John McCain asked in 2008 during his victory speech in the Wisconsin primary: “Will we risk the confused leadership of an inexperienced candidate who once suggested invading our ally, Pakistan?”
Ally may not be quite the right word although we kept convincing ourselves that is the necessary word. It turned out our country did risk it and hey, look what happened.
PolitiFact has now posted the full text of the question and answer from the Oct. 7, 2008 debate in Nashville, Tenn., which was moderated by Tom Brokaw. The video of the debate is here via hulu.
Excerpts:
TOM BROKAW: Next question for Senator Obama. It comes from the F Section, and it’s from Katie Hamm. Katie?
KATIE HAMM: Should the United States respect Pakistani sovereignty and not pursue al Qaeda terrorists who maintain bases there, or should we ignore their borders and pursue our enemies, like we did in Cambodia during the Vietnam War?
SEN. OBAMA: Well, Katie, it’s a terrific question.
And we have a difficult situation in Pakistan. I believe that part of the reason we have a difficult situation is because we made a bad judgment going into Iraq in the first place when we hadn’t finished the job of hunting down bin Laden and crushing al Qaeda.
So what happened was we got distracted, we diverted resources, and ultimately bin Laden escaped, set up base camps in the mountains of Pakistan in the northwest provinces there.
[...]
And if we have Osama bin Laden in our sights and the Pakistani government is unable or unwilling to take them out, then I think that we have to act, and we will take them out.
We will kill bin Laden. We will crush al Qaeda. That has to be our biggest national security priority.
He walked that talk and without the cheesy banner, too. Perhaps our "ally" simply thought he was politicking, eh? This actually turned us briefly into a bard of sorts. A wordy exercise below fresh (then updated) from the oven --
That's my president, Barack; don't care that he's black
Or that his middle name is Hussein for that's not a sin
He's as American as McCain born in the Panama Canal Zone
And while the guy with a fox on his head had to eat
His socks over the long form whatchamacallit,
Barack Hussein Obama marched into the history books
As the man who got Bin Laden in old Paranoidistan
Go thank President A,B,C,D ...but not O for the catch but
We all know who ordered the "kill team" and he--
Did not have a mission accomplished banner
Draped like an empty swagger behind him
And the sour guy with the fox on his hair
Is now remembered best as the magnificent
Seth Meyers' punchline with a tacky hairline.
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