Hey, At Least Hillary's Better Than Condi

We all know that Hillary Clinton voted for the resolution authorizing the war on Iraq. And when Barack Obama objected to the use of nuclear weapons against terrorists, she replied, "I don't believe that any president should make any blanket statements with respect to the use or nonuse of nuclear weapons."

Surely though, as secretary of state, she would do President Obama's bidding. Not necessarily, according to the dean (if only due to his tenure) of political writers, the Washington Post's David Broder. In his already much-commented upon Wednesday column, "A Force for Good - but Not at State," he wrote:

What Obama needs in the person running the State Department is a diplomat who will carry out his foreign policy. He does not need someone who will tell him how to approach the world or be his mentor in international relations. ... The last thing Obama needs is a secretary of state carving out an independently based foreign policy.

Then the money line:

He needs an agent, not an author.

Still, however strange it is to choose a secretary of state whose area of expertise is domestic, would her hand pressing Obama's at the foreign policy helm be disastrous? To give Hillary the benefit of the doubt, weren't her Iraq and Iran statements just flukes?

During the campaign Stephen Zunes of Foreign Policy in Focus worked up in-depth rundowns (like this one) of each candidate's foreign policy. Here, as I wrote during the campaign, is some of what most of us don't know about Hillary...

• Of her White House days, Zunes writes that "when President Bill Clinton and others correctly expressed concerns that bombing Serbia would likely lead to. . . ethnic cleansing in Kosovo, Hillary Clinton successfully pushed her husband to bomb that country anyway."


• She also defended the bombing raid on the Sudanese chemical-weapons-plant-that-wasn't. (If you'll recall, it was a pharmaceutical plant.)


• Hillary supports military aid, including missiles which can be nuclear weaponized, to Israel, Pakistan and India, all of which have refused to sign the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty. She even voted to end restrictions on US nuclear cooperation with such states.


• After defending Israel's right to occupy Palestinian territory, not to mention its erection of the Wall, she denounced the International Court of Justice for calling on Israel to abide by international humanitarian law.


• Besides supporting her husband's bombing of Iraq, Hillary, Zunes writes, "has expressed pride that [his] administration changed underlying U.S. policy toward Iraq from 'containment' to 'regime change.'" Bet she wish she could take that one back.


• During the Senate debate over the resolution authorizing the invasion of Iraq, Clinton was the only Democrat to accept all of the Bush administration's claims about Iraq.

As if the above weren't troubling enough, Hillary's stances and votes on international law are downright chilling.

• In 2002, she voted in favor of an amendment by Senator Jesse Helms (yes, you read that right) prohibiting the United States from cooperating with the International Criminal Court. In other words, when it comes to prosecuting for genocide in Darfur, don't look at us.


• After Israel's 2002 offensive in the West Bank, Hillary opposed UN efforts to investigate alleged Iraqi war crimes by Israeli occupation forces. Even more startling, she criticized President Bush for calling on Israel to pull back.


• Finally, she refused to support the international treaty to ban land mines. Then she voted down a Democratic-sponsored resolution restricting U.S. exports of cluster bombs to countries using them against civilian-populated areas. Just keeping defense donors happy or are these legitimate weapons to her?

Still, it's not as if she'll be worse than previous secretaries of state. Check out this list going back to Nixon: Rice, Colin Powell, Madeline "We think it was worth it" Albright, Warren Christopher, Lawrence Eagleburger, James Baker, George Shultz, Alexander "I'm in control now" Haig, Ed Muskie, Cyrus Vance, and, of course, saving the best for last, Henry Kissinger.

The only ones who didn't seem to be predisposed to military force are: 1. Muskie. 2. Vance, with his interest in arms reduction and who resigned in protest against the mission to rescue hostages in Iran. 3. Schulz, who urged Ronald Reagan to go all in for nuclear disarmament at Reykjavik.I think we can safely say, that besides Condi, Hillary is an improvement over at least Madeline Albright, Alexander Haig, and, of course, Henry Kissinger.

If that's something best filed under "thank goodness for small favors," remember that, during the Bush administration, there were no favors whatsoever.

Comments

[Hawka]

Look to the National Security Adviser to keep her in check, he'll be making the shots and Obama will be making the decisions. Other then that I think as a diplomat Hillary is qualified enough, her reputation abroad is much more respected then at home for the most part. And geez, what's with the criticism on bombing Serbia anyway? The guys committed ethnic cleansing way before we bombed them anyway. At least this got them to stop eventually rather then never. That's like saying we shouldn't have bombed German factories because we killed civilians as well, even though not doing so would have prevented us from stopping the Holocaust or something. War offers no clean answers, we have to weigh everything on a scale for the most part.

[Adrienne Williams - Huffpost Blogger]

mmm. well to be fair, Hillary and Condi have the same personality, Hillary is just on the Dems side, so lets see how she does. As I stated, I'm okay with Hillary in this role. Just wasn't with her as President. I hope Obama can keep his personality as the peacemaker level, they can get out center and side with whomever has a more stronger personality. OH, Hillary, Michelle and Condi has the same type. :-) Hence why I wasn't surprised about the pick on this role.

[janeInCA]

Would say amen to your title. But that's all, everything else are big questions to put Hillary in the SoS position, or let say it's scary to see her in that job. What about threatening to "obliterate" a country during primary? Thanks God that's why we didn't vote for her to be President. Great article which stated exactly what're in a lot of people's mind.

[ozamerican]

Colin Powell would have been a good choice...

Hilary? There's something funny going on...

[NKR]

The only ways I can rationalize this is:

1) Obama & Clinton made a deal back in June that she would campaign for him and not throw a fit about losing if she got a job in his administration. Far-fetched? Maybe.

2) In the last few months Obama has become a hawk

3) Obama is really serious about "unity". Still, it would've been fine to pick her for any domestic position.

The other odd thing is that most of her foreign policy & worldview isn't much like Richardson's, or Kerry's, or Hagel's, etc.

Whatever it is I want an explanation. I did not work my ass off to get him elected so he'd pick HRC as his Secretary of State.

[luckyt]

Sure you did!

[standard]

Selecting Mrs. Clinton to be Secretary of State would be a grave error. One can only hope that our President-Elect will remove her from office at the very first instance on her part of incompetence or insubordination--or, perhaps, shortly after the first instance (since dismissing her during his administration's first hundred days might be seen as needlessly dramatic).

[Chety168]

I was a Hillary supporter and delegate and have supported Obama with all my heart after he won the nomination. I made calls, put out signs all over the place, worked the elections headquarters on election day, etc., for Obama. Give Hillary her-due. The Clinton years were good for all of us Democrats. Hillary is a very smart lady, who works hard and is a team player. I cannot understand why you would buy into the Hillary hatred that was instilled and proclaimed by the republicans? The reason why they hate her is simply because Bill-- a Democrat-won the presidency . Wait till Obama gets into office and you will see more hatred being spun and it will probably include Michelle. Imagine if all Hillary supporters wrote her name in on the ballot and did not support and work for Obama's election--where would he be? Lay off-we are trying to get together as a party again.

[NationalTreasure]

Hillary's delusional comments during the primary season countermand your assertion.

[FearlessFreep]

Is that the best you can do? IMHO, being better than the Chimp's administration still isn't good enough.