umh, slips of the tongue from Reid, like, o, say, calling George W. Bush a “loser;” Alan Greenspan, “one of the biggest political hacks we have here in Washington” (looks who’s talking); and saying that Frist has “no institutional integrity”, because Frist planned to leave the Senate to fulfill a term-limits pledge.
Of course, Reid later had to apologize for these remarks.
Josh Marshall rightfully points out that Gonzales is - still - much worse than Reid (for one thing, Gonzales has probably been lying about certain matters), but Broder’s main point still stands: Reid is incompetent. He is causing too much controversies, he is not careful enough, he is pandering to the base about matters like abortion, when exposed he contradicts himself and makes no sense whatsoever… He says things that do not just hurt him, but the Democratic Party as a whole…
I do not quite understand why the Democrats elected Reid to be their leader in the Senate. Surely there must be better candidates out there?
(Of course there are - the Dems also have some great politicians)
Also read this post by Ed Morrissey: he exposes and debunks, what he calls, “the five myths of Reid. In his update, he links to this story: Republican Duncan Hunter called on Reid to resign as Senate Majority Leader.
Boy o boy, how the Democrats are hurting themselves. It is unbelievable. Whether one agrees with what Republicans are saying and doing right now or not, one has to admit one thing: Reid has caused this problem himself by acting stupid.
I once heard that if the Democrats can be trusted to do one thing, it is to lose, when it seems impossible for them to do so. Is that what we see happening right now? Granted, the Republican noise machine is in full swing and jumps on everything that the Democrats do, but point is: the Dems should not provide political opponents with so much ammunition.
1 thomas joyce
April 26, 2007 @ 12:16 pm CESTdear Mr. van der Galien
Four points for your consideration:
first, as Think Progress points out, Mr. Broder refers to Schumer’s remarks to attack Reid. How is what Schumer said Reid’s responsibility?
second, considering Mr. Broder’s other recent columns, for example, President Bush’s strong showing and “comeback” in February of 2007, why pay attention to him? Mr. Broder’s facts, such as attributing the responsibility for Schumer’s remarks during an appearance on Fox to Reid or his assuring his reader’s that Democrats sat on their hands when General Clark talked about serving in the military, are stretches and mis-reporting.
and third, if you read Reid’s actual statement he said that he thought President Bush knew “the war is lost,” a sentiment shared by many observors and the majority of people in America. I think Mr. Broder, as so many people do, deliberately twists everything to give the right wing noise machine ammunition.
and fourth, whether it is Harry Reid or anyone else, what good does it do to our discourse to jump on isolated phrases and remarks as if the only way we Americans can think is in slogans and group speak?
By the way, the notion that Reid is always apologizing has been thouroughly debunked, captain Ed or no.
Thomas Joyce
2 Brent
April 26, 2007 @ 12:58 pm CESTThomas,
Don’t worry . . .Gonzalez hasn’t yet fired the U.S. Attorney still quietly working on Reid and his Abramoff connections.
His shady Nevada land deals alone should disqualify him from the Senate, much less leadership.
Unless the best you can do is “oh yea, well at least our corrupt guy isn’t as bad as your corrupt guy.
So many Democrats, so little inspiration . . .
3 Nobody
April 26, 2007 @ 1:04 pm CESTThanks Michael. Maybe you understand just a little bit my outrage at what Reid said.
It is the most amazingly incompetent thing I’ve ever heard on the floor of the Senate since I’ve been alive.
Even his own party is trying to distance themselves from it and he is their LEADER!!!!
4 Marlowe
April 26, 2007 @ 1:10 pm CESTHeheheh…Michael, you speak of the great Republican noise machine…yet we see here (as with Pelosi’s ME trip) quite an extensive “pushback” operation.
Thomas…you said: “By the way, the notion that Reid is always apologizing has been thoroughly debunked, captain Ed or no.”
