Hillary Clinton's Shades of Bush

Is Hillary Clinton as dishonest as George Bush? I know this sounds like a crazy question, one posed by a person who must be a staunch supporter of Barack Obama or John Edwards. But it isn't. I'm not rabidly anti-Clinton, at least not yet.

Clinton voted for the Iraq war three years ago. Now, she says she opposes the war and wants to bring the troops home. She's making good, but needs to come clean about her past before I'll fully believe she's moved on.

From what I heard on NPR radio news yesterday, she dodges questions on her past suport of the war, gives half answers in response to the question of why she supported it, and in desperation turns the subject of conversation to President Bush.

I would forgive her for her transgression, if she’d only ask for forgiveness. I understand how the war might have seemed like a good idea at the time it began. Saddam Hussein was, after all, a truly bad guy. The war turned out to be a big mistake, yet many otherwise sensible people supported it.

But Clinton won’t say she messed up. That’s downright Bushian of her. Our President has shown himself incapable of honesty, of introspection, of coming to grips with his own mistakes. His pride drags us deeper into the war in Iraq as all signs clearly point to the fact that the war has been, and will continue to be a fiasco.

I don’t want another person in the White House who is incapable of saying “sorry.” I'm tired of my questions being skirted, and of the subject of conversation being changed. When did American politics evolve to the point at which politicians believe it’s political suicide to admit fallibility? Do they believe Americans are so wholly unforgiving that we truly expect our politicians to be perfect? We don't expect perfection, but we ought to demand humility.

Political campaigns spend lots of time pointing out the errors of the competing candidate. Yet each politician is one of our own. Someone who we hopefully trust to make the right decision most of the time, and who we expect to operate in good conscience.

If we have this level of faith, we ought to be willing to forgive a mistake when the desire to make amends is sincere. Maybe Hillary Clinton doesn't believe she deserves such trust.

Missing the Colts' Real MVPs

Football is the most undemocratic of sports. Every player contributes to victory. But the quarterback receives accolades that often far exceed his performance.

Take last night’s Super Bowl, for example, when Peyton Manning quarterbacked his Indianapolis Colts to victory over the hapless Chicago Bears. Manning’s performance was nothing more than competent. He managed to lead his team the length of the football field five or six times. Each time the Colts reached the “red zone”, however, the drive would come to a standstill as Manning failed to use multiple receiving and rushing talents, and his own gift for scrambling, to drive his team into the end zone. The Colts scored only one offensive touchdown on their way to 29 points.

Manning had plenty of time to make plays. His offensive line protected him well. Manning was sacked just once, and Chicago’s defense got its hands on the quarterback just a couple of times more. Yet no offensive linemen stood on the podium with the team owner, coach, NFL commissioner and Manning to accept the Vince Lombardi trophy.

Manning rarely passed the ball in last night’s Super Bowl, the first ever played in the rain. He usually handed the slippery football to his running backs rather than risk throwing through the deluge. The backs racked up the bulk of yardage and scored the team’s only offensive touchdown.

A Colt’s defender scored the other touchdown following his interception of a Bear’s pass. A second Colt’s defender intercepted a pass late in the fourth quarter to end the Bear’s final offensive drive.

Maybe there are simply too many star performers on a football team to give an MVP trophy to just one. The quarterback is at the nexus of their efforts. He is the symbol of their collective success or failure. Last night, however, other player’s performances shone brighter than Peyton Manning’s. After the game, the light of center stage should have focused on one of them.