THE O'Bumma Thread - Original Vintage Edition

[myron myron]

As for the rest of your post, you offer an abundance of allegations and speculations, but no support. Is this your opinion, or is this somehow fact? Not that I care. Wes Clark is no one to me. Just trying to cleanse the record.

Regarding the incident with the Russians, following is the relevant excerpt from BBC News:

Thursday, 9 March, 2000, 14:14 GMT

Confrontation over Pristina airport

Details of Russia's surprise occupation of Pristina airport at the end of the Kosovo war are revealed in a new BBC documentary on the conflict.

For the first time, the key players in the tense confrontation between Nato and Russian troops talk about the stand-off which jeopardised the entire peacekeeping mission.

The Russians, who played a crucial role in persuading Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic to end the war, had expected to police their own sector of Kosovo, independent of Nato.

When they did not get it, they felt double-crossed.

As Nato's K-For peacekeepers prepared to enter the province on 12 June, they discovered the Russians had got there first.

A contingent of 200 troops, stationed in Bosnia, was already rolling towards Pristina airport.

'Third World War'

General Wesley Clark, Nato's supreme commander, immediately ordered 500 British and French paratroopers to be put on standby to occupy the airport.

''I called the [Nato] Secretary General [Javier Solana] and told him what the circumstances were,'' General Clark tells the BBC programme Moral Combat: Nato at War.

''He talked about what the risks were and what might happen if the Russian's got there first, and he said: 'Of course you have to get to the airport'.

''I said: 'Do you consider I have the authority to do so?' He said: 'Of course you do, you have transfer of authority'.''

But General Clark's plan was blocked by General Sir Mike Jackson, K-For's British commander.

"I'm not going to start the Third World War for you," he reportedly told General Clark during one heated exchange.

General Jackson tells the BBC: ''We were [looking at] a possibility....of confrontation with the Russian contingent which seemed to me probably not the right way to start off a relationship with Russians who were going to become part of my command.''

Russian plans

The Russian advance party took the airport unopposed. The world watched nervously.

A senior Russian officer, General Leonid Ivashev, tells the BBC how the Russians had plans to fly in thousands of troops.

''Let's just say that we had several airbases ready. We had battalions of paratroopers ready to leave within two hours,'' he said.

Amid fears that Russian aircraft were heading for Pristina, General Clark planned to order British tanks and armoured cars to block the runways to prevent any transport planes from landing.

General Clark said he believed it was ''an appropriate course of action''. But the plan was again vetoed by Britain.

. . .

Link: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/671495.stm

Regarding Clark's forced premature "retirement" as SACEUR, here is the link to the news story in the July 29, 1999 International Herald Tribune: http://www.iht.com/articles/1999/07/29/clark.2.t_0.php

Shelton's comments about Clark during the 2004 Democratic Presidential primaries that I quoted in my post above, were originally published in the Los Altos Town Crier on September 23, 2003, and were the subject of a September 29, 2003 attack piece against Shelton published in the liberal Slate by liberal columnist William Saletan, the relevant excerpt from which follows:

Frag Officer

Hugh Shelton smears Wes Clark

By William Saletan

Posted Monday, Sept. 29, 2003, at 6:20 PM ET

I have a problem with Wesley Clark's former boss and current bad-mouther, Gen. Hugh Shelton. The problem has to do with Shelton's integrity and character. Let's just say that if Shelton runs for office, he won't get my vote.

A couple of weeks ago, Shelton, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, was asked at a forum in California, "What do you think of Gen. Wesley Clark, and would you support him as a presidential candidate?" Shelton replied, "I've known Wes for a long time. I will tell you the reason he came out of Europe early [i.e., was forced to step down as commander of U.S. forces in Europe] had to do with integrity and character issues, things that are very near and dear to my heart. I'm not going to say whether I'm a Republican or a Democrat. I'll just say Wes won't get my vote."

Shelton's remarks appeared in the Los Altos Town Crier on Sept. 23.

. . .

Link: http://www.slate.com/id/2089014/

There are more factual sources I can cite and/or link, but these should suffice to confirm that I don't make up the facts on which I base my opinions.

[Big Ben]

clark is incredibly stupid. By attacking McCain, he points out, underscores and highlights one of obama's shortest and weakest suits: lack of meaningful experience.

[mogadishu]

Hmm... it's quite possible a risky strategy, but you can see a certain logic to what he's doing.... the democrats are trying to raise the arguments re. Obama's lack of experience and nix them before the convention. I think.

[ZiaAries]

Question to the Americans, the Right and the wrong.... I mean, the Left.


If the Democratic party takes control in January, do you plan to make changes to your present financial planning accounts between election night final results and inauguration day? If so, well you give a hint of what changes you are considering.

Since no one replied to my question, I'm giving it another try. Are you concerned about your portfolio if there is a change of power in the White House? Anyone besides me?

[Big Ben]

Hmm... it's quite possible a risky strategy, but you can see a certain logic to what he's doing.... the democrats are trying to raise the arguments re. Obama's lack of experience and nix them before the convention. I think.

clark attacked McCain's strong suit, experience. How does that help obama, for whom experience is his second weakest attribute, with only about one and a half years of national experience in the Senate before he began to run for president?

