To be fair, the former Secretary of State had a pretty nice speech in Cleveland, though I take issue with some of it. More on that in a bit.

But I am thoroughly disappointed, though at this point no longer surprised, that the presumptive Democratic nominee showed her lack of political courage once again on the Monday morning talk shows. In two different appearances she broke with President Obama and joined Donald Trump in being willing to frame the horrible attacks in Orlando, San Bernadino and other places as acts of "radical Islamism."

First, let's talk about why these words matter and why President Obama and even the CIA refuse to frame these attacks in this way:

Obama has refrained from using the term preferred by many Republicans, and explained earlier this year that the term "radical Islamism" inappropriately smears the religion of more than a billion people.

"[F]or us to be successful in fighting this scourge, it's very important for us to align ourselves with the 99.9 percent of Muslims who are looking for the same thing we're looking for — order, peace, prosperity — and so I don't quibble with labels. I think we all recognize that this is a particular problem that has roots in Muslim communities," Obama said in an interview with CNN's Fareed Zakaria in February. "But I think we do ourselves a disservice in this fight if we are not taking into account the fact that the overwhelming majority of Muslims reject this ideology."

Even as far back as 2010, CIA Director John Brennan put it even more eloquently:

"Nor do we describe our enemy as 'jihadists' or 'Islamists' because jihad is a holy struggle, a legitimate tenet of Islam, meaning to purify oneself or one's community, and there is nothing holy or legitimate or Islamic about murdering innocent men, women, and children," Brennan said.

I couldn't have put it better myself as a person who spent years studying world religions and the psychology of religion and politics. There is nothing holy or legitimate or Islamic about murdering innocent men, women and children.

Even as recently as last December, Secretary Clinton seemed to get it. She refused to refer to what happened in San Bernadino as "radical Islamism" and explained her reasons why:

“The problem is, that sounds like we are declaring war against a religion. That to me is number one, wrong,” Clinton told ABC "This Week" host George Stephanopoulos. “It doesn’t do justice to the vast numbers of Muslims in our own country and around the world who are peaceful people.”

So just six short months ago, using the term "radical Islamism" sounded like we were declaring war on a religion. It was "number one, wrong" in Clinton's own words. But she changed her tune quite a bit today. After a new terrorist attack and a round of attacks from Donald Trump, who criticized Clinton and Obama for refusing to use the phrase, Clinton inexcusably and inexplicably took the bait and decided the Donald was right:

In an interview with NBC's "Today" on Monday morning, Clinton said words matter less than actions, but that she didn't have a problem using the term.

Both terms "mean the same thing," Clinton continued, adding, "And to me, radical jihadism, radical Islamism, I think they mean the same thing. I'm happy to say either, but that's not the point."

"I have clearly said many, many times we face terrorist enemies who use Islam to justify slaughtering innocent people. We have to stop them and we will. We have to defeat radical jihadist terrorism or radical Islamism, whatever you call it," Clinton said later on MSNBC's "Morning Joe," reiterating, "it's the same."

Six months ago, before the Democratic primaries, she stood shoulder to shoulder with President Obama and told us that using those words was "number one, wrong" and seemed like we were declaring war on a religion. Today, under attack by Donald Trump and the Republicans, it's all "whatever you call it" and "they mean the same thing". Yep, it's all the same.

I know many Democrats are trying to rally around a terribly flawed candidate because the alternative seems so much worse. But on a day like today, it's hard to see Hillary Clinton as anything other than a politician who has lacked the courage to lead ever since her defeat on healthcare in the early 90s. In fact, I think this is just the latest instance of her number one flaw--she lacks courage.

And she seems more afraid of right wing attacks than she is of losing the left or being true to principles. She has experience and intelligence in abundance but voted to authorize the Iraq War in 2002 with several other cowardly Democratic Senators. Like nearly every other Democrat with potential presidential ambitions, she was afraid a "no" vote would make her look weak on defense or soft on terror. So to hell with judgment and intelligence and planning. Hillary Clinton could not afford to be called soft on defense so she voted for the worst foreign policy disaster in recent American history. Some of you may think the fact that other ambitious Democrats did, too, somehow excuses her. Far from it. It merely implicates all of us Democrats who have been far too willing to accept it.

The same story is apparent in her "evolution" on LGBT rights. Back in the 1990s when the Clintons were under attack for not exactly living up to "family values", she and her husband voiced support for the Defense of Marriage Act. You know, the act that defended marriage from gay people. In the early 2000s while running for Senate she was still more afraid of right wing attacks than she was proud to stand up for progressive principles and declared that marriage was between a man and a woman. She didn't change her tune until 2013. Then she had the gall to celebrate the Supreme Court marriage ruling like she was the one who had helped spearhead the fight to get there.

And today in Cleveland she told the LGBT community they had many allies and she was proud to be one of them.

Yep. Ally since 2013.

Sure, that's better than nothing, I guess. It's better than continuing to fight to keep people safe from the transgendered in public bathrooms while murderers with assault weapons slaughter whole buildings full of people. But when you wait until corporations are lining up to sponsor Pride celebrations so their corporate logos can be seen you don't have a whole lot of credibility on the issue. Would she have made this same speech in 2008 or 2012 or whatever other year the support for gay marriage still hovered just under fifty percent?

So now Hillary is afraid of being called weak on defense and soft on terror. Well I'm calling her weak on principle. I'm calling her soft on solidarity. Because the second it looks like something might become an issue to the political self-preservation of Hillary Clinton, progressive principles get tossed under the bus.

Today I look back fondly on my vote for Obama in 2008. I've had many disagreements with him, particularly on economic policies involving Wall Street and trade. But he's run a scandal free White House for 8 years even under ferocious Republican attacks. He refused lobbyist donations to the DNC. He wouldn't given in and use terms that demonize an entire religion even when they were out there claiming that he was a Muslim himself (as if that would be something to be ashamed of).

And I look back fondly on my vote for Bernie Sanders in this year's primary. He stood up against the Iraq War even when it wasn't popular. He takes on Wall Street even if that means he doesn't get their money. And he was standing up for LGBT rights when that was a very unpopular thing to do.

As for Hillary? If I vote for her in November it will not be proudly. It will be with regret and a sense of shame that the only reason I'm voting for her at all is that one of the two great parties in this nation, the party of Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt, has put forward as it's nominee a xenophobic, bigoted, misogynistic moron while our vaunted "free press" aided and abetted it the entire way. I feel absolutely sickened that we live in a country where it has come to this. The only country in the world where mass slaughter by automatic weapon happens regularly and where we lack the political will to do anything about it. The only country in the world where the two least popular candidates in American history could somehow secure their respective parties' nominations for the presidency.

So go ahead and battle "radical Islamism" and drop some more drones from the sky in a neverending war. Go ahead and battle the Republicans by becoming more like them every day. I'm not afraid of Muslims. I'm not afraid of gay people. I'm not even afraid of people who would attack me for not being afraid of them. I just wish the Democratic Party had a nominee with at least as much courage.