That’s just one of the boneheaded things that Markos Moulitsas said in his appearance alongside Harold Ford, Jr. on Meet the Press. I don’t have the transcript but here’s a close paraphrase of what he said:

Whether we leave Iraq in 3 months, in 6 months or a year, it’s just a matter of semantics.

David Gregory, sitting in for Tim Russert, didn’t let that go, asking him how he could say that it’s just a matter of semantics. That led to another Moulitsas misstep. In explaining his statement, he said that, as a former military logistics man, he knew that they couldn’t leave immediately. He did say that (again, another paraphrase) “We all would like it if we could get out now.”

That’s a telling statement if ever I heard one. With Dick Durbin, Carl Levin and other pacifist Democrats talking last week about the military progress being made, voting for unilateral defeat in Iraq is political suicide. House Majority Whip James Clyburn echoed those thoughts last week:

“I think there would be enough support in that group to want to stay the course and if the Republicans were to stay united as they have been, then it would be a problem for us,” Clyburn said. “We, by and large, would be wise to wait on the report.”

With support for the war increasing, Moulitsas is putting himself on the wrong side of this issue. What he essentially said was that winning in Iraq wasn’t a priority for him. Let’s hope Michelle Malkin heard this and is capturing it on film forever.

Markos made another misstep, in my opinion, when he tried tying John Breaux’s writing the Bush tax cuts with the I-35 bridge collapse. He said that the bridge’s collapse wasn’t shocking when you cut taxes. He essentially said that cutting taxes meant not doing the necessary repairs of our nation’s infrastructure.

That’s utter nonsense.

Michael’s post about Jim Oberstar is a perfect example of why Moulitsas’ statement rings hollow:

“Oberstar wrote the legislation in 1991 that first allowed Highway Trust Funds to flow to states for bike trails. Until then, the 50 states combined for the past 20 years had spent only $40 million on bike trails.

The 1991 law required each state to have a bicycle coordinator, funded from the Highway Trust Fund, to have a state bicycling plan, and would be given the authority to use abandoned railway grade beds as bicycle, pedestrian and in-line skating trails. In the next six years, $1.3 billion was invested in bicycling facilities nationwide, Oberstar, an avid biker, said.”

Even more damning than Michael’s highlighting the wasteful spending that’s typical of transportation bills was this quote from President Bush’s news conference:

“From my perspective, the way it seems to have worked is that each member on that committee gets to set his or her own priority first, and then whatever is left over is spent through a funding formula,” Bush said.

In other words, the Bush tax cuts didn’t have anything to do with the bridge collapse. Moulitsas is using the tragedy in Minneapolis for political posturing, which is disgusting and reprehensible. There will be politics associated with part of the solution to this disaster. I’m not decrying that. That’s just part of the process.

There is a difference, though, between using this tragedy for political posturing and setting sensible policy as part of the political process. Politicians who openly attempt to gain politically will pay a price. Politicians who simply use the political process to set smart public policy will be rewarded.

Overall, I’d say that it’d be wise for Moulitsas to avoid making policy statements, especially if he’s on TV. He committed several gaffes this morning. In Beltway politics, a gaffe is defined as inadvertently saying what you really think. That’s what Moulitsas did this morning. The end result wasn’t pretty.

Technorati Tags: Daily Kos, Markos Moulitsas, Iraq War, Bridge Collapse, Bush Tax Cuts, Bike Trails, Earmarks, Harold Ford

Cross-posted at LetFreedomRingBlog

1. […] California Conservative notes the Chief Kossack’s dismissal of the debate over when to leave Iraq as “semantics.” […]

   Pingback by Michelle Malkin » Kos vs. Ford: Open thread Update: Video link added — August 12, 2007 @ 9:17 am

2. […] Original post by Gary Gross and software by Elliott Back […]

   Pingback by Markos: When We Leave Iraq Is “Semantics” at Conservative Times--Republican GOP news source. — August 12, 2007 @ 9:21 am

1. Maybe this country will start to wake up when imbeciles like this open their mouths. Steady decline for the Dem’s in the making. Watch and enjoy.

   Comment by John Houghton — August 12, 2007 @ 8:46 am

2. Ill tell you why the crats will win…

   1. Electronic Voting.
   2. Illegal aliens voting.
   3. No voter ID checks at all.

   How can anyone say any election from this point forward can ever be called a fair election?

   Civil War Now!

   Comment by Mitch the Bitch — August 12, 2007 @ 10:13 am

3. Moulitsas has to be correct. After all, it makes him feel morally superior, and if that’s not the definition of correct to a donkey/leftist/moonbat, I don’t know what is.

   Meanwhile, back where reality sucks but is faced by actual people who know right from wrong…

   Comment by Carlos — August 12, 2007 @ 2:43 pm

4. The withdrawal from Iraq will be by no means simple, but unavoidable. It seems clear today that the majority of Americans favor bringing our troops out of harm’s way. It has been voiced a political request to our politicians for disengaging our military people from that obscene intestine civil war and its rampant terrorist activity. There is also a sizeable portion of the country, and among them, the mainstream of the Democratic Party who state that Iraq should take responsibility of its own future, develop a stable country and a healthy society and institutions.