What is the logic that you see in that?

[Cambridge]

Hmm... it's quite possible a risky strategy, but you can see a certain logic to what he's doing.... the democrats are trying to raise the arguments re. Obama's lack of experience and nix them before the convention. I think.

clark attacked McCain's strong suit, experience. How does that help obama, for whom experience is his second weakest attribute, with only about one and a half years of national experience in the Senate before he began to run for president?

What is the logic that you see in that?

I think the logic is that experience is not McCain’s strong suit. He has had no experience as an executive at all. He’s as weak in this area as was GWB, and we've all seen what was the result of that fiasco. The truth in Clark’s words is in the distinction between being a war hero and being an experienced and world-wise executive. McCain lacks the latter.

[Big Ben]

Hmm... it's quite possible a risky strategy, but you can see a certain logic to what he's doing.... the democrats are trying to raise the arguments re. Obama's lack of experience and nix them before the convention. I think.

clark attacked McCain's strong suit, experience. How does that help obama, for whom experience is his second weakest attribute, with only about one and a half years of national experience in the Senate before he began to run for president?

What is the logic that you see in that?

I think the logic is that experience is not McCain’s strong suit. He has had no experience as an executive at all. He’s as weak in this area as was GWB, and we've all seen what was the result of that fiasco. The truth in Clark’s words is in the distinction between being a war hero and being an experienced and world-wise executive. McCain lacks the latter.

Yes, but the presidency is such a unique position that you are never totally ready unless you have done it before. So the closest people meeting that criteria would be Bush Senior with one term of elgibility remaining or Hillary who watched her husband do it for eight years.

Between the candidates running, McCain has military experience as a war hero and has twenty-one years in the Senate. All are useful exerience. obama has one and half years in the senate, did nothing, then indulged his personal ambitions by running for president half way through his first term as a rookie senator. His lack of substance, radicalism and lack of experience form a dangerous trifecta.

I'll take McCain.

[Cambridge]

Yes, but the presidency is such a unique position that you are never totally ready unless you have done it before. So the closest people meeting that criteria would be Bush Senior with one term of elgibility remaining or Hillary who watched her husband do it for eight years.

I agree with you about Bush No. 41, whom I personally liked and thot was a truly intelligent and wise statesman. I disagree that a wife who managed floral arrangements on the tables of State dinners is qualified for anything having to do with government. Besides, she is an adulteress, and that’s out of vogue these days.

Between the candidates running, McCain has military experience as a war hero and has twenty-one years in the Senate.

Military experience can sometimes be counterproductive. How much experience in mediation does one with military experience have? It’s the opposite wall, isn’t it? What does McCain know about what the State Department does? Can he properly direct the Commerce Commission? Does he even know what the Environmental Protection Agency does? How do you manage a budget and get the deficit down? These and a trillion other things are what GWB didn’t know and why we are killing our children, by the hundreds per annum, with a dedicated commitment to do the same for the next 100 years by McCain, while heading into the greatest depression in the US since 1929.

Do you want someone without experience and will lead you into La-La land?…I give you McCain.

[ZiaAries]

Do you want someone without experience and will lead you into La-La land?…I give you McCain.

You mean opposed to the one that will weaken our nation and wants a nanny state? Boloney!

"Little children, Now ya'll go check the air pressure in your tires."

[Big Ben]

The Europeans have tried diplomacy with Irran for years and it got them nowhere.

If Irran causes trouble, do you want obama who said Irran is a small country and isn't a threat?

Do you think the State Department can negotiate with ossama been laughin, show a little understanding for his point of view and get him to surrender?

I'll take McCain.

[Cambridge]

Do you want someone without experience and will lead you into La-La land?…I give you McCain.

You mean opposed to the one that will weaken our nation and wants a nanny state? Boloney!

"Little children, Now ya'll go check the air pressure in your tires."

Well, I've already told you that neither of them is my candidate. I'm going to vote for myself, as I do whenever I don't like the offerings. As a true libertarian, I ask myself, ‘who would be better than me?’ No one, right? So, unless someone convinces me that he/she/they could do the job for me better than I could do it for myself, I vote for myself. If everyone did that, we could have some interesting results. Especially if they voted for me. VOTE FOR CAMBRIDGE!!

[ZiaAries]

[Cambridge]

:lol:

Um, together we could rule the world, zia.

[Big Ben]

Zia for President, with Cambridge on the ticket for Vice-President

[mogadishu]

Hmm... it's quite possible a risky strategy, but you can see a certain logic to what he's doing.... the democrats are trying to raise the arguments re. Obama's lack of experience and nix them before the convention. I think.

clark attacked McCain's strong suit, experience. How does that help obama, for whom experience is his second weakest attribute, with only about one and a half years of national experience in the Senate before he began to run for president?

What is the logic that you see in that?

Simply that the dems have to raise the "experience" question themselves, unless they want to wait to be attacked on it by McCain, which would put them further onto the back foot. I agree with you that Obama + Clark is still an inexperienced package.