Comments on: Poll Update: Public divided on president meeting with rogue nations

By: Jeff Morgan

Jeff Morgan — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 04:13:05 +0000

As this relates to the campaign, this is Hillary’s loss in that she lost the messaging fight. Now Obama can for the rest of the campaign say things like, “I’m not afraid to lose to a PR war to tin-pot dictators,” “I’ll stand toe-to-toe with them,” “Look them in the eye,” etc etc. These are things he can say to the public and be crystal clear, while any message Hillary has to counter these would have to be convoluted or vague and just not hit home quite like his message.

“If the point of starting the campaigns a year earlier than normal was to get more people interested and involved, so far the experiment has been a flop.”

I would imagine many more people are involved at this point than in any previous election. The fireworks will fly in 4-5 months, but especially for the Obama campaign, this is time used to raise money and get groups organized and ready to go for when that fight comes. Clinton inherited money (10 million) and a support network from her 2000 campaign and from loyalists to the Bill machine, while Obama is building from scratch.

By: lyn

lyn — Tue, 31 Jul 2007 21:23:12 +0000

Obama is absolutely correct in speaking from America’s strength. Never fear to meet when we occupy the high ground. Afraid those dictators will use the meetings for propaganda purposes? What a flimsy stance! Since when did the fear of spin-masters have ever been a factor in diplomacy (except now in Hillary’s heated imagination)? Diplomacy IS about going toe-to-toe with your antagonists; to quote Churchill, as so many have, it’s better to jaw, jaw than war, war. The war over words (propaganda) is NOT a US and global problem; military combat IS.

By: George Rose

George Rose — Mon, 30 Jul 2007 19:50:11 +0000

The US has always met with their enemies:

FDR, Harry Truman and Ike met with Josef Stalin.
Vice President Nixon met with Castro.
JFK met with Nikita Khrushchev.
President Nixon met with Mao Zedong.

Besides that, H.Clinton flip-flopped:

In the January 27th interview on MSNBC H.Clinton was asked if she would “meet immediately” with leaders of Iran and Syria, she said:

“I don’t see it as a sign of weakness, I see it as a sign of strength. You know our president will not talk to people he considers bad. Well there are a lot of bad actors in the world and you don’t make peace with your friends. You’ve got to deal with your enemies, your opponents, people whose interests diverge from yours.”