Some candidates have written their resumes with examples of great foresight underpinning their campaigns and providing great reasons for us to vote for them. These claims do not entirely stand up under scrutiny.
John McCain claims that he was the first to call for Donald Rumsfeld to resign as Secretary of Defense. In truth the nation had already soured on the war. There were many calls from the press and others for Rumsfeld to go. In McCain's role as a major military spokesman, while he might have thought ousting Rumsfeld was the right thing to do, it was also very opportunistic and politically savvy.
Barack
Obama would have us believe that his vote in the Senate against the U.S. invading Iraq was strictly a vote out of conscience and prescient statesmanship. He contrasts this use of judgment with Hillary Clinton's vote for the invasion. While she may have been wrong in her vote, his vote was not born solely out of conscience and wisdom.
Black politicians are traditionally more reluctant to go to war, because of the disproportionate number of young black men that serve in the military, especially in times of all-volunteer armies. Among others, Charles Rangel, Representative from N.Y., said that the administration was too eager to go to war and that the reinstatement of a military draft might make Congress more reluctant to authorize the invasion.
The fact that Barack Obama voted against the war is a plus on his side of the ledger, but that it should be the centerpiece of his resume is about as unwarranted as George Bush's pre-election claims that he was the great conciliator.