White House slams Howard Dean’s comments on Iraq
As expected, the White House fired back at Howard Dean, saying that Dr. Dean had to answer for his comments in an interview with San Antonio radio station WOIA.
White House spokesman Scott McClellan said President George W. Bush is “focused on our plan for victory,” and will give the second in a series of speeches on Wednesday about the way forward in Iraq looking ahead to December 15 elections. “I think that on the eve of historic elections, it sends the wrong message to our troops. America wants our troops to win and we have a plan to help them succeed and we know that they will,” McClellan said. He suggested Dean had some explaining to do. “I think those are remarks for him to clarify,” McClellan said, calling it “absolutely the wrong message to send to our troops when we are on the verge of historic accomplishments.”
In a strange way, I suspect that this won’t cause Dr. Dean to explain his actions but rather will cause him to fire back yet again. If there’s anything as certain as death and paying taxes, it’s that Dr. Dean doesn’t explain himself at the command of a Republican, although he’ll quickly retreat if confronted by a Sunday morning political talk show host.
The truth is that I think Scott McLellan’s comment was designed to bait Dean into making even more outrageous comments.
In a separate but related article, RNC Chairman Ken Mehlman issued a press release taking Dr. Dean to task. Here’s that release:
“In predicting that America will lose the war in Iraq, Howard Dean is the latest national Democrat leader to embrace retreat and defeat in the central front in the War on Terror. His outrageous prediction sends the wrong message to our troops, the enemy, and the Iraqi people just 10 days before historic elections. Democrats across the nation should stand up and reject the pessimism of their chairman and strategy of defeat by their Congressional leaders.”
It’s long past time for Democrats to “reject the pessimism of their chairman and strategy of defeat by their Congressional leaders.” The truth is that there’s a significant part of the Democratic Party that are more radical than Dean. (Talk about scary.)
Here’s what Dean said in his WOAI interview:
- “The idea that we’re going to win the war in Iraq is an idea which is just plain wrong.”
- “I’ve seen this before in my life. This is the same situation we had in Vietnam.”
- “The White House wants us to have a permanent commitment to Iraq. This is an Iraqi problem. President Bush got rid of Saddam and that was a great thing…”
- “I think we need a strategic redeployment over a period of two years…Bring the 80,000 National Guard and Reserve troops home immediately. They don’t belong in a conflict like this anyway…We need a force in the Middle East, not in Iraq but in a friendly neighboring country…”
When Dean says that “We need a force in the Middle East, not in Iraq but in a friendly neighboring country”, is Dr. Dean saying that Iraq isn’t a friendly country? I wonder. I’m sure that the Iraqis wonder, too.
UPDATE:
Michelle Malkin: Howard The Coward Dean
A round-up of commentary on the screamer…
Political Teen: Howard Dean Says We Won’t Win In Iraq
Cross-posted at LetFreedomRing
December 6th, 2005 at 12:27 pm
[...] White House spokesman Scott McClellan responded to Howard Dean’s assertion that the U.S. military can’t win in Iraq(via CA Conservative): “I think that on the eve of historic elections, it sends the wrong message to our troops. America wants our troops to win and we have a plan to help them succeed and we know that they will,” McClellan said. He suggested Dean had some explaining to do. “I think those are remarks for him to clarify,” McClellan said, calling it “absolutely the wrong message to send to our troops when we are on the verge of historic accomplishments.” [...]
December 6th, 2005 at 1:09 pm
Howard Dean is an idiot, and I don’t waste such words on just anyone. He’s a total moron, and I don’t believe in name calling. My husband is a soldier who served in Operation Iraqi Freedom for a year, starting in Kuwait, donning chemical suits (remember when Saddam threatened to use WMD on our troops in Kuwait while they were waiting to enter Iraq? I guess that was Pres. Bush’s fault, too) Since I have hundreds of stories from him and all our many friends in the 82nd, 101st, 4th ID and 1st AD, I know that Dean doesn’t know WHAT he’s talking about. We also have several friends in Iraq, particularly Baghdad and Mosul, who e-mail and call us, keeping us abreast of goings on. Dean is an idiot who’s never been to Iraq… even Dems who have been there are not as reckless in their verbiage as Dean. Hillary has been there several times, including when my husband was there in ‘03-04, and hecklers chastized her for not being hard enough on Iraq… she has somewhat of a conscience.
For Dean to say, on the eve of yet a THIRD election in Iraq when the first two have been extremely successful, shows he’s a total boob who deserves to not be heard.
December 6th, 2005 at 1:12 pm
By the way, when Iraqis here the likes of Dean and Kerry talk, they are frightened. Saddam is still alive and in a jail cell waiting to be rescued. Iraqis HATE the UN (who virtually raped them with the Oil for Food scandal), Cindy Sheehan and John Kerry.
December 6th, 2005 at 3:41 pm
By the way, it should be “hear”, not “here”.
:)
December 6th, 2005 at 3:45 pm
That’s ok. We don’t spelchek comments around hear. ;)
December 6th, 2005 at 5:17 pm
Dean: U.S. can’t win Iraq war
Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean is drawing GOP fire after telling a Texas radio s
December 6th, 2005 at 8:26 pm
Hey, I was being passionate when I wrote it! Emotion doesn’t have spell check… does it?
December 6th, 2005 at 9:33 pm
Knot that eye know of, it doesn’t…LOL
I’m just being a smartaleck.
December 7th, 2005 at 8:12 am
Too bad the media isn’t fact checked. Then the people wouldn’t have Dean’s rants taken as true facts, nor Kerry’s lies.
December 7th, 2005 at 8:17 am
PC, If the media did its job right and fact-checked its work, then you wouldn’t have seen the proliferation of blogs. Think about it: If blogs didn’t fact-check themselves, and the Agenda Media, you wouldn’t have the privilege of reading our great group of writers here at California Conservative.
The ‘if only’ here would deprive you of us. :)
December 8th, 2005 at 9:10 am
I am an American Soldier with 29 years combined service. I served in desert Storm, Bosnia, and Operation Iraqi Freedom. I have a message for moonbats like Howard Dean;
Your proctologist called. He found your head.
SFC Cheryl McElroy
US ARMY