In a recent foreign policy speach, John McCain advocated kicking Russia out of the G8. He also stated that India and Brazil should be included, but not China.
Now, I understand that Russia is moving away from democracy and that is a problem, but expelling them from the G8 is ridiculous.
Fareed Zakaria rips apart McCain’s position in a very thoughtful column.
McCain will quickly destroy his own candidacy as time goes on.
They keep rolling in, and these two are big ones.
The Obama campaign is fighting back. After ridiculing Senator Clinton yesterday for implying that he might make a good Vice-President, the Obama campaign is hitting her hard on her claims of foreign policy “experience.” As many bloggers and news organizations have been pointing out, Hillary has been padding her resume on foreign policy experience. The entire memo from Greg Craig, former director of the Policy Planning Office, U.S. State Department, is below, and it makes Hillary’s claims look absurd.
When your entire campaign is based upon a claim of experience, it is important that you have evidence to support that claim. Hillary Clinton’s argument that she has passed “the Commander- in-Chief test” is simply not supported by her record.
There is no doubt that Hillary Clinton played an important domestic policy role when she was First Lady. It is well known, for example, that she led the failed effort to pass universal health insurance. There is no reason to believe, however, that she was a key player in foreign policy at any time during the Clinton Administration. She did not sit in on National Security Council meetings. She did not have a security clearance. She did not attend meetings in the Situation Room. She did not manage any part of the national security bureaucracy, nor did she have her own national security staff. She did not do any heavy-lifting with foreign governments, whether they were friendly or not. She never managed a foreign policy crisis, and there is no evidence to suggest that she participated in the decision-making that occurred in connection with any such crisis. As far as the record shows, Senator Clinton never answered the phone either to make a decision on any pressing national security issue – not at 3 AM or at any other time of day.
When asked to describe her experience, Senator Clinton has cited a handful of international incidents where she says she played a central role. But any fair-minded and objective judge of these claims – i.e., by someone not affiliated with the Clinton campaign – would conclude that Senator Clinton’s claims of foreign policy experience are exaggerated.
Northern Ireland:
Senator Clinton has said, “I helped to bring peace to Northern Ireland.” It is a gross overstatement of the facts for her to claim even partial credit for bringing peace to Northern Ireland. She did travel to Northern Ireland, it is true. First Ladies often travel to places that are a focus of U.S. foreign policy. But at no time did she play any role in the critical negotiations that ultimately produced the peace. As the Associated Press recently reported, “[S]he was not directly involved in negotiating the Good Friday peace accord.” With regard to her main claim that she helped bring women together, she did participate in a meeting with women, but, according to those who know best, she did not play a pivotal role. The person in charge of the negotiations, former Senator George Mitchell, said that “[The First Lady] was one of many people who participated in encouraging women to get involved, not the only one.”
News of Senator Clinton’s claims has raised eyebrows across the ocean. Her reference to an important meeting at the Belfast town hall was debunked. Her only appearance at the Belfast City Hall was to see Christmas lights turned on. She also attended a 50-minute meeting which, according to the Belfast Daily Telegraph’s report at the time, “[was] a little bit stilted, a little prepared at times.” Brian Feeney, an Irish author and former politician, sums it up: “The road to peace was carefully documented, and she wasn’t on it.”
Bosnia:
Senator Clinton has pointed to a March 1996 trip to Bosnia as proof that her foreign travel involved a life-risking mission into a war zone. She has described dodging sniper fire. While she did travel to Bosnia in March 1996, the visit was not a high-stakes mission to a war zone. On March 26, 1996, the New York Times reported that “Hillary Rodham Clinton charmed American troops at a U.S.O. show here, but it didn’t hurt that the singer Sheryl Crow and the comedian Sinbad were also on the stage.”
Kosovo:
Senator Clinton has said, “I negotiated open borders to let fleeing refugees into safety from Kosovo.” It is true that, as First Lady, she traveled to Macedonia and visited a Kosovar refugee camp. It is also true that she met with government officials while she was there. First Ladies frequently meet with government officials. Her claim to have “negotiated open borders to let fleeing refugees into safety from Kosovo,” however, is not true. Her trip to Macedonia took place on May 14, 1999. The borders were opened the day before, on May 13, 1999.
The negotiations that led to the opening of the borders were accomplished by the people who ordinarily conduct negotiations with foreign governments – U.S. diplomats. President Clinton’s top envoy to the Balkans, former Ambassador Robert Gelbard, said, “I cannot recall any involvement by Senator Clinton in this issue.” Ivo Daalder worked on the Clinton Administration’s National Security Council and wrote a definitive history of the Kosovo conflict. He recalls that “she had absolutely no role in the dirty work of negotiations.”
