What Hillary Left Out
Selective American history in action.
Sen. Hillary Clinton presumed the other day to give a think-tank audi ence a history lesson. But it turns out that the would-be president is herself in need of some tutoring.
Appearing before the Center for American Progress, Clinton quoted extensively from President Franklin Roosevelt’s speech to the nation two days after the attack on Pearl Harbor.
“We are now in this war. We are all in it, all the way. Every man, woman and child is a partner in the most tremendous undertaking of our American history,” FDR told an anxious nation that had just entered World War II.
Added Clinton: “That was presidential leadership that understood that when American soldiers are in harm’s way, we are all at war.”
Of course, there was something else Roosevelt understood about war and presidential leadership – as does the current commander-in-chief, George W. Bush: When you find yourself in a war, you fight to win.
As FDR put it in that same speech: “The United States can accept no result save victory, final and complete . . . The sources of international brutality, wherever they exist, must be absolutely and finally broken . . . We’re going to fight it with everything we got.”
Hillary conveniently chose not to quote from that part of the speech.