Time & Perspective Quote by Ken Lucas

"I thought that the administration needed bipartisan support, and I was for our commander-in-chief. Because I felt at that time it was the right thing do. If I knew then what I know now, I would have never voted for the war"

Ken Lucas, Politician

About this Quote

Ken Lucas is doing the political version of an apology tour without the melodrama: he’s not confessing to malice, he’s confessing to the seductions of process. “Bipartisan support” and “commander-in-chief” aren’t just explanations; they’re moral alibis, the sort of civic language that lets a lawmaker treat a vote for war as a vote for unity. The line carries a quiet indictment of the post-9/11 atmosphere, when dissent was framed as disloyalty and caution could be spun as weakness. Lucas signals he wasn’t swept up by bloodlust; he was swept up by the pressure to appear responsible.

The real subtext sits in the hinge phrase: “If I knew then what I know now.” It’s a classic retrospective escape hatch, but it also gestures at something more damning than bad intelligence: the reality that lawmakers were asked to make irreversible decisions under conditions designed to narrow debate. His syntax is tellingly personal and slightly awkward (“the right thing do”), suggesting a man still trying to reconcile self-image with consequences. He wants credit for good faith while acknowledging catastrophic outcome.

Contextually, the quote reads as a response to the Iraq War’s long shadow: a recognition that patriotic choreography can override skepticism, and that institutional incentives reward consensus even when consensus is wrong. Lucas isn’t just revising a vote; he’s naming how easily “supporting the troops” mutates into supporting the policy that endangers them.

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Topic	War
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About the Author

Ken Lucas (born August 22, 1933) is a Politician from USA.

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