Citizen in Exile: Lincoln Chafee (Part 2)

In the second part of our chat former Senator Lincoln Chafee makes the Iraq war vote “totally disqualifying” for higher office.

Lincoln Chafee at Watson

It’s a ban on all the Senators running except Barack Obama, an anti-war voice who hadn’t reached the Senate in 2002. The premise that Saddam Hussein, contained by arms inspectors and no-fly zones, was a threat beyond his borders “was so grossly hollow,” Chafee remembers from his own researches. “Even the Kuwaitis, who’d been invaded by Saddam, were telling us: don’t do it.” It’s Chafee’s guess that some unpredictable reckoning of responsibility for the war is still to come; that the striking feature of the early race for ’08 is the quiet unhappiness with the choices so far. “Americans would rather have a vigorous exchange,” he says. “We need a good tilt.”