Barack Obama has learned an early lesson on being careful of using words which can lead to the twisting of statements. Obama said the war “should have never been authorized, and should have never been waged, and on which we’ve now spent $400 billion, and have seen over 3,000 lives of the bravest young Americans wasted.”
Obama later said he immediately realized that he made a mistake said, “What I would say — and meant to say — is that their service hasn’t been honored because our civilian strategy has not honored their courage and bravery, and we have put them in a situation in which it is hard for them to succeed.”
While “wasted” has unfortunate connotations, Obama was right in his initial statement. Over 3000 died in an unnecessary war which is unlikely to succeed due to incompetent management. That is a waste of lives. The loss of their lives has not helped in the achievement of worthwhile goals as the war has acted to undermine our national security and strengthen al Qaeda and Iraq. The nation would have been better served if they had not been sent to Iraq. This is not the fault of the troops, as Republicans would claim Obama was saying, but the fault of the Bush administration.
Republicans have twisted Obama’s initial statement to sound like an attack on those who died just as they twisted Kerry’s joke on George Bush getting us stuck in Iraq as being an attack on the troops. As was the case with Kerry’s joke, Obama’s statement did not represent criticism of the troops or those who have been killed. It is a valid criticism of those who sent them to Iraq. Criticism of government leaders is not criticism of the troops who have no choice other than to follow the orders and go where sent.