How has it been debunked? By who? Reid has, in fact, apologized on numerous occasions (e.g., Bush being a loser; when he accused all Republican senators of beeng corrupt and without integrity). At times, when he compared Sen. Santorum to a mafiosi (Santorum being Italian American) he has conceded that he went “too far” but refused to apologize.
You are simply repeating MediaMatters/Think Progress talking points without proof. Reid has been forced to apologize numerous times…this is a matter of public record…and you cannot wish this away.
Schumer’s response is not Reid’s responsibilty, and Broder never implied as much. Schumer is a leading Democrat, and he clearly found Reid’s partisan language excessive and difficult to defend.
“…whether it is Harry Reid or anyone else, what good does it do to our discourse to jump on isolated phrases and remarks as if the only way we Americans can think is in slogans and group speak?
Uhh…so Democrats have never mocked Bush for his “isolated phrases and remarks”…his Bushisms?
Reid should not have said: “the war is lost” That single phrase has resonated across the Middle Eastern media.
It was a mistake. Reid and liberals should admit as much.
Instead, the liberal view is that Democrats can never make any mistakes as long as they are attacking Bush.
By any means necessary….
5 Marlowe
April 26, 2007 @ 1:19 pm CESTI should add that I think Reid has been a very successful pol for the Democrats. He clearly outmanuevered the hapless leadership of Frist in the senate for years.
However, he clearly is focused on partisan advantage over the national good.
A half century ago GOP Senator Vandenberg put aside partisanship - as advocated by many in the GOP - to support President Truman at the opening of the Cold War against communism. The Democrats today clearly are of of Vandenberg’s stature.
6 Marlowe
April 26, 2007 @ 1:20 pm CESTCorrection: “The Democrats today clearly are not of Vandenberg’s stature.”
7 Michael van der Galien
April 26, 2007 @ 1:22 pm CESTBesides Marlowe: these are not “isolated phrases”. They are all part of a pattern.
Also: what Broder said about Bush is completely irrelevant. We are now talking about Reid, not Bush.
8 Nobody
April 26, 2007 @ 1:46 pm CESTYou have to look at what is being said and done in the context of what has transpired in the last 4 years.
When you do that. When you look at the overall picture then you perhaps can grasp the magnitued of what Pelosi did going to Syria. What Hoyer did meeting with terrorists in Egpyt. What Reid said.
The parts of the whole sometimes get lost. Examining the parts with the whole in mind puts an entire new light on every subject.
I have spent the last 2 days ranting and raving. But my rant was not without its purpose.
Think about it Michael. When I called the Democrats cowards and traitors. You rebuked me and told me to tone it down.
Yet daily. Daily the left calls Bush and the Republicans and Christians…..Nazi’s, Fascist’s, Warmonger’s, American Taliban, Fuhrer, Oberfuhrer, Herr, Chimperor, King, Emperor, Idiot-in-chief…..and a thousand other names and nary a response from you or ANYONE.
My outrage here was actually to prove a point Michael.
I firmly believe that the left has embarked upon political correctness. That it is a one way street. That if we on the right say ugly things we are bigots and are shouted down.
We are told my moderators to shut up. Yet the Left has used these words so often, and have refused to relent, to be cowed by moderators.
That we have grown to accept their usage in posts as normal. Nazi is accepted terms to describe Bush. Traitor is not an accepted term to describe Reid.
They are both not true. But Michael you proved my point by telling me to tone my language down. The outrage on the left in using the word traitor was apparent yesterday when I used the word traitor yet they use the words Nazi, Fascist and on and on daily and nary a peep.
That in and of itself is how and why I keep saying the left has defined the argument, set the ground rules and the right is left with no weapons in which to use in the debate.
And once the argument begins to make sense. The left has a new catch phrase now. Strawman. (Speak to the hand, your point is a lie mentality.)
9 mvdg
April 26, 2007 @ 1:52 pm CEST10 jpe
April 26, 2007 @ 2:31 pm CESTIt was a verbal gaffe. The point is that he didn’t say anything that most other politicians in both parties haven’t already said (Bush has said the same thing himself).