Rwanda:
Last year, former President Clinton asserted that his wife pressed him to intervene with U.S. troops to stop the Rwandan genocide. When asked about this assertion, Hillary Clinton said it was true. There is no evidence, however, to suggest that this ever happened. Even those individuals who were advocating a much more robust U.S. effort to stop the genocide did not argue for the use of U.S. troops. No one recalls hearing that Hillary Clinton had any interest in this course of action. Based on a fair and thorough review of National Security Council deliberations during those tragic months, there is no evidence to suggest that U.S. military intervention was ever discussed. Prudence Bushnell, the Assistant Secretary of State with responsibility for Africa, has recalled that there was no consideration of U.S. military intervention.
At no time prior to her campaign for the presidency did Senator Clinton ever make the claim that she supported intervening militarily to stop the Rwandan genocide. It is noteworthy that she failed to mention this anecdote – urging President Clinton to intervene militarily in Rwanda – in her memoirs. President Clinton makes no mention of such a conversation with his wife in his memoirs. And Madeline Albright, who was Ambassador to the United Nations at the time, makes no mention of any such event in her memoirs.
Hillary Clinton did visit Rwanda in March 1998 and, during that visit, her husband apologized for America’s failure to do more to prevent the genocide.
China
Senator Clinton also points to a speech that she delivered in Beijing in 1995 as proof of her ability to answer a 3 AM crisis phone call. It is strange that Senator Clinton would base her own foreign policy experience on a speech that she gave over a decade ago, since she so frequently belittles Barack Obama’s speeches opposing the Iraq War six years ago. Let there be no doubt: she gave a good speech in Beijing, and she stood up for women’s rights. But Senator Obama’s opposition to the War in Iraq in 2002 is relevant to the question of whether he, as Commander-in-Chief, will make wise judgments about the use of military force. Senator Clinton’s speech in Beijing is not.
Senator Obama’s speech opposing the war in Iraq shows independence and courage as well as good judgment. In the speech that Senator Clinton says does not qualify him to be Commander in Chief, Obama criticized what he called “a rash war . . . a war based not on reason, but on passion, not on principle, but on politics.” In that speech, he said prophetically: “[E]ven a successful war against Iraq will require a US occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences.” He predicted that a U.S. invasion of Iraq would “fan the flames of the Middle East,” and “strengthen the recruitment arm of al Qaeda.” He urged the United States first to “finish the fight with Bin Laden and al Qaeda.”
If the U.S. government had followed Barack Obama’s advice in 2002, we would have avoided one of the greatest foreign policy catastrophes in our nation’s history. Some of the most “experienced” men in national security affairs – Vice President Cheney and Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and others – led this nation into that catastrophe. That lesson should teach us something about the value of judgment over experience. Longevity in Washington, D.C. does not guarantee either wisdom of judgment.
Conclusion:
The Clinton campaign’s argument is nothing more than mere assertion, dramatized in a scary television commercial with a telephone ringing in the middle of the night. There is no support for or substance in the claim that Senator Clinton has passed “the Commander-in-Chief test.” That claim – as the TV ad – consists of nothing more than making the assertion, repeating it frequently to the voters and hoping that they will believe it.
On the most critical foreign policy judgment of our generation – the War in Iraq – Senator Clinton voted in support of a resolution entitled “The Joint Resolution to Authorize the Use of U.S. Military Force Against Iraq.” As she cast that vote, she said: “This is probably the hardest decision I have ever had to make — any vote that may lead to war should be hard — but I cast it with conviction.” In this campaign, Senator Clinton has argued – remarkably – that she wasn’t actually voting for war, she was voting for diplomacy. That claim is no more credible than her other claims of foreign policy experience. The real tragedy is that we are still living with the terrible consequences of her misjudgment. The Bush Administration continues to cite that resolution as its authorization – like a blank check – to fight on with no end in sight.
Barack Obama has a very simple case. On the most important commander in chief test of our generation, he got it right, and Senator Clinton got it wrong. In truth, Senator Obama has much more foreign policy experience than either Bill Clinton or Ronald Reagan had when they were elected. Senator Obama has worked to confront 21st century challenges like proliferation and genocide on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. He possesses the personal attributes of a great leader – an even temperament, an open-minded approach to even the most challenging problems, a willingness to listen to all views, clarity of vision, the ability to inspire, conviction and courage.
And Barack Obama does not use false charges and exaggerated claims to play politics with national security.
More evidence of Hillary Clinton padding her resume.
“I don’t know there was much she did apart from accompanying Bill [Clinton] going around,” he said. Her recent statements about being deeply involved were merely “the sort of thing people put in their canvassing leaflets” during elections. “She visited when things were happening, saw what was going on, she can certainly say it was part of her experience. I don’t want to rain on the thing for her but being a cheerleader for something is slightly different from being a principal player.”
Would you hire someone who exaggerates the experience listed on her resume? Looks like Hillary Clinton’s claims of foreign policy experience are not holding up to scutiny. The Chicago Tribune digs deep to uncover the truth.
Many Cubans are using it to challenge the government.
We should end the draconian travel restrictions for Cuban-Americans immediately and start to engage the Cuban government. This will embolden the Cuban people to demand more changes.
