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6 tweets,
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1. Obviously, Biden claiming falsely that he turned 180 degrees and opposed the Iraq war the moment it started (npr.org/2019/09/02/756…) is bad. But here's what really bugs me...
2. Like many politicians, he wants to claim that he was right about this all along, i.e. that he wanted inspections before the war but then opposed the war when it actually became a war. Again, this is false.
3. He says that his only mistake was trusting George W. Bush when Bush told him he just wanted inspections. This is utterly bonkers. EVERYONE knew at the time Bush was hell-bent on getting his war. "I believed Bush" means you were the most naive person in America.
4. Of course that's not true. Like many other Dems - including Kerry, H.Clinton, Reid, Schumer - Biden didn't want to look weak and worried the war would be popular (which it was for a while). That's why they voted for it.
5. But now, his "I was right all along" baloney prevents Biden from telling us what he learned from his part in the worst foreign policy disaster in American history. What does it say about the use of force and the projection of American power? About all those unknown unknowns?
6. About how Americans respond to propaganda on foreign threats? About the pressures politicians face at key moments and how they respond to them? On all this Biden has nothing to say because he has to keep claiming he saw it all perfectly at the time. Which he didn't. /end