This story tells us virtually nothing about Reid, but does say quite a bit about the press corps and the GOP.
11 jpe
April 26, 2007 @ 2:33 pm CESTMeh. Neither were the Republicans of Vandenberg’s “stature” during the Balkans, etc. The lesson I take from that isn’t that the GOP is just as bad (which is what I’d argue if I were of the Broder school of bogus equivalence), but that the Vandenberg doctrine isn’t very useful, and is likely an historical anomaly.
12 Interested
April 26, 2007 @ 3:18 pm CESTThe guy that gave Clinton his years of economic stability (for the most part).
Nobody
I can say here that I havn’t seen peeps call Bush a Nazi without being told to tone it down. Of course here is a lot different due to the reduced number of trollers. But I do have to agree with the first part of your 2nd quoted above. You hear it enough there is going to be a time that it’s desensitized.
jpe
Oh c’mon - are you going to portray yourself as that transparent? Can you possibly say with a straight face that you never pounced on anybody on the right when they made verbal gaffe’s? Please. If your going to apply one standard to one side, at least have the integrity to apply the same level to the other side.
Actually it says a lot about the Democrat party.
13 Michael van der Galien
April 26, 2007 @ 3:22 pm CESTJPE: are you actually saying that Bush said that the war in Iraq is lost? Bush? The same person who constantly advocates being positive, who cosntantly says that, although mistakes have been made, it can still be ‘won’, Iraq can still be stable and democratic, etc.?
I might have missed important news here, but I have never heard Bush say “the war is lost”.
14 jpe
April 26, 2007 @ 3:32 pm CESTHe didn’t say the war was lost; when you read all of Reid’s quote, he’s saying that the war can’t be won solely through military means. We need politics, diplomacy, etc. And Bush has said the same thing.
Reid made a gaffe, but the substance of what he was saying is just conventional wisdom.
15 jpe
April 26, 2007 @ 3:33 pm CEST(by that first sentence, I meant that Bush hasn’t uttered [in public, at least] the phrase ‘the war is lost])
16 mvdg
April 26, 2007 @ 3:47 pm CESTNono, he said that the war is lost and then backed off a bit. Nice try, but too late. He tried to do some damage controll, that’s it.
That’s akin to saying “the Democrats are lousy, cowardly, unamerican, unpatriotic anti-semites.”
- “really?”
- “well, I meant to say that their proposed policies aren’t always the best ones to implement.”
17 Interested
April 26, 2007 @ 3:47 pm CESTheh - we might be able to get Schumer in to explain it.
18 jpe
April 26, 2007 @ 3:48 pm CESTHave you read the whole quote, or just that single line provided by the MSM?
When you read the whole thing, it becomes perfectly clear that this whole kerfuffle is manufactured and, frankly, dishonest.
19 jpe
April 26, 2007 @ 3:59 pm CESTOriginal quote:
“I believe … that this war is lost, and this surge is not accomplishing anything, as is shown by the extreme violence in Iraq this week….I know I was the odd guy out at the White House, but I told [Bush] at least what he needed to hear….I believe the war at this stage can only be won diplomatically, politically and economically”
20 mvdg
April 26, 2007 @ 4:17 pm CESTNo I read the whole thing and he still said it. “The war is lost.” The he probably understood that he should not has said that and gave a more nuanced view. However, he already said it. The troops in Iraq hear it and will wonder why the hell it is they are doing the fighting over there then, Al Qaeda in Iraq will hear it and will use it for propaganda purposes, Reid has made the Democrats look like Defeatists, he has made himself and the DP vulnerable for attacks…
Yeah, he screwed up bigtime and should not have said it.
Now - perhaps it is time for you to admit that, hey, you know what, Reid said something stupid.
Also - your attitude, I am sorry to say, makes people go after Reid more aggressively. If people like you would just admit that Reid acted stupid, it would make the controversy go away.
