Potential presidential candidate Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) on Monday said that the Iraq War was not a mistake, but he seemed unsure of how he would have approached the war given what he knows now.
“If I knew then what I know now, a land invasion may not have been the right answer,” Graham said on CNN’s “The Situation Room.”
He added that Saddam Hussein “had a lot to do with destabilizing the region.” Graham told CNN he would have “kept the pressure to get rid of Saddam.”
He then blamed the current situation in Iraq on President Obama.
“At the end of the day, I blame President Obama for the mess in Iraq and Syria, not President Bush,” Graham said.
Graham is one of a few potential 2016 candidates who defended the Iraq War, including Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal (R), in the wake of former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush’s (R) struggle to answer questions about the invasion.
When asked last week whether he would have authorized the Iraq invasion given what he knows now, Bush initially said he would have gone into Iraq. But he quickly backtracked and claimed he misheard the question. Eventually, he said that “would not have gone into Iraq” if he’d had the information available today.
Bush’s stumble prompted numerous presidential candidates and Iraq War architects to weigh in on the invasion again.
Ms Lindsey, Ms Lindsey, my do you have a sense of humor, hahahahhohohohohohohohoho
And bless his heart…he don’t know no better.
Graham won’t be president. That recent PPP poll of favorability ratings among GOP likely primary voters showed Graham pretty negative. Maybe not Christie levels of negative and I don’t know why he’s viewed negatively, probably not for the reasons he should be. But Republicans have a load of candidates where they do feel positive that they don’t need to consider the ones they don’t like. Graham probably knows this and is just yelling “someone look at me!”
Has Graham been asked by anyone yet to explain how President Obama is to blame?
A clusterfuck? A fiasco? A colossal waste of money and lives? Based on manufactured intelligence?
The neo-con wet dream? A quagmire? The incubator of ISIS?
Yes to all of those, but not a mistake.