This was the conversation as he was getting ready for bed this evening:

Lad: I think that George Bush was worrying way too much about Iraq. That was his big mistake. It’s like he wanted to start a war. He should have worried about other things, and not started another war.
Dad: Wow, that’s a  serious thought.
[Beat.]
Lad: But now, I want to know who started the Vietnam War and why they did that.

It’s a little hard to get your message out with Ferraro ranting and Spitzer folding, but Obama had a good event today in which he received the endorsement from a lineup of retired flag officers from the Army, Navy, and Air Force. It was a good counter to the insinuations from the Clinton campaign in recent weeks that Obama fails to meet some vague threshold of Commander-in-Chiefness.

Since it’s drowned out by the other news of the day, I’m posting the link to the Obama news conference to help give it a tiny bit of play.

Best line of the speech:

After years of being told that Democrats have to talk, act and vote like John McCain to pass some Commander-in-Chief test, how many times do we have to learn that tough talk is not a substitute for sound judgment?

I’ll also note that in addition to the support of these retired generals and admirals, Obama has the enthusiastic support of two of my favorite fighting Dems–Bryan Lentz and Patrick Murphy.

I think that the question of judgment is a credible one for Obama to raise. Of course, past performance is not a perfect indicator of future success, but clear thinking about Iraq in the runup to the war seems like a good test.

My ears pricked up at a new wrinkle in Clinton’s explanation as to why she voted for the authorization of force:

Knowing that he was a megalomaniac, knowing he would not want to compete for attention with Osama bin Laden, there were legitimate concerns about what he might do.

So I think I made a reasoned judgment.

I’ve always been bothered by Clinton’s assertion that the intentions of Bush, Cheney, and Rumsfeld were concealed and unknowable. But okay, screw me once….

And I’ll concede that nearly everybody in government seemed to believe that Saddam probably–if not certainly–had a stockpile of some weapons of mass destruction.

But having WMD is different from using WMD. Hussein had control over the Iraqi state. Using WMD outside of his borders would cause an immediate and swift, unified response from the world to strip him of his power. Clinton justifies her vote by saying that she thought that Hussein would be jealous of all the attention that Osama bin Laden was getting? A ridiculous bit of amateur psychological profiling is a centerpiece of your “reasoned judgment” to authorize the war?

In my book, that’s either being governed by unreasonable fear, or being tragically overconfident in your ability to personally read the intentions of faraway dictators.

On the way to catch a basketball game together–see, I expose him to normal things–the lad explained to me how he sizes up the current election field and his own future in politics:

I don’t know who to vote for. You just need to vote for whoever will STOP THE WAR. I want to know who will bring all of those soldiers home. Maybe someday I’ll be president, and I will stop the war…some war that is going on. That’s what a president should do.

An hour later, at halftime, he added:

I also want to be a basketball referee, and maybe an editor. Plus being president.

I wouldn’t put it past him.

History is the present. That’s why every generation writes it anew. But what most people think of as history is its end product, myth. –E. L. Doctorow

My favorite political post of the week was by Barabara O’Brien’s “The Power of (Right Wing) Myth.” She does a really good job at breaking down the misuses of history by the current generation of right wing propagandists. (Tip by way of Akkam’s Razor.)

You might need to be a fan of Star Trek: TNG to really appreciate it, though. (If you read O’Brien’s post, you may pick up on the delicious irony of using a referential metaphor to illuminate the dangers of explaining complex historical events through referential metaphor.)

Congressman Joe Sestak (PA-07) will hold a town hall meeting in his district this week. The topic will be Iraq. Sestak plans to give brief remarks and then take questions from the audience.

When: Thursday, August 16th, 6:30 pm
Where: The Science Center, Room 101, Swarthmore College [map]

The event is open to the public and the press.

PSoTD recommends that we start talking publicly about whom Lieberman will endorse in the 2008 election. The logic is that doing so may prevent the MSM from acting with shock if he gives a speech at the Republican convention, a la Zell Miller. So PSoTD asks us: will Lieberman support ANY REPUBLICAN NOMINEE FOR PRESIDENT in 2008 over ANY DEMOCRATIC NOMINEE FOR PRESIDENT in 2008?

For starters, I hope Lieberman does endorse the Republican nominee, and that they hungrily snatch him up for a prime time podium slot. After all, Lieberman’s endorsement will be entirely based on the Iraq War. The highly unpopular Iraq War. Nothing would hang that particular albatross around the Republican’s necks quite so well. It’s not as though Connecticut is likely in play for the Republicans in November, and Lieberman’s dynamic personality isn’t gong to convert the nation’s seven remaining independents who haven’t already made up their mind about Iraq. I dare him to do it. I double-dog dare him.

Since the probable Democratic nominee is one of two Senate colleagues who didn’t endorse him after his loss in the Democratic primary, one has to assume that loyalty will not keep Lieberman from endorsing a Republican. After all, it was the Republicans who got him re-elected.

The only thing that might keep him from crossing the line–which again, I’d welcome–is that the Senate looks very to likely to swing a few more seats toward the Democrats in 2008. If he keeps pressing his luck, he may lose his seniority privileges and end up a lonely soul. He’d be too much of a RINO to have influence in the GOP except when they need him as a prop. Crossing the red line during what might be shaping up to be a historic electoral realignment might be one too many betrayals to ever come home again.

If I’m being asked to place a bet, I’d bet that he would endorse any of Romney, Giuliani, or McCain. He obviously won’t back Ron Paul. Thompson’s an unknown. If he doesn’t endorse the Republican nominee, then he’ll be backing down strictly out of self-preservation.