It attracted little attention the other day when Harry Reid said:
In 1994, former House Majority Leader Dick Armey infamously stated on the House floor ‘your president is just not that important for us.’ Liberals were outraged, and Armey was (rightly) criticized widely in the media. Michael Barone recalls the incident in this piece, and Paul Begala talked about it in this PBS Interview:
If disowning the president demonstrates contempt for democracy, is it less of an offense to disown the ongoing war in which our nation is engaged? Harry Reid may not like it, but this nation and our troops are in a war. He might think it’s lost already, or he might think we can win it by surrendering–it’s not really all that clear. But it is the nation’s war. And until it ends he–in his roles both as Senate Majority Leader and as the senior Democrat in national leadership–has a responsibility to try to ensure that we win it. Like it or not, this is Harry Reid’s war, too. It became his when he voted to authorize it, and he renewed his responsibility each time he voted to fund it, or to confirm its leaders, and when he took his oath of office. If he doesn’t accept his responsibility, he ought to step aside.
