Nobel winner: Hillary Clinton's "silly" Irish peace claims

[catgirl]

Hillary Clinton had no direct role in bringing peace to Northern Ireland and is a "wee bit silly" for exaggerating the part she played, according to Lord Trimble of Lisnagarvey, the Nobel Peace Prize winner and former First Minister of the province.

Full coverage of the US Elections 2008
David Trimble: Hillary Clinton mere "cheerleader" in Ireland


Hillary Clinton with the Rev Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness after their meeting in Washington last year
"I don’t know there was much she did apart from accompanying Bill going around," he said. Her recent statements about being deeply involved were merely "the sort of thing people put in their canvassing leaflets" during elections. "She visited when things were happening, saw what was going on, she can certainly say it was part of her experience. I don’t want to rain on the thing for her but being a cheerleader for something is slightly different from being a principal player."

Mrs Clinton has made Northern Ireland key to her claims of having extensive foreign policy experience, which helped her defeat Barack Obama in Ohio and Texas on Tuesday after she presented herself as being ready to tackle foreign policy crises at 3am.

"I helped to bring peace to Northern Ireland," she told CNN on Wednesday. But negotiators from the parties that helped broker the Good Friday Agreement in 1998 told The Daily Telegraph that her role was peripheral and that she played no part in the gruelling political talks over the years.

more: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/03/08/wuspols108.xml

It seems Europe media doesn't shy away from bringing out the truth about Hillary's "experience".

[anamnua]

1. I *am* Irish and

am resident in Ireland. I can tell you that she played a significant if low key role in the Irish Peace process. Trimble has a chip on his shoulder - like many posters here, it must be said.

[Coexist]

3. WaPo's factchecker says otherwise, as does this article;

http://www.irishecho.com/newspaper/story.cfm?id=18626

[catgirl]

4. Yah, like how? You're not convincing me

Any links? Want to back it up instead of dissing me? This is
significant and neccessary because Hillary is claiming to have
all this international experience, which she in fact, does not
have.

[dansolo]

6. You are using the same rational as Hillary

Sorry, but I'll take the word of an active participant over a casual observer. Trimble has credibility on this issue. You don't.

[City Lights]

11. Show us your proof. eom

[jgraz]

18. Well, somebody had to serve the tea.

[Raven]

2. How long did those peace talks go on? n/t

[laban]

5. John Hume Nobel laureate: she played a positive role for over a decade in helping to bring peace

I am quite surprised that anyone would suggest that Hillary Clinton did not perform important foreign policy work as first lady. I can state from firsthand experience that she played a positive role for over a decade in helping to bring peace to Northern Ireland,\\\" said former SDLP leader and Nobel laureate John Hume is a statement responding to critical press reports.


\\\"She visited Northern Ireland, met with very many people and gave very decisive support to the peace process. In private she made countless calls and contacts, speaking to leaders and opinion makers on all sides, urging them to keep moving forward,\\\" said Hume.


This would appear to be an important point. Press-based criticism of Senator Clinton has been based on the public record, and what has been recorded by both Clintons in their respective autobiographies


http://www.irishecho.com/newspaper/story.cfm?id=18626

[Alamom]

16. Hume -Nobel ,Gandhi Peace Prize, Martin Luther King Award. The only winner of all three Awards

I included both men's bio below due to Baron Trimble giving a different opinion


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Hume

John Hume (born 18 January 1937) is a former Northern Irish politician, founding member of the Social Democratic and Labour Party and co-recipient of the 1998 Nobel Peace Prize, with David Trimble.

He was the second leader of the Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP), a position he held from 1979 until 2001. He has served as a Member of the European Parliament and a Member of Parliament for Foyle, as well as a member of the Northern Ireland Assembly.

He is regarded as one of the most important figures in the modern political history of Northern Ireland and one of the architects of the Northern Ireland peace process there. He is also a recipient of the Gandhi Peace Prize and the Martin Luther King Award, the only recipient of the three major peace awards.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Trimble

William David Trimble, Baron Trimble, PC (born 15 October 1944), is a politician from Northern Ireland who served as leader of the Ulster Unionist Party (UUP) and the first First Minister of Northern Ireland. He shared the 1998 Nobel Peace Prize with John Hume of the Social Democratic and Labour Party. He served as Member of Parliament for Upper Bann from 1990 until 2005, when he was defeated in the British general election and resigned the leadership of the UUP soon afterwards. On 6 June 2006 he became a member of the House of Lords as The Right Honourable William David Trimble by the name, style and title of Baron Trimble, of Lisnagarvey in the County of Antrim.<1> On 17 April 2007 he announced that he was to leave the UUP and join the Conservative Party.<2>


http://www.irishecho.com/newspaper/story.cfm?id=18626

Hillary's Irish Legacy
Prominent backers cite relevant role in peace process
By Ray O'Hanlon
3/5/08

"I am quite surprised that anyone would suggest that Hillary Clinton did not perform important foreign policy work as first lady. I can state from firsthand experience that she played a positive role for over a decade in helping to bring peace to Northern Ireland," said former SDLP leader and Nobel laureate John Hume is a statement responding to critical press reports.

[NorthernSpy]

19. "positive role" = "How do you do? Tea? Biscuit? Best of luck with your negotiations..."

:eyes:

[Faygo Kid]

7. She'll likely claim credit for driving the snakes out of Ireland, too.

And hiring them to run her campaign.

Besides, it's O'bama who is Irish.

"It was initially believed the would-be president's great-great-great-grandfather Fulmuth Kearney was the only one of his family to have sailed from Ireland to New York at age 19 in 1850. But the newly uncovered records show other family members had in fact emigrated to America since the 1790s. They also reveal that Fulmuth's father, Joseph, was a shoemaker — a wealthy skilled trade at the time, the newspaper reported.

"They would have been among the upper echelons of society back then," said Neill."

[laban]

8. Obamabot..you shold read this one..

http://www.blog.newsweek.com/blogs/stumper/archive/2008/03/07/the-real-problem-with-power-s-monster-remark.aspx

The incident is less interesting to me as a scandal--I mean, really--than as a symptom of the growing rancor between Obama and Clinton supporters. Some reader comments on Stumper and other blogs are insightful. But most of them have little to do with the post in question. Instead, the exchanges quickly descend into what Internet lexicographers call \"flame wars\"--malicious, escalating, ad hominem attacks on the rival candidate and anyone dumb, deluded or debased enough even consider voting for him or her. Sociologists, in fact, have a name for this process: \"infrahumanization,\" or, as \"GlennWSmith\" writes at Open Left, \"the tendency for in-group members to strip out-groups of full human emotions and capabilities.\" In other words, infrahumanization occurs when \"we\" stop seeing \"them\" as real, live people. And it\'s not \"limited to the close-minded and the bigoted,\" as Smith notes. Instead, it \"seems to be rather universal.\"

[Faygo Kid]

9. It's Hillbot, and Obamaniac. Get the insults right.

\Are you\a new poster\or one\previously tombstoned\and now posting under\a new name?

I'm\supposed to read\that crappy post?

[City Lights]

14. LOL!

:thumbsup:

[Rosa Luxemburg]

13. so Obama IS Irish! Hurrah!

I liked the one about the snakes in HRC's campaign!

[SoCalDem]

10. that vast resume'

[City Lights]

12. Hillary is starting to look like a serial exaggerator.

People who actually have impressive resumes don't need to pad them.

This will come back to bite her backside.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

15. her serial exaggerations must be highlighted on TV ads forthwith

[Alamom]

17. Not with John Hume supporting her resume nm