"The world is not in the mood for that"
By Max Pizarro, PolitickerNJ.com ReporterThe Hillary Clinton camp says Clinton’s quick, detail-oriented response during a CNN debate last week shows she’s ready to lead in a crisis.
"It’s experience here," said John Graham, one of the chief fund-raisers for the Clinton for President Campaign in New Jersey, which will welcome their candidate to two private events on Monday - one in Jersey City and one in Cresskill, in which they hope to raise around $200,000.
Graham said the face-off between Clinton and Obama on foreign policy hinges on a key distinction, which Clinton nailed and Obama did not. To the question of whether he or she would negotiate with sworn enemies of the United States "without preconditions," Obama said he would, while Clinton said nay.
Here’s the question from the debate: "In 1982, Anwar Sadat traveled to Israel, a trip that resulted in a peace agreement that has lasted ever since. In the spirit of that type of bold leadership, would you be willing to meet separately, without precondition, during the first year of your administration, in Washington or anywhere else, with the leaders of Iran, Syria, Venezuela, Cuba and North Korea, in order to bridge the gap that divides our countries?"
Here’s the money part of Obama’s answer: "I would. And the reason is this, that the notion that somehow not talking to countries is punishment to them -- which has been the guiding diplomatic principle of this administration -- is ridiculous."
And here’s the germane portion of Clinton’s answer: "Well, I will not promise to meet with the leaders of these countries during my first year. I will promise a very vigorous diplomatic effort because I think it is not that you promise a meeting at that high a level before you know what the intentions are. I don't want to be used for propaganda purposes. I don't want to make a situation even worse. But I certainly agree that we need to get back to diplomacy, which has been turned into a bad word by this administration."
Clinton later called Obama’s response "irresponsible and naive."
"He didn’t pre-qualify it the way she did," admitted Graham, who also said it’s naive to think Obama would negotiate without preconditions - but the fact that Clinton was attentive to that nugget in the question shows she’s better prepared to be president.
"Barack didn’t know how to say it yet," said Graham."Hillary, as smart as she is - she understood what needed to be said at that moment.
"Barack is very bright, but we don’t need on-the-job training right now," Graham added. "We’ve just been through that with Bush. The world is not in the mood for that."
Graham said he likes Obama and would love him for the number two spot on the ticket.
Of the opposition candidate’s on-stage comeback in New Hampshire on Thursday, in which Obama likened Clinton’s foreign policy approach to "Bush-Cheney-lite," Graham said, "He’s under such pressure from the ultra-liberal end of the party, which thinks he’s not strong enough, and he’s not distinguishing himself enough, that he’s trying to position himself by saying, ‘I’m different from her.’"
Graham said Clinton demonstrated she has the spot-on instincts "not to be sitting down there in that school for 20 minutes the way Bush was on 9/11."
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Hillary & Bush: Perfect together
What makes Hillary different than Bush on this issue? A quick response in a debate doesn't mean that someone has the right diplomatic tools to take on today's World and its leaders. Hillary articulated Bush's strategy -- Another 8 years of that type of thinking will surely continue to ruin the direction of America's foreign policy; or what's left of it.
Iraq does
She has many different stances on foreign policy than the Bush administration. She wants out of Iraq, she wants a no fly zone over Sudan, and she believes in economic sanctions against China to coerce them out of supplying the Janjueed and the Taliban. And what's more important she emphasizes working with the UN; refreshing in comparison to the Bush policy. This guy, Graham, is wrong to say his candidate is the better choice because of one trivial debate question I agree. He's vaunting his candidate on the campaign trail, what do you expect...Objectivity? I do agree with Hillary on this one though. It's ill conceived to think our president could make friends out of enemies by having a sitdown, when our enemies have expressed no intention to change their ways at lower levels. Presidents, on an international level, are responsible for negotiating what we are willing to compromise and what needs to be changed; the office is not responsible for knocking on our enemies doors asking "why can't we get along?" We have ambassador's and undersecrataries for that. Hell Jimmy Carter and Powell did it for Clinton with Haiti in the 90's. The acting President is above that. To sum it up with our nation's past time: The president is the 9th inning closer when it comes to international relations, not the starting pitcher.
Good points but...
There has to be some kind of outreach to foreign leaders; foreign diplomacy is key in today's world and economy. Shutting people out, with no initial attempt to bring them in, is just being stubborn and too proud. That has been Bush's policy during his administration and the result is a soured relationship, and in some cases, that method has destroyed any chances at U.S. relations the world over. Hillary or Obama, the next President must realize that there at least must be an initial effort before slamming the door.
Ready for a Lesbian President?
are you?
Homophobic Blather Backfires Again
Hey, BillConservative.
That was such a stupid/ineffective/impotent low blow that I have to wonder if you're not actually a Clinton supporter. LOL
From Frederick Douglass
Clinton v Obama? Nahhh, It's USA v Bush/Cheney!
Obama, was indeed off in his response.
Clinton caught the nuances better (she also had more time to think since Obama answered first)...and if Obama ever becomes President; I strongly doubt he would actually have "unconditional" summits with the likes of Kim Jung Il.
On the other hand Hillary really should admit that she made a mistake in allowing Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld/Rove con to her into the vote to give Bush "authorization" to invade/occupy Iraq.
We were taken to war, to use Thomas Friedman's phrase, "On the wings of a lie".
Hell they even managed to con/manipulate Colin Powell into lying, see: http://www.bushoniraq.com/powell5.html
Hillary and Obama need to ease up on each other and shed all that intellectual LIGHT/firepower on the Bush administration and challenge any Republican who dares to enable/support these criminal lying traitors.
It's no accident that most Americans STILL believe that Saddam Hussein was, somehow, behind 9-11.
This bloody wasteful war is the biggest boondoggle in the history of mankind; it's all about money, corruption and ego.
Even the crazed vicious violent mad dog terrorists are pawns in this game of profit for the a global military-industrial-petrochemical-financial complex.
It's all about divide and conquer. Who is being divided? Who is "conquering"/profiting?
Follow the money.
Who benefits from the status quo?
Who benefits from "Staying the Course"?
We're into Iraq to the tune of nearly a TRILLION BORROWED dollars!!! It'll take a generation to pay the full bill...and the meter is still running.
Any one of the Democrats running would be a major improvement over any of the Republicans who have not yet thouroughly condemned the Iraq policies of Bush et al.
If and when the American people become more fully informed about just how and why all this blood and treasure have been wasted in Iraq; the call for impeachment and removal from office will be the least of Bush/Cheney's problems.
Hell, if I were Osama Bin Laden and I wanted to see American democracy/prosperity/power belittled and destroyed I would be doing all I possibly could to keep the Bush policies in effect in perpetuity.
What we have in Iraq is a confluence of corrupt/self serving interests that does not require a conscious overt "conspiracy" to reinforce the current dysfunctional (yet perversely /extremely profitable for some) dynamic.
Think!
From Frederick Douglass If there is no struggle there is no progress......Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. From Frederick Douglass
hey everymanforhimself
Isn't that what we had installed to make sure Saddam Hussein would live up to the conditional surrender he signed? Then came Oil for Food. A great UN run program. Yet no one ever did anything when Saddam refused to honor the conditional surrender agreement. Then came Bush. Now we want to leave Iraq? So Hillary's sanctions are just more empty words. She won't enforce the sanctions so why make empty threats which the enemy knows is bogus. So if we run out of Iraq other countries will know we mean business when we impose more sanctions. I doubt that.