That vote on the Iraq War

An interesting comment from Sherman Yellen at the Huffington Post:

Hillary is smart as hell, and God knows we need smart more than ever to get us out of this Bush hell. And I have wanted to vote for a woman because life has taught me that most women are smarter, kinder, and altogether superior to most men. But sometimes Hillary reminds me of the bright girl who sat beside me in the third grade who kept her arm over her test paper so that I couldn't copy her answers. In fact, that's at the core of my vote for Obama. Hillary's brilliance. I'm sort of okay when it comes to making a political judgment, but not half as informed or as bright as Hillary Clinton. And yet I knew at that time before the war that voting to give Bush war powers was worse than a crime. And that's what her vote did, no matter how she tries to spin it. Everything Bush had done prior to that vote showed that he would abuse his power, that he was an arrogant, willful bully and thus a coward, and would use other men's lives to prove that he was a real man. And of course, that's what he did. And she had to have known that too. [my emphasis] Only she was preparing to run for the presidency and she wanted to seem properly bellicose to please the war crowd, and not risk being on the wrong side of history. It was just such a miscalculation that put her on the wrong side of history.

Otherwise, he says, he'd probably vote for Hillary, but as it stands, he's voting for Obama.

I remember the days leading up to that vote in Congress... I was living in Portland, Oregon, at the time and attended quite a few anti-war rallies. It seemed so obvious to me that Bush's war was a bad idea. And I've never quite been able to figure out the explanations of those who voted for it but now regret it. It was a problem for Kerry for years ago... and it's an issue that hasn't gone away.