The Democratic candidates for the presidential nomination debated again Sunday night. From the news reports, it sounds like Iraq was the predominant issue:

Wesley Clark, responding to criticism by Joe Liberman:

"Well, I wasn't in Congress; I wasn't able to vote on the $87 billion," General Clark said. "But I want to make it very clear: I would not have voted the $87 billion," he said. "I want to commend John Edwards and John Kerry and those who voted on the resolution. I didn't believe last year we should have given George Bush a blank check in Iraq. Now we're trying to give him another blank check."

...."Well, Joe, I had seared in me an experience which you don't have, and that's the experience of being one of those troops on the front lines when the policy has gone wrong," he said. "And the way you best protect the troops is to guarantee that you put the troops in the safest, strongest position as fast as possible. Our troops are today more exposed, are in greater danger, because this president didn't put together a real coalition, because this president's been unwilling to share the burden and the task."

...."Right after 9/11, this administration determined to do bait and switch on the American public," he said. "President Bush said he was going to get Osama bin Laden, dead or alive. Instead, he went after Saddam Hussein. He doesn't have either one of them today."

John Edwards, who voted for the Iraq War but against the $87 billion Bush funding request:

"My view of leadership is standing up for what you believe in, Joe," he said. "For me to vote yes on that would be to give President Bush a blank check, and I am not willing to give George Bush a blank check."

Kerry, Edwards, Lieberman and Gephardt voted for the war. Of the four, only Lieberman and Gephardt also voted for the $87 billion.