CHICAGO -- Sen. Barack Obama is using his platform in front of a raucus liberal audience in Washington, D.C. today to confront Democrats -- Sen. Hillary Clinton in particular -- who voted in 2002 to authorize the use of military force in Iraq.
Obama regularly tells Democrats that he was proud to oppose the war from the start. He was running for the Illinois state senate at the time. Today, Obama brings that distinction into sharper relief, saying that he is "proud that I stood up in 2002 and urged our leaders not to take us down this dangerous path."
He continues: “So many of us knew this back then, even when it wasn’t popular to say so."
“We knew back then this war was a mistake. We knew back then that it was dangerous diversion from the struggle against the terrorists who attacked us on September 11th. We knew back then that we could find ourselves in an occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences. “But the war went forward. And now, we’ve seen those consequences and we mourn for the dead and wounded. ”I know that turning the page is possible. This isn’t just the rhetoric of a campaign, it’s been the cause of my life – a cause I will work for and fight for every day as your President.
Obama does not, of course, mention Clinton by name, but it's clear which side he says she's on -- and it's not the "we knew" side.
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