May 19th, 2009 at 12:25 pm

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Brilliant rebuttal. The difference from being objective and fair to having an obvious anti-Hillary prejudice.

The Outspoken Hillary Clinton: What Is the US’ Top Diplomat Up To?
Submitted by christine on Mon, 05/18/2009 – 12:21pm. Analysis
A BUZZFLASH NEWS ANALYSIS
by Christine Bowman

What has Hillary Clinton been up to? So far, her diplomacy has held surprises for observers worldwide.

Paul Richter’s report on Secretary of State Hillary Clinton (”What will she say next?”) in the May 18 Chicago Tribune raises interesting questions about the Secretary’s diplomatic style. He writes, “Her candor is raising eyebrows.”

It’s true, she accused the Pakistani government of “abdicating” to the Taliban. Since that comment, President Zardari’s government launched an all-out effort to rout the Taliban from the Swat valley.

In February, Clinton upset human rights groups by seeming to brush off Beijing’s stonewalling on improving their human rights record. A few months later, she risked China’s ire by calling their involvement in Latin America “quite disturbing.”

From Mexico, she pointedly commented on the fact that assault weapons flowing southward from the US, fueling drug-trade violence: “Our inability to prevent weapons from being illegally smuggled across the border to arm these criminals causes the deaths of police officers, soldiers and civilians. I feel very strongly we have a co-responsibility.” That really upset the NRA back home.

On April 30, she called North Korea’s return to nuclear talks “implausible if not impossible.”

Are these blunders and missteps? Perhaps, but it’s also possible such unaccustomed honesty from a top diplomat is simply a new approach. This may be a time when the US’ top diplomat has chosen to cast aside the old “speak softly” approach to diplomacy and to stop tiptoeing around sticky issues. Maybe Clinton favors a stir-the-pot approach. Maybe the best thing the US can do following a period of intense international disapprobation is to admit it when “the emperor has no clothes.” When the Secretary chooses to use “tough talk,” career diplomats further down the chain of command can still parse their words and smooth ruffled feathers as well as they ever have.

Clinton’s personal history certainly is one of direct outspokenness. It is possible in 2009 as Secretary of State that Clinton has found the ideal match for her temperament and talents.

Where is President Barack Obama on the issue of diplomatic bluntness? Richter notes that Clinton’s approach has not drawn a rebuke from Obama.

Talk of Clinton’s style and hints about possible errors also demands comparison to the diplomatic style and legacies of Clinton’s predecessors.

To his chagrin, Secretary of State Colin Powell will be remembered for his persuasive UN presentation about weapons of mass destruction on the eve of the Iraq war, and for his role as an outsider in the Cheney-dominated Bush inner circle. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice famously pushed support for democratically elected governments, but then Hamas came to power. Rice also will be forever known for her fear-mongering in the lead-up to war: “… we don’t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud.” Her footwear, too, raised eyebrows. President Bush himself was known for his “gut-check” diplomacy, as Eleanor Clift at Newsweek puts it. He was better at massaging German Prime Minister Merkel’s shoulders than he was at implementing nuanced policy.

Now we have Clinton at State telling the world the truth as she sees it. Couple that with the kind of toughness she showed in the presidential primary, and it could be a winning combination for US diplomacy. “Smart power” is the Obama/Clinton strategy for the future. That would be a break in substance and style from the recent diplomatic past.

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Weakening our allies is risky
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Obama approach makes U.S. less secure

By Frank J. Gaffney Jr.
Tuesday, May 19, 2009

This is a lousy time to have a president in the White House who is, apparently, contemptuous of Winston Churchill. At this writing, President Obama was poised to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday, the latest in a series of efforts aimed at weakening Israel and otherwise bending it to the U.S. administration’s will – a practice against which an historian/statesman like Churchill would have strenuously warned.

In his extraordinary memoir, “The Gathering Storm,” the future British prime minister recalled how he had publicly pronounced in the run-up to World War II that he could not “imagine a more dangerous policy” than one then being practiced by the British government. It involved trying to appease Adolf Hitler by encouraging Britain’s principal continental ally, France, to disarm – even as Nazi Germany was remilitarizing in increasingly offensive ways.

This practice was subsequently applied by both the British and French as they compelled another powerful ally, Czechoslovakia, to surrender its formidable Western defenses and military-industrial capabilities to the Nazis. The results of these misbegotten initiatives produced not peace, but an unprecedented conflagration. Extreme care should be exercised to avoid a repetition of this tragic history.

Yet, every indication is that Mr. Obama is determined to weaken Israel, America’s most important and reliable ally in the Middle East, by forcing the Jewish state to surrender territory and make other strategic concessions in order to create a Palestinian state. As in the past, this weaken-your-friend approach to achieving the so-called two-state solution will not work. It will encourage, not eliminate, the abiding ambition of other nations in the region and their terrorist proxies to “wipe Israel off the map.” It will actually exacerbate regional instability, not alleviate it.

