It has been the tradition of this country to allow a newly elected president what has come to be called a “honeymoon.” It is usually defined as a brief period of indulgence and good will before the gloves come off and the media and the president’s adversaries renew the traditional skirmishes. But one issue that is not likely to be put to rest is Barack Obama’s choice of Hillary Clinton as his top diplomat.
The reaction by many political analysts to Obama’s choice of Clinton to be his secretary of state has the pundits asking, “What was he thinking?” Just a few weeks ago, Obama questioned Clinton’s judgment on foreign policy as well as her husband’s international enterprises and the financial dealings connected to those activities.
The division within the Democratic party was reflected in the nature of the TV commercials aired against Hillary, questioning what she would do when the phone rang at three in the morning, announcing a major international crisis. Her early support of the war in Iraq was also a prime target of the TV assault.
Then there was the issue of Clinton’s claim that she ducked sniper fire in Bosnia, an episode that later proved to be concocted. One of her mortal enemies, journalist Christopher Hitchens, accused her of pathological lying: “She’s being punished, not for one episode of ‘mis-speaking’, but for a whole record of dishonesty.” The Times of London said the Bosnia fiction “helped to expose a much bigger untruth - that her time in the White House means she has the necessary foreign policy experience to be president.”
While Mrs. Clinton will not be putting her experience to work as president, the position of secretary of state requires its own share of experience and knowledge of what is going on around the world. Shortly after the Bosnia debacle, a Washington Post-ABC News poll showed Clinton regarded as “honest and trustworthy” by only 39 percent of the American public.
Like the multiple layers exposed in peeling an onion, the Bosnia episode exposed several conflicting answers that Hillary Clinton gave in other situations. The Washington Post noted in a story last year, “Senior Clinton advisers argued that the Bosnia story would not have developed the way it did were it not for a story line about Clinton that goes back to the 1990s, when scandals involving the first lady, including the firings in the White House travel office and her financial dealings, resulted in widespread doubts about her trustworthiness.”
Fast forward to the present. With Hillary waiting to be sworn in, President-elect Obama will have to answer whether, as a strategic ploy, he chose her in order to neutralize her position. As The Wall Street Journal notes, “The job at State all but eliminates any threat that Mrs. Clinton would use her position to highlight her differences with the sitting president. As the nation’s top diplomat, Mrs. Clinton will be barred, both by law and by custom, from partisan politics.”
So there you have it. Was the appointment of Mrs. Clinton to head the state department a brilliant political move by Obama to “neutralize” his formal rival, or will he be perceived as “dragging the Clinton political baggage back into the White House,” despite Obama’s theme of Change and moving beyond the Clinton era?
The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank points out that, “Obama, who campaigned against the Clinton way of doing things, is now engaged in a veritable restoration of the Clinton administration. Obama has named nine former Clinton aides to top positions in the White House, and of seven cabinet-level nominees announced so far, four served in the Clinton administration.” It remains to be seen whether Hillary, functioning as a good and faithful servant to Obama, will announce before the election of 2012 that one term for Obama is sufficient.
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5 users commented in " Hillary Clinton…Still Lurking? "
Follow-up comment rss or Leave a TrackbackHillary surprised everyone when no longer just a support act for Bill she successfully not only won a Senate seat but performed exceptionally well as a Senator. She came amazingly close to being a major political party’s first Presidential candidate and the Obama phenomenon aside she would have been – and would now be a couple of weeks away from being President.
The Clintons have put up with all the right-wing media could throw at them and always triumphed in the end. I’m not saying they have both been Saints – far from it. But Bill’s legacy is pretty positive and Hillary can certainly burnish the Clinton brand further. The only people likely to be disappointed are the Clinton haters – and that bunch aren’t worth worrying about for too long!
HRC’s Bosnia gaffe was just that - a media generated GAFFE. There WERE snipers in the mountains, the plane DID have to make a quick landing due to the danger of it being shot down. So, in fact, HRC did land under sniper fire. Yet the Obama-loving Clinton-hating blogosphere had a field day with the story to damage her and it worked. Now looking back I think we all know it’s as irrelevant as Obama’s “I’ve visited 57 states.” As far as HRC making a comeback in 2012 - that’s up to Obama. If he doesn’t deliver on what he promised and becomes unpopular than the party will probably jump ship and push Clinton to retain the White House in 2012.
Hillary Clinton won more votes than any other primary candidiate for president in history.
NY, CA, OH, FL, MI, TX, PA, NJ, MA, PR, NV, NH, KY, WV, SD, AZ, NM, RI, OK, TN, AK, IN - All for Hillary and she won the majority of the big, heavily populated states. 18 Million Votes!
Smart, strong, composed and nobody works harder or knows more than Hillary.
She will be an excellent Sec. of State.
Come on. What did Hillary Clinton accomplish for New York? How does refusing to step down help NY? She is hobbling not only the governor, who can’t pick anybody until she goes, but her replacement. Senate works on seniority, and HRC has rudely stepped on the seniority of her replacement.
By the way, Bosnia sniper fire, not a gaffe. A stone cold lie. (A stupid one at that) An insult to everybody who has actually taken fire.
Obama never promised to move beyond “Clinton era” politics. The Clinton-hater coalition in the media / blogsphere promised that. In fact, the Clinton era was held up by Democrats as more of what we need, by all Democrats. Interestingly, the wanted Obama to bring it about, not Hillary, but I take issue with the idea that any Democratic presidential candidate after 8 years of Bush would be foolish enough to talk down about the most successful and prosperous Democratic administration in the modern day.
Also, Hillary Clinton wanted to be President. That’s why she ran for president. That’s why she competed in every primary. That’s why she continued to campaign and make her case until the last votes were cast. And, as soon as someone else crossed the finish line before her, she did more for that person (Obama) than any other former pres. candidate in the history of American politics including raising millions of dollars for Obama and other Democratic candidates while her own campaign was still millions of dollars in debt. Hillary’s priorities in the campaign were: 1) Hillary for President, 2) Barring that, a Democrat for president. Once it was clear it would not be her, she conceded and got on board. Everyone nearly worships Ted Kennedy, who is guilty of a much bigger spectacle and much louder and more petulant temper tantrum over losing the Democratic nomination than Hillary Clinton even threatened to do at the height of the Clinton-Obama Drama.
The fact is — in retrospect and if we’d not lost our heads over Obama Mania we could have seen it, did see it three years ago, just lost perspective — ANY Democrat could have won this year. I think anyone in their right mind who has been paying attention knows that Hillary Clinton was the establishment choice for President as far back as 8 years ago — everyone knew she was running for the Senate to get on the White House career track. It’s being said now that she would have “taken the nomination in a walk” in 2004, but she was cautioned that it was too soon. To go from assumed President-In-Waiting to Establishment Punching Bag in the space of a few months is a hard blow for any politician to deal with, and Hillary Clinton was obviously blindsided by Barack Obama; it wasn’t even until the primaries actually began that Obama even appeared the least bit viable. By the end of it all, I believe the REAL contest was between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama — John McCain or any Republican really stood no chance. And I think the entire Democratic organization at least knew that, which is why put so much gravity on the primaries to begin with.
Now, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama’s fates are tied together — by Obama’s doing. He may well have tapped her a SecState IN PART to neutralize her as a 2012 challenger, but that does not in any way imply he would oppose her down the road. In fact, the “we can have them both” argument gets some more credence from her State Department appointment, not less. We got eh “Dream Team” after all. Vote obama 2012, Vote Hillary 2016.
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