3 salient points that John Edwards missed that could have killed Chene

[othermeans]

First when Cheney said that Senator Edwards denigrating the coalition allies the Iraqis, Senator Edwards should have pointed out that they were and are not members of the coalition.

Second Senator Edwards should have continued to hammer Cheney on his vote to kill the same redundant weapons systems that Senator Kerry voted against.

Third Senator Edwards allowed Cheney to two-face on the gay issue and escape. He should have pointed out the hypocrisy in his statement. If nothing else he would have made the fundamentalists a little more uncomfortable in their unwavering support of Bush/Cheney

[Don Claybrook]

1. r.e. no-gay-marriage amendment

I think Edwards had to let it lie. Cheney was very smart in simply thanking Edwards for his kind words, with no further response. For Edwards to push further would've been counter-productive. As things stand now, I have no doubt that Edwards educated a good number of homophobic right-wingers who were not previously aware that Cheney had a lesbian daughter. I think JE left that one where it needed to be left, given the circumstances.

[CityHall]

2. Disagreeing with Bush

Should have hit Cheney for contradicting Bush, even though he tried to say he supported the President's policies. With Bush's need for "loyalty," that would make one or both of them upset.

But this thing about states not recognizing each others' marriages is wek as hell.

[tmooses]

5. Cheney's "no comment"

to Edward's point on states making decisions on gay marriage was pretty much all he could do without contradicting Bush and the religious righties.

[othermeans]

6. In retrospect you're probably right.

I've talked to many RWs that didn't know Cheney's daughter was gay and that she was in charge of his reelection campaign. Two of them accused me of being a liar.

But like you said millions of fundies are going to be disappointed when they find out that their hero has a gay daughter.

[Guaranteed]

3. The FREAKING $87B!!

The TWO THREATENED VETOES!! God, NEITHER of them mentioned that. Stupid, stupid stupid.

[eleanor]

4. There was a 4th

When Cheney spoke of needing the coalition of the "Brits, Germans & French" in dealing with Iran. I was waiting for Edwards to jump on him as to why the Germans and French were important there and not important in Iraq. Hopefully, this will be used against him in the future ...

[othermeans]

7. I thought of that one too but I thought the little dig about Halliburton

doing business with Iran was even better

[w4rma]

8. He did the first. He did what he could with his time on the 2nd.

I agree with post #1 on the 3rd. He did exactly what he needed to do. Frankly I think alot of folks don't care about hypocracy, anyway.

[eridani]

9. And a 4th one--

JE should have crammed this 1992 quote right up the Dick's face--

"And the question in my mind is how many additional American casualties is Saddam worth? And the answer is not that damned many. So I think we got it right, both when we decided to expel him from Kuwait, but also when the President made the decision that we had achieved our objectives and we were not going to get bogged down in the problems of trying to take over and govern Iraq."

[othermeans]

10. Wow! That's better than Scowcroft's quote in Bush I's bio

"While we hoped that popular revolt or coup would topple Saddam, neither the U.S. nor the countries of the region wished to see the breakup of the Iraqi state. We were concerned about the long-term balance of power at the head of the Gulf. Trying to eliminate Saddam, extending the ground war into an occupation of Iraq, would have violated our guideline about not changing objectives in midstream, engaging in "mission creep," and would have incurred incalculable human and political costs. Apprehending him was probably impossible. We had been unable to find Noriega in Panama, which we knew intimately. We would have been forced to occupy Baghdad and, in effect, rule Iraq. The coalition would instantly have collapsed, the Arabs deserting it in anger and other allies pulling out as well. Under those circumstances, furthermore, we had been self-consciously trying to set a pattern for handling aggression in the post-cold war world. Going in and occupying Iraq, thus unilaterally exceeding the U.N.'s mandate, would have destroyed the precedent of international response to aggression we hoped to establish. Had we gone the invasion route, the U.S. could conceivably still be an occupying power in a bitterly hostile land. It would have been a dramatically different--and perhaps barren--outcome."

http://www.thememoryhole.org/mil/bushsr-iraq.htm