I wonder when people will ever learn this lesson: come clean. Admit to having made mistakes. Explain what you meant. Apologize.
And you’re good to go again.
21 jpe
April 26, 2007 @ 4:25 pm CESTIt was a verbal gaffe; verbal gaffes are stupid. I already said that (although I didn’t think I’d have to make clear the implicit premise that verbal gaffes are stupid and shouldn’t be made).
But what I’m noticing is that no one has noticed that Reid’s point is identical to that made by virtually every other politician in Washington. In fact, everything I’ve read suggests that no one knows about the rest of his statement. If one is going to argue against Reid, it should at least be an honest argument (eg your argument above that the words themselves have a magic-like effect on troop morale)
That’s fine. The right is fairly rabid at the moment, and since I think the american public is a fairly keen group, I’m comfortable that the GOP’s caterwauling will backfire on them.
22 mvdg
April 26, 2007 @ 4:31 pm CESTWell, I disagree with you on that. See the downfalling polls of the Democrats.
Also, no not everybody has said that. The war cannot be won by military means only, that’s for sure, but military success is a major part of bringing stability to Iraq. Without safety / security, there can be no peace.
23 jpe
April 26, 2007 @ 4:41 pm CESTTraitor!
I’m sure you saw that coming.
At any rate, I highly doubt Reid disagrees with you. See, this is what kills me about contemporary discourse; that you seem to agree substantively with Reid is less important than the occasional verbal blunder.
That’s politics, I suppose (and the GOP has been on the receiving end of that quite a bit themselves, and it’s just as lame when DKos or some hacky DC pundit does it to them). Ah well.
24 thomas joyce
April 26, 2007 @ 5:03 pm CESTdear Mr. van der Gelien and dear Marlowe and anyone else who would like to speak and not shout:
Some points I hope you will consider
1. Forgive me for not sending you the link, but I am a citizen and neither a blogger nor activist so I don’t know how to do so. From Time’s site here is the full quote, without elipses:
“I believe myself that the secretary of state, secretary of defense and — you have to make your own decisions as to what the president knows — (know) this war is lost and the surge is not accomplishing anything as indicated by the extreme violence in Iraq yesterday,” said Reid, D-Nev.
That is much different than saying “This war is lost” because Reid thinks that the President and everyone else think the war is lost but cannot and will not say so. I hope you see that this is different than asserting without such context that this thing is hopeless.
2. Yes, marlowe, it is wrong, stupid, and self defeating when Democrats take Bush’s statements out of context. In 1982 or so a great book by Neal Postman asserted eponymously that we Americans were “Amusing ourselves to death.” The whole structure of finding a phrase that can encapsulate your supposed enemies and jumping on every phrase as if it was the ONLY thing said is sad for our country and devastating to me, because I love writing, poetry, drama, novels, and culture besides loving my home, my America and all of your Americas, the only place I ever feel at home or want to call home.
3. Yes, Reid has shot from the hip and apologized, and yes, his remarks were stupid and lazy thinking and speaking, so he should have. However, not one of the examples that have been cited were from his tenure as Majority Leader. Mr. Broder is arguing that there is an equivalence between an Attorney General who has offered no explanation except a faulty memory for the way his Department has been turned into something shameful. Many, many non-partisan Americans have great doubts about the independence of AG Gonzales from the White House’s political structures, and many, many people watched his performance and thought (as I did) “this man Gonzales is lying and stupid and incompetent.” We can do better.
I have tried to speak and write honestly and without rancor and if you read and listened I look forward to hearing from you.
Tom Joyce
25 Interested
April 26, 2007 @ 5:26 pm CESTNo, it’s not. Your missing some more of Reid’s quotes.
That quote is from a really left blog.
http://blog.thedemocraticdaily.com/?p=5652
Like it, or not, he said what he said and just as the left piles on the right for - what was the term - oh - “Gaffe” the right does it to the left as well.
The Dems have quite the history of “gaffes” when they discuss the military.
