Democratic Underground Latest Greatest Lobby Journals Search Options Help Login
Google

The TRUTH about Hillary's so-called "Foriegn Policy Experience"

Printer-friendly format Printer-friendly format
Printer-friendly format Email this thread to a friend
Printer-friendly format Bookmark this thread
This topic is archived.
Home » Discuss » Archives » General Discussion: Presidential (Through Nov 2009) Donate to DU
 
Krashkopf Donating Member (965 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-07-08 01:41 PM
Original message
The TRUTH about Hillary's so-called "Foriegn Policy Experience"
www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-experiencemar07,1,2875944.story

CAMPAIGN 2008

Clinton's experience claim under scrutiny
Hillary Clinton may have influenced foreign policy, but evidence is scant she played pivotal role


By Mike Dorning and Christi Parsons, WASHINGTON BUREAU Tribune correspondents Jim Tankersley and Rick Pearson contributed to this report

March 7, 2008

WASHINGTON

Surrounded by military leaders in a Cabinet-style setting, Hillary Clinton on Thursday said she has "crossed the threshold" of foreign policy experience to serve as commander in chief.

Supporters of rival Barack Obama fired back immediately, arguing that the former first lady's trips abroad hardly constituted a practice run for managing global crises.

"She was never asked to do the heavy lifting" when meeting with foreign leaders, said Susan Rice, who was an assistant secretary of state in the Clinton administration and is now advising Obama. "She wasn't asked to move the mountain or deliver a harsh message or a veiled threat. It was all gentle prodding or constructive reinforcement. And it would not have been appropriate for her to do the heavy lifting."

The debate over readiness for the global arena is emerging as the flash point in the race for the Democratic presidential nomination, crystallized by a dramatic Clinton campaign commercial asking who is best prepared to answer a 3 a.m. phone call to the White House during a crisis.

Clinton says she is the answer, arguing that Obama's major achievement was his early opposition to the Iraq war in 2002. Indeed, Obama doesn't have much in the way of experience managing foreign crises, nor does Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, for that matter. In fact, it is rare for any president to have that kind of experience before coming into office.

In Clinton's case, she may well have exercised influence on foreign policy that is hard to document because she had a unique opportunity to offer private counsel to her husband, President Bill Clinton.

But while Hillary Clinton represented the U.S. on the world stage at important moments while she was first lady, there is scant evidence that she played a pivotal role in major foreign policy decisions or in managing global crises.

Pressed in a CNN interview this week for specific examples of foreign policy experience that has prepared her for an international crisis, Clinton claimed that she "helped to bring peace" to Northern Ireland and negotiated with Macedonia to open up its border to refugees from Kosovo. She also cited "standing up" to the Chinese government on women's rights and a one-day visit she made to Bosnia following the Dayton peace accords.

Earlier in the campaign, she and her husband claimed that she had advocated on behalf of a U.S. military intervention in Rwanda to stop the genocide there.

'Ancillary' to process

But her involvement in the Northern Ireland peace process was primarily to encourage activism among women's groups there, a contribution that the lead U.S. negotiator described as "helpful" but that an Irish historian who has written extensively about the conflict dismissed as "ancillary" to the peace process.

The Macedonian government opened its border to refugees the day before Clinton arrived to meet with government leaders. And her mission to Bosnia was a one-day visit in which she was accompanied by performers Sheryl Crow and Sinbad, as well as her daughter, Chelsea, according to the commanding general who hosted her.

Whatever her private conversations with the president may have been, key foreign policy officials say that a U.S. military intervention in Rwanda was never considered in the Clinton administration's policy deliberations. Despite lengthy memoirs by both Clintons and former Secretary of State and UN Ambassador Madeleine Albright, any advice she gave on Rwanda had not been mentioned until her presidential campaign.

"In my review of the records, I didn't find anything to suggest that military intervention was put on the table in NSC deliberations," said Gail Smith, a Clinton NSC official who did a review for the White House of the administration's handling of the Rwandan genocide. Smith is an Obama supporter.

Prudence Bushnell, a retired State Department official who handled the Rwanda portfolio at the time and has not allied with a presidential candidate, confirmed that a U.S. military intervention was not considered in policy deliberations, as did several senior Clinton administration officials with first-hand knowledge who declined to be identified.

Clinton has previously described her role in the Northern Ireland peace process as meeting with women's groups to encourage them to build a political climate for peace.

