Stupid, all of it. I just thought it was callous of Obama to have to look at his notes to remember the deceased soldier's name. You added Iran into the thread, for reasons which I am still not certain. Gotta run. Good night Minstrel!
Ouch. That was mean. Are you still the victim? You started a thread on what you considered a gaffe by Obama. I didn't want to start an entirely new thread on gaffes, so I added McCain's gaffe to this thread. Ideally, it all would have stayed in a debate discussion thread, rather than spawning multiple threads on each detail, but I felt merging threads would be over-moderation. There's your explanation. Sleep well.
the dad didn't give him the bracelet..... and zagsfan is right, you say your not a kid but you sure as hell act like one
Where does Obama look at his notes? He doesn't move his arms as to shufle through his notes or anything. What it looks like is Obama was trying to avoid the gaffe of saying a dead soldier gave him a bracelet, and caught himself before saying that.
you are all being way to critical. The point was just that McCain was being presumptous by trying to give the impression that he was the only candidate that cared for the soldiers and vets. I'm also tired of the "requirement" that everyone describe McCain as a "true American hero" whenever they mention his name.
http://www.nbc15.com/state/headlines/29864149.html Soldier's Mother "Ecstatic" about Obama's Bracelet
Anyway, the bigger issue isn't bracelets. McCain's major point was pretty irresponsible for a leader, IMO, and much more worthy of discussion. He said that we have to stay in this war because so many had already died for it, and we can't just "waste" those deaths. I find that to be the most terrible rationale possible for sticking with any war. Those soldiers are dead. Their deaths are validated in the choices they made leading up to their enlistment and the brave actions they took on the ground. Although their deaths may lead to our eventual success, they are (in the ruthless parlance of economics) sunk costs. Sending more people to die just to justify the people who already died is the kind of bad logic that has ruined so many other armies. It's the exact same bad reasoning that makes a gambler spend his last hundred bucks because he's already blown his car and house. If "feels" good to say it, but no military leader should risk more lives on that basis. They have to be above that emotion. If you think it's worth having a hundred, thousand or ten thousand more Americans die to secure Iraqi freedom, that's fine. We can have a well-reasoned debate about that. But don't get into the whole, "If we leave, they died for nothing!" debate. It cheapens their sacrifice, because you discount the bravery and patriotism they showed in joining the military to fight for something greater than themselves. And it cheapens the lives of those who have yet to die.
The bracelet line was good, given he was wearing a bracelet, and it neutralized McCain's gambit. I was a little surprised that Obama didn't talk about Tomas Young there though.
[video=youtube;n7NoXo3kBeA]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7NoXo3kBeA"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7NoXo3kBeA[/video] I'm not sure how to post a video from youtube on here, but this is the best I can do. Fox News again proves how much of a joke they are.
