"I cannot make that commitment," noted former Sen. John Edwards.
This is a far, far departure from the candidates' stump speeches. Clinton, for example, is fond of saying that if George W. Bush won't end the war in Iraq, "I will."
Edwards has thrashed his opponents still in the Senate for not doing enough to get troops out of Iraq.
And Obama repeatedly points out that he is the only major candidate who opposed the war from the start, and that he's the only one with the clarity of judgment to get the U.S. out of Iraq.
It's tough to tell by the candidates' comments whether they suddenly had a moment when they decided to match rhetoric to reality, or whether it was a politically fueled move to seem more "centrist," with an eye toward the general election.
Whichever it was, voters need to take note.
The only other marginally viable candidates to guarantee a complete troop withdrawal were Sen. Chris Dodd, of Connecticut, and New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson.
Leaving aside whether complete withdrawal by 2013 is realistic (we think it is, by the way), those voters who believe that it is a reasonable deadline to have all of our troops out of the middle of the quagmire in Iraq do not have as much of a champion in Clinton, Obama or Edwards as they may have thought.
The bottom line is that, even in the Democratic primary, in which the promises seemed to be running solidly for ending combat involvement in Iraq on a reasonable timetable, the attitudes are a lot softer than they had seemed.
And this just underlines the fact that this president will be leaving the next one a complete mess with no easy or clear solutions.
The (small d) democratic process would be much better served if candidates in both parties were much more honest on the stump about how they really see the situation, instead of running toward the fringes.
The result would be a much more fruitful debate, with vigorous and productive back and forth, and a chance for voters to have a real choice among the candidates. *