Former Sen. George Mitchell, who was the lead U.S. negotiator, said Clinton's visits were "very helpful."

"She was especially involved in encouraging women to get involved in the peace process," which was a "significant factor" in the agreement, Mitchell said in an interview.

But Tim Pat Coogan, an Irish historian who has written extensively on the conflict in Northern Ireland, said the first lady's visits were not decisive in the negotiating breakthroughs in Northern Ireland.

"It was a nice thing to see her there, with the women's groups. It helped, I suppose," Coogan said. "But it was ancillary to the main thing. It was part of the stage effects, the optics.

"There were all kinds of peace movements, women's movements throughout the 'Troubles.' But it was more about the clout of Bill Clinton," added Coogan, who said Clinton administration decisions to grant visas to leaders of the Irish Republican Army's political wing and appoint a U.S. negotiator were the keys to changing the political climate.

Beijing speech

One of Clinton's most noteworthy forays onto the foreign stage came in 1995, when she delivered a speech at the United Nations' women's conference in Beijing. That speech was widely noted and hailed as a bold call for women's rights, especially because Clinton explicitly spoke out against forced abortion and other practices of the host country.

"In the years since, I have met many women from many places who tell me they were at Beijing, or had friends who were, or who were inspired by the conference to launch initiatives," Albright wrote in her 2003 memoir.

The speech might never have happened if the first lady had not pressed for it, said one former Clinton administration official sympathetic to her candidacy who traveled with her and Albright to Beijing. The administration was conflicted about whether Hillary Clinton should go to Beijing at all because of the regime's record on human rights.

"Yet she was determined to go and was convinced that her going would send a very strong signal of support for human rights," said the official, who spoke on the condition that he not be named. "Everyone at the end of the process almost certainly would have said, 'How could we be so foolish to question the wisdom of the trip?'"

Still, Rice questioned whether that trip amounted to the kind of preparation for a global crisis that Clinton has claimed.

"How does going to Beijing and giving a speech show crisis management? There was no crisis. And there was nothing to manage," Rice said.

Macedonia visit

In 1999, Clinton visited Albanian refugee camps in Macedonia during the NATO bombing campaign to force Slobodan Milosevic's troops out of Kosovo. Macedonia had sealed its borders in an attempt to stop the arrival of refugees but, under Western pressure, reopened them the day before Clinton visited the camps.

A former Clinton administration official sympathetic to her candidacy said her presence "played a very important role in helping to shore up support for the Kosovars."

But Ivo Daalder, a former Clinton NSC official with responsibility for the Balkans and author of a history of the Kosovo conflict, said the border opening had nothing to do with her negotiating skills.

"It was her coming that helped. But she had absolutely no role in the dirty work of negotiations," said Daalder, an Obama supporter. "This had nothing to do with her competence."

Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
Fredda Weinberg Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-07-08 01:46 PM
Response to Original message
1. That's right. HRC knew her place as first lady. So what?
She was still there and knows how things are done. That's experience.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
HooptieWagon Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-07-08 01:52 PM
Response to Reply #1
2. true,
serving tea and scones to diplomat's wives has to count for something...
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
Medusa Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Mar-08-08 10:30 PM
Response to Reply #2
14. Choosing the china & flowers is important too!
And don't forget choosing the menus! She's got 35 years of experience in that.
:rofl:
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
Diane R Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-07-08 01:52 PM
Response to Reply #1
3. So, you think Babs and Pickles should also be president someday? Wow.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
zulchzulu Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-07-08 02:16 PM
Response to Reply #1
8. Without NSA/other security clearance as First Lady, Hillary has NO "foreign policy experience"
Without national security clearance, no access to Presidential Daily Briefings and not talking to her husband much in 1998 as First Lady, saying she has foreign policy experience is like saying someone can be a doctor because they've been in a hospital.

It's bullshit.

Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
Fredda Weinberg Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-07-08 02:40 PM
Response to Reply #8
9. My interns haven't written a line of original code, but they now have programming experience
Your problems are your problems ... this is our chance to get a president who's seen the process up close. That cuts the learning curve ... and that's no bull shit!
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
Krashkopf Donating Member (965 posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-07-08 04:43 PM
Response to Reply #9
11. That's B.S . . .
Edited on Fri Mar-07-08 04:51 PM by Krashkopf
My wife is a Real Estate agent: I hear her end of a lot of Real Estate-related telephone conversations; she bounces Real Estate marketing ideas off of me; I help her put out her "Open House" signs; and, we sleep together every night.

