A vote for war is the most sober, profound, consequential vote that a senator can make.  No other vote in an entire career will be remotely as important.  So, what is all this backsliding?  What are Edwards, Kerry, Rockefeller, et al saying?  That they didn't do their homework?  That they took a lax attitude to their duties? 

They voted in the fullness of their maturity to send their countrymen — the sons and daughters of their constituents — off to danger, possibly death or maiming.  And they didn't consider the consequences?  Is that their point? 

Yes, there was uncertainty.  In human affairs there is always uncertainty.  You never know everything.  The major point about Saddam was not the existence of WMD's specifically, but that after 9/11 our margin for error had vanished, and we could not take Saddam's recalcitrance as evidence of good faith.  That has not changed.

Greg Richards   11 14 05