I suppose attention must be paid when a Hall of Fame campaigner like Clinton says that Kerry should focus on domestic issues, rather than on foreign policy, Bush's "strong suit" (as reported in The New York Times). Me, I'm with the unidentified senior aide quoted in the Times article, who thinks a broad focus that very much includes Iraq is just fine, thank you:

The notion that the campaign was settling on a new message for the fall came as news to some senior staff members.

"That's really groundbreaking," one senior aide said sarcastically.... "I think our negative frame should be that George Bush is a liar. He misled the country on Iraq. And then everything else that he lies about, bring it back to that."

Amen.

Today, in case you didn't know, a car bomb in Fallujah killed seven Marines. "Strong suit" my ass.

Incidentally, here's Kerry, as quoted by Reuters, attacking Bush on Iraq in response to a question at a town meeting:

"I said this from the beginning of the debate to the walk up to the war. I said, Mr. President don't rush to war, take the time to build a legitimate coalition and have a plan to win the peace."

Kerry said Bush had failed on all three counts. He called the president's talk about a coalition fighting alongside about 125,000 U.S. troops "the phoniest thing I've ever heard."

"You've about 500 troops here, 500 troops there and it's American troops that are 90 percent of the combat casualties and it's American taxpayers that are paying 90 percent of the cost of the war," he said. "It's the wrong war, in the wrong place at the wrong time."

I say do this more, John, and keep refining it. Why the hell should Republicans be more willing to talk about their own failures than Democrats are?