26 daveinboca
April 26, 2007 @ 5:28 pm CESTThomas Joyce should go back to class and take elementary thinking lessons. And examine his conscience to see how he has drifted away from logic and rationality. [spellcheck: “rancour”]
The larger point is that made above that Vandenberg’s “politics stops at the water’s edge” has no meaning for the scandalous grifters now representing the Dem party. Broder is a liberal of the sort before the sixties turned them into a Blue Team support squad for cultural degeneration.
A Blue Plate special of drugs, defeatism, dysfunction, and generational decline. Broder may be a living fossil, but he harks back to a better time for Dems, the generation before they sluiced themselves down the chute.
27 mvdg
April 26, 2007 @ 5:49 pm CESTThat is unacceptable. You might disagree with Thomas’ comment, I know I do, more about that later, but ad hominem attacks are not to be tolerated. I greatly appreciate you commenting here, you normally leave great comments, but leave the ad hominem’s out.
Thomas: “I believe myself that the secretary of state, secretary of defense and — you have to make your own decisions as to what the president knows — (know) this war is lost and the surge is not accomplishing anything as indicated by the extreme violence in Iraq yesterday.”
Yes and no that does not make the case any different. He simply says “this war is lost and I think that Bush thinks so as well.” In fact, one could argue, it’s even worse. He doesn’t just say “the war is lost,” he says “and Bush is lying about it.”
I generally agree with this part of your comment. However, I believe it not to be so in this case. This isn’t a case of that, at least, not entirely. Mostly, the foundation, it’s Reid saying that the war is lost and that nothing can be accomplished militarily while American - and foreign - soldiers are dying in Iraq to bring about security and stability.
28 Nobody
April 26, 2007 @ 6:04 pm CESTCall it a strawman. Call it what you want.
Think about what he is saying.
The war is lost.
What does that imply?
Well I for one think it implies bring the boys home from Iraq. Bring the boys home from Afghanistan. Hope we can talk Iran into not attacking Iraq. Hope we can prevent the fall of Pakistan with nice verbal words of encouragement.
The DEMOCRATS HAVE SURRENDERED!!
Its official…..The WAR..not the BATTLE…but the WAR is lost.
Bring the boys home and apologize.
Assumption. Cowards. Appeasers. Incapable of dealing with foreign affairs without apologizing for being Americans.
Harry Reid. Do us all a favor. Retire. You are no longer Relevant in National Politics.
29 thomas joyce
April 26, 2007 @ 6:09 pm CESTdear interested (and, a note to daveinboca)
Thank you for providing the link, but the quote that you referred to still says what Time reported Reid said. Click on the link, and you will see that after “I believe” there is an elipse, indicating that the writer is leaving out part of what Reid said. The part the blogger left out is exactly what Time reported.
The blog you referenced features the quote this way (I am inserting verbatim the excised part exactly where it occurs):
“I believe [writer leaves out this passage: “myself that the secretary of state, secretary of defense and — you have to make your own decisions as to what the president knows — (know)”] this war is lost and the surge is not accomplishing anything as indicated by the extreme violence in Iraq yesterday,” said Reid, D-Nev.
Uninterrupted, here is what Reid said:
“I believe myself that the secretary of state, secretary of defense and — you have to make your own decisions as to what the president knows — (know) this war is lost and the surge is not accomplishing anything as indicated by the extreme violence in Iraq yesterday,” said Reid, D-Nev.
That is the quote and I think (again) that you can see that it is different from what the media and the blogs are reporting.
We all need to practice accuracy and humility and I am pointing this out here because I think there is a hunger for moderation. If Reid said flat out. with no ellipses that bring a context to what he said, I would acknowledge that he did .