Fortunately, another thoughtful student of history and accomplished statesman has come forth in Churchill’s footsteps (and follows his example) by laying out a markedly different approach to the idea of creating a second state out of the 22 percent of the original mandate Palestine west of the Jordan River that was not given to the Arabs in 1922. (The other 78 percent became “Transjordan,” known today simply as Jordan.)

At a Washington dinner hosted on May 6 by the Endowment for Middle East Truth, R. James Woolsey was recognized as a “speaker of the truth.” In his brief acceptance address, a man who has served presidents of both parties as undersecretary of the Navy, conventional arms control negotiator and director of central intelligence laid out preconditions that must apply before there is any likelihood of a Palestinian polity with which Israel might actually be able to live “side by side in peace.”

Mr. Woolsey’s analysis is informed by the status Israeli Arabs enjoy in the Jewish state today. They make up roughly one-fifth of the population of Israel. They are able to have their own places of worship and schools. They are free to own and publish their own newspapers.

Israel’s Arab citizens are also entitled to vote for real representation in a real legislature. Currently, they have 10 of the 120 seats in the Israeli Knesset. There is an Arab justice on the Israeli Supreme Court. And an ethnically Arab Druze holds a seat in Mr. Netanyahu’s Cabinet.

Most importantly, as Mr. Woolsey notes, law-abiding Arab citizens of Israel “can go to sleep at night without having to worry that their door will be kicked down and they will be killed” by agents of the Israeli government or others among the majority Jewish population. In short, they enjoy real security as well as opportunities in a society in which Israeli Arabs are a distinct minority.

Regrettably, as Mr. Woolsey notes, the world has a tendency to “define deviancy down for non-Jews.” As a result, governments around the world, including the Obama administration, never even mention the possibility that Jews should be able to enjoy the same rights and privileges in any future Palestinian polity that Israeli Arabs exercise today in the Jewish state.

So, instead of what amounts to a Hitlerian program of Judenrein in any prospective Palestinian state – meaning, as a practical matter, if not a de jure one, that no Jews can reside or work there – there could be about twice the number of Israeli Jews as currently reside in so-called settlements on the West Bank. They should be free to build synagogues and Jewish schools. And newspapers that serve the Jewish population in any future state of “Palestine” should be permitted to flourish there.

Jews should also have a chance to elect representatives to a future Palestinian legislature. They should be able to expect to be represented as well in other governing institutions, like the executive and judicial branches.

In order for the foregoing to operate, Jews in the Palestinian state must be able to live without fearing every day for their lives. In Mr. Woolsey’s view, “Once Palestinians are behaving that way, they deserve a state.”

By establishing full reciprocity as the prerequisite basis for a two-state solution Mr. Obama might just be able to make useful progress toward peace in the Middle East. If, however, he persists in distancing the United States from Israel and otherwise weakening the Jewish state, he will likely get war, not a durable end to hostilities. As Churchill and Mr. Woolsey might attest, no good will come of Mr. Obama ignoring history and his efforts to euchre Israel into doing the same.

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Frank J. Gaffney Jr. is president of the Center for Security Policy and a columnist for The Washington Times.

As I posted above, I have serious reservations about Haiti. It seems Bill can do more good on issues like the Mmiddle East/Pakistan/Russia…..Sadly, part of the” bargain”, imo, for Hillary getting SOS, was that Bill would be kept on a tight leash.
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Bill would be criticized by the Pressers for interfering with Foreign Policy. And further, giving BO’s sycophants an opening for saying “We Told You So!”, if his focus were on Mmiddle East/Pakistan/Russia. You know that as well as I do. heh!

part of the” bargain”, imo, for Hillary getting SOS, was that Bill would be kept on a tight leash.

The announcement for Special Envoy to Haiti doesn’t include Bill making his residence there.. Most of his work can be done from Chappaqua overseeing the project from home or at his office in Harlem or just about anywhere for that matter. Initially, I think he would have to spend some time there laying the foundation for his plans. Once that is done, if he checks in every other week or so overseeing their progress would work well for him. A friend of mine works for a business man where his residence and home office is in Tenn. He flys in every other week or so to oversee his second office location servicing local contracts he has with the State of MA.

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You mean “short” leash, don’t you? And what is the definition of short anyway?

hillbuzz.org/2009/05/18/is-the-white-house-using-the-chicago-tribune-to-attack-hillary-clinton/

Real??? Haven’t got a clue but fits the “pattern”.

Martin Crutsinger, AP Economics Writer
On Tuesday May 19, 2009, 10:49 am EDT
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This is not not not the issue. Eventually we will hit bottom. It is inevitable. The question is–has always been what about the recovery. Will it be the V shaped recovery Bambi claims, or will it be a Japanese L shaped recovery. The former means a quick return to prosperity whereas the latter entails years of employment, and the pain and suffering it entails. Moreover, the 3.6 trillion dollar budget, banker bailout, credit bailouts, auto bailouts, and doubling of money supply guarantee a lower standard of living thanks to bambi. Lets put it this way: if Bush owns the drop then Bambi owns the recovery. And if the recovery is not what he promised, or it plunges further the responsibility lies with bambi. In that case, big media will find it impossible to deny what is happening because it will be visible.