   At last, an increasing number of well intended Americans want to restore to the nation its credibility in the international arena, as well as to regain a feeling of common decency by stopping our involvement in that carnage and the obviously immoral use of torture, white phosphorus on civilian populations and the killing and maiming of innocent children.

   The differing positions about the withdrawal seem to reside in the various proposed dates for a timetable rather than on its possibility. The withdrawal will happen; either before or after the conclusion of the Bush administration, but its occurrence is certain. What seems to be uncertain, and puzzling to me, is the level of responsibility that we are prepared to undertake.

   When the US government, with the backing of the legislative branch of power and the undeniable support—albeit misled—from the population as a whole; decided to attack and invade Iraq against the UN advice and the opinion of the Weapons inspectors on the field, brought alongside the invasion the very same problems we are facing now.

   Despite all sound recommendations we invaded a sovereign country under the most indecent banner of all: preemptive war. With such an excuse we toppled a government we disliked, we created and allowed a court of the most dubious kind to perform the grotesque hanging of the captured ex-dictator to be broadcasted over the world to show the world which values we were putting forward.

   With the arrival of our troops, composed mainly by the poor and the meek, the hopeless and the newly arrived immigrants; we freed the path to the newly fueled partisan hate on the Iraqi soil. Most incredibly, with the corruption of our management and the corruption of the puppet government we put in power, we finally brought to Iraq the shock and awe of al-Qaeda.

   It is clear that we have to get out of Iraq. What should be clear as well is the immense debt we have contracted with the Iraqi people. I presume that it is sufficiently obvious both that we cannot solve the Iraqi turmoil by ourselves and the fact that we are responsible to help bring Iraq out of the crisis we have created. I believe the only chance we have to bring some comfort to our future generations from the hate and perils we are passing them as inheritance is to solve this conundrum.

   A possible solution after withdrawal might be for us to fund the UN to have non-American armed forces in Iraq to curtail the raise of sectarian terrorism, impose an enforceable peace keeping and allow the formation of a functional government. Secondly, we need to give the UN the necessary economic support for the reconstruction of Iraq with the express prohibition for American companies to gain contracts in that process. It is a moral imperative that we do not profit from it.

   This would need to be an extremely expensive, perhaps much more than what we spend in the reconstruction of Germany and Japan together; after all Iraq never attacked us. This perhaps could bring a long lasting stability in the region and with it some peace may come to our nation’s conscience.

   It seems to me improbable that we, as a people, will soon vote to increase taxes in order to save our future by financing the future of a people so alien to us; but I prefer to believe that eventually, we are going to assume the cost of our actions.

   Comment by Alonso Alvarez de Araya — August 12, 2007 @ 8:16 pm

5. “With the arrival of our troops, composed mainly by the poor and the meek, the hopeless and the newly arrived immigrants; we freed the path to the newly fueled partisan hate on the Iraqi soil.”

   I wonder how much facts hinder the thought processes of Sr. de Araya? The troops we sent are overwhelmingly educated and at least lower middle class. But then, why let little things like that interfere with abject hate?

   “Despite all sound recommendations we invaded a sovereign country under the most indecent banner of all: preemptive war.”

   I hate to break the news, but all wars are “preemptive”. Just ask the “invadee”.

   “I presume that it is sufficiently obvious both that we cannot solve the Iraqi turmoil by ourselves and the fact that we are responsible to help bring Iraq out of the crisis we have created.”

   And I presume it is sufficiently obvious that if our “friends” in the international community had a lick of sense they would be there in Iraq, too. Unfortunately, like the writer, they don’t have the sense to protect their own real national interests.

   “A possible solution after withdrawal might be for us to fund the UN to have non-American armed forces in Iraq to curtail the raise of sectarian terrorism, impose an enforceable peace keeping and allow the formation of a functional government. Secondly, we need to give the UN the necessary economic support for the reconstruction of Iraq with the express prohibition for American companies to gain contracts in that process. It is a moral imperative that we do not profit from it.”

   I thought we already were funding the vast majority of what the thieves and scoundrels at the U.N. already propose to bring spite and shame to our country. Why? Because we want everyone to love us!

   Stupid jerks. And vipers.

   Comment by Carlos — August 12, 2007 @ 8:59 pm

6. “With the arrival of our troops, composed mainly by the poor and the meek, the hopeless and the newly arrived immigrants; we freed the path to the newly fueled partisan hate on the Iraqi soil.”

   When in hell was the last time you visted a military base????

   Comment by T. A. Gray — August 13, 2007 @ 8:42 am

7. hi nice post, i enjoyed it

   Comment by Karlee — August 18, 2007 @ 8:20 pm