I would extend my deep apologies to daveinboca for misspelling “rancor”, but the Dictionary spelling that I used is correct. If that is an example of why I need to “go back to class and take elementary thinking lessons,” perhaps he will take my suggestion that a discourse that reduces the other person’s argument to “Blue Team support squad for cultural degeneration,” while clever, advances no argument and convinces nobody. Perhaps it is not meant to convince anyone but simply to denounce, but, if so, that would be very sad. I would also say that criticisms of misspellings are strange when they are based on actual misspellings, but when they are not, as in this rancor, they make one feel ashmaed to be human and subject to such smallness of spirit.
To interested I would say that of course the left piles on over gaffes and I think it is absurd and wrong and immoral. My point is that such piling on is not thinking nor is it acceptable discourse. The author I cited approvingly (for Entertaining Ourselves To Death) was pigeon-holed as a conservative/Conservative. I am asking, what good does this way of arguing over things do us?
Thank you for commenting.
Tom Joyce
30 Marlowe
April 26, 2007 @ 6:15 pm CESTThomas…
It was good to read that you agree Reid makes mistakes.
We clearly disagree, but moderation is key to debates.
I have been struck by the absolutism that characterizes the blogosphere in this “pushback” phase…no yielding, not even an inch. I have criticized Bush, and I know Michael has as well…but the defences of Pelosi and Reid are straight out of “300″. No retreat, no surrender.
It seems we are in the midst of a concerted blogswarming of Broder - it reminds me of the similar swarming of the WashPost’s comment page when a columnist observed that Reid had dubious land dealings himself in re Abramoff.
There is clearly a level of organization behind the Democrats pushback…Paul Begala now has a piece up at Huff and Puff attacking Broder.
We saw a similar display recently over Pelosi’s botched ME trip.
Michael made reference to the Republican Noise Machine at the opening of this post…but clearly it is the Democratic Noise Machine at work here.
They know this could be a problem - what with Pelosi refusing to meet Petraeus (yet claiming Iraq is the No.1 issue) then deciding on a phonecall when the media took her to task; Reid claiming he simply doesn’t believe Petraeus - so the swarm is out to nip it in the bud.
If we make a mistake…no problem…just shout the critics down!
31 Interested
April 26, 2007 @ 6:19 pm CESTAgain, he said exactly what he said. If your concerned about accuracy than you do need to see his text. This text came on the heels of his saying he wouldn’t believe the commander if he stated there was progress or not.
you cannot now attempt to take what he said out of context to shine some sort of light on his believing that we are winning? I do not believe anyone on any political spectrum accused him of saying we’re winning.
32 mvdg
April 26, 2007 @ 6:25 pm CESTMarlowe: I agree completely with your comment. The Democratic noise machine is in full swing right now. Quite remarkable this, I have to say.
It never ceases to amaze me that both sides do the exact same things, while denying that they do it themselves, they accuse the other side of doing it.
Both do it. Both pretend they don’t. Both act as if it’s just the other side and people even fall for it.
Lets face it people: both sides do it and both should called out on it when they do.
And - like Marlow I appreciate Thomas’ moderate comments.
Nobody: I told you this yesterday, tone it down. Enjoy your comments but this is the last time that I leave a warning.
33 Interested
April 26, 2007 @ 6:34 pm CESTAmen on that crap.
oops I didn’t mean to say “crap” that was a mere gaffe
34 mvdg
April 26, 2007 @ 6:35 pm CESTWatch it. No room for any giraffes here.
35 Nobody
April 26, 2007 @ 8:26 pm CESTThe difference here is that the democrats have defined the debate for about 3 to 4 years now. They are getting ancy and they are making mistakes. They are having to face up to the crowd they stirred up (antiwar) and now its time to pay the piper.
It is time to hit back and hit back hard. It is time to start making them pay for every word they mispeak. It is time to put the democrats on the defenisve. To make them talk about the issues.
To make them explain to me why they think the war is lost. Why America and the world can trust them in the White House.
Its time to make them answer for this Antiwar rhetoric that I believe even they have managed to let get out of hand.
Time to pay the piper. I for one am not going to let them get off scott free with more of their deflections…..Bu..Bu..But Bush Lied.