But, inspite of all of that, I would never try to pass myself off as having relevant "Real Estate experience."

Would you trust me to sell your house?

Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
Fredda Weinberg Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Sat Mar-08-08 10:14 PM
Response to Reply #11
13. Strange you should bring that up ... I sold my own condo after my
mother passed away. I learned from watching my parents.

Would I trust you? Probably not.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
goclark Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-07-08 05:10 PM
Response to Reply #1
12. The waiters were in the rooms too as well as the Secretaries
that prepared the minutes from the meetings.

They watched how things were done as well but they did not have, and she did not have, the authority to do anything from the experience.

She was so busy putting on a good face for Bills "affairs" and his impeachment proceedings, she rarely had time to "stand by her man."

Face it, " This dog don't hunt."

She was the First Lady and she held the Bible for her husband when HE was sworn into office.

She smiled and lit the Christmas Tree on the front lawn.

She danced at the Balls and represented America with style. So did Jackie Kennedy and she was never a Jackie Kennedy.

We waited for eight years for her to push through her Universal Health Care Achievement ~ nada.

Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
grassfed Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-07-08 01:59 PM
Response to Original message
4. Clintons had separate bedrooms
She was unaware of any midnight phone calls. Daytime she was busy enabling and defending her serial philanderer – even with interns! – husband.

Senator George Mitchell is reportedly stunned and offended by Hilary's suggestion that she had any involvement whatsoever with the Irish Good Friday Agreement.
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
malik flavors Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-07-08 02:08 PM
Response to Original message
5. First Ladies have always been ready to lead, so Hillary needs to get in line...
NANCY REAGAN FOR PRESIDENT!!!
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
XemaSab Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-07-08 02:11 PM
Response to Reply #5
6. What about Betty Ford?
:shrug:
Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
tabasco Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-07-08 02:16 PM
Response to Original message
7. Why doesn't Hillary release her White House records and tax records?
The Clintons have those records of her White House activity, but they are keeping them secret.

What is Hillary hiding??

"CLINTON: And I will release my tax runs. I have consistently said that.

RUSSERT: Why not now?

CLINTON: Well, I will do it as others have done it, upon becoming
the nominee or even earlier, Tim, because I have been as open as I can
be. The public has 20 years of records from me. And I have very
extensive filings with the Senate where you can see...

RUSSERT: So before next Tuesday's primary?

CLINTON: Well, I can't get it together by then, but I will
certainly work to get it together. I'm a little busy right now; I
hardly have time to sleep. But I will certainly, you know, work toward
releasing, and we will get that done and in the public domain.

RUSSERT: One other issue. You talk about releasing documents.
On January 30th, the National Archives released 10,000 pages of your
public schedule as first lady.
It's now in the custody of former
President Clinton."

...

RUSSERT: But you had it for more than a month. Will you get it to
him -- will you get it to the White House immediately?

CLINTON: As soon as we can, Tim. I've urged that, and I hope it
will happen.

http://www.ohiodailyblog.com/content/complete-debate-transcript

Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
City Lights Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-07-08 03:01 PM
Response to Original message
10. The fact that she had to surround herself with generals at her photo-op
yesterday tells me all I need to know about her so-called experience. They were George Bush's Dick Cheney. I'm not buying what she's peddling. Her experience must not so great after all if she needed them to validate her. :eyes:

Printer Friendly | Permalink |  | Top
 
DU AdBot (1000+ posts) Click to send private message to this author Click to view 
this author's profile Click to add 
this author to your buddy list Click to add 
this author to your Ignore list Thu Oct 31st 2024, 06:46 PM
Response to Original message
Advertisements [?]
 Top

Home » Discuss » Archives » General Discussion: Presidential (Through Nov 2009) Donate to DU

Powered by DCForum+ Version 1.1 Copyright 1997-2002 DCScripts.com
Software has been extensively modified by the DU administrators


Important Notices: By participating on this discussion board, visitors agree to abide by the rules outlined on our Rules page. Messages posted on the Democratic Underground Discussion Forums are the opinions of the individuals who post them, and do not necessarily represent the opinions of Democratic Underground, LLC.

Home  |  Discussion Forums  |  Journals |  Store  |  Donate

About DU  |  Contact Us  |  Privacy Policy

Got a message for Democratic Underground? Click here to send us a message.

© 2001 - 2011 Democratic Underground, LLC