From the mouth of Markos himself:
Richardson, in just the last couple of months, has brokered landmark deals in Darfur and North Korea — efforts that had stymied the Bush Administration through two terms. There is no one in American politics today more respected and accomplished on foreign policy than Bill Richardson.
Compare this to Hillary Clinton, who talks about “ending the war”, yet the fine print of her plan shows she’d keep up to 75,000 American troops in Iraq.
Richardson’s clear plan (to get out of Iraq by the end of calendar year, without leaving behind a “residual force” to continue a failed war on a smaller scale) is a sharp contrast to his primary opponents. No one can accuse the man of having an unsophisticated mind when it comes to foreign policy, and no one can accuse him of being insufficiently “serious.” While one- and two-term Senators play hawk in D.C., Richardson is pushing us back from nuclear catastrophe and demanding we get out of Iraq.
Perhaps Clinton wants to leave tens of thousands of U.S. troops in Iraq because she doesn’t want to look “weak” on foreign policy; maybe, as I tend to think, she really believes it. Who knows? The brightest minds in our party and our nation’s most accomplished super-diplomat, though, are all on the same page: Out of Iraq. Now.