I’d like to see Obama go down to South Florida and give a major address on Cuba and foreign policy. He can use Cuba as an example of how the old ways of doing things don’t make sense.
I just saw this clip of Bill Clinton in 2004 on Countdown, as Keith Olbermann ridicule Hillary’s Clinton’s attempt to bring fear into the campaign.
Bill Clinton was right - go with the candidate who asks you to think and hope vs. the candidate that is trying to scare you.
He just doesn’t get it.
“And my friends, if we left, they (al-Qaida) wouldn’t be establishing a base,” McCain said Wednesday. “They’d be taking a country, and I’m not going to allow that to happen, my friends. I will not surrender. I will not surrender to al-Qaida.”
They’d be taking a country? Last time I checked, Iraq has a Shi’ite majority. McCain thinks the Shi’ites–the Mahdi Army, the Badr Corps (and yes, the Iranians)–would allow a small group of Sunni extremists to take over? In fact, as noted above, the vast majority of indigenous Iraqi Sunnis aren’t too thrilled about the AQI presence in their country, either. (The usual caveats apply: AQI is barbaric, dastardly and intent on violating the Qu’ran by engaging in the annihilation of innocents. We can’t get rid of them fast enough.)
Joe Klein deserves credit for addressing this point, and hopefully the Obama campaign is paying attention. Bush and McCain have been justifying the continued presence in Iraq by playing the Al Qaida card, but Klein points out the obvious. They will never “take over” Iraq.
With President George W. Bush, we had a president who made sweeping promises about the importance of fostering democracy around the world, to the point that many of his speeches reminded listeners to the utopian goals of Woodrow Wilson. Unfortunately, Bush and his advisors had no clue about the challenges facing those trying to bring democracy to places like the Middle East. Just as in Iraq, lofty goals were not backed up with preparation or hard work. Instead we had utter incompetence.
Joe Klein reports the following from the U.S,-Islamic World Forum in Doha:
The distress was deeper than exhaustion. Many of the Muslim delegates seemed stunned, finally, by the rush of history unleashed by the Bush Administration. “Everything the United States has favored is now radioactive, especially democracy,” said Rami Khouri, a Lebanese journalist. The Administration had pushed for elections in places like the Palestinian territories where the essential components of democracy—a free press, a free economy, the rule of law—did not exist. Religious parties had won, or gained momentum, in most of these elections, and the U.S. had backtracked, refusing to accept the Hamas victory in the Palestinian territories, re-embracing autocrats like Hosni Mubarak in Egypt. “Our indigenous democratic reformers,” Khouri said, “are in retreat across the region.”
This isn’t about conservative or liberal foreign policy. It’s about common sense. Conservatives like George Will and Pat Buchanan saw the folly of Bush’s policies, as did liberals like Ted Kennedy. The greatest tragedy is that real efforts to bring democracy to the world have been set back by this administrations incompetence.
This is quite a coup for Obama:
Zbigniew Brzezinski, one of the most influential foreign-policy experts in the Democratic Party, threw his support behind Barack Obama’s presidential candidacy, saying the Illinois senator has a better global grasp than his chief rival, Hillary Clinton.
Obama “recognizes that the challenge is a new face, a new sense of direction, a new definition of America’s role in the world,'’ Brzezinski said in an interview on Bloomberg Television’s “Political Capital with Al Hunt.'’
“Obama is clearly more effective and has the upper hand,'’ Brzezinski, who was President Jimmy Carter’s national security adviser, said. “He has a sense of what is historically relevant, and what is needed from the United States in relationship to the world.'’
Brzezinski, 79, dismissed the notion that Clinton, 59, a New York senator and the wife of former President Bill Clinton, is more seasoned than Obama, 46. “Being a former first lady doesn’t prepare you to be president. President Truman didn’t have much experience before he came to office. Neither did John Kennedy,'’ Brzezinski said.
Clinton’s foreign-policy approach is “very conventional,'’ Brzezinski said. “I don’t think the country needs to go back to what we had eight years ago.'’
“There is a need for a fundamental rethinking of how we conduct world affairs,'’ he added. “And Obama seems to me to have both the guts and the intelligence to address that issue and to change the nature of America’s relationship with the world.'’
The press has had a field day with Hillary’s petty criticisms of Obama’s foreign policy statements. Perhaps this endorsement will begin to change the narrative that Obama lacks experience. As the Bloomberg article notes, Brzezinski is one of the foreign policy heavyweights in the Democratic Party, and he is an excellent strategic thinker. He called out Hillary on her policies and her claims of experience. Tucker Carlson addressed this on his show today. Hopefully Brzezinski will be invited on some of these programs to discuss this further.
Newsweek’s Christpher Dickey has been one of the nest reporters covering the Iraq War from the beginning. If you read his columns, you knew that the chest-thumping and rosy scenarios coming from the Bush administration were not to be believed.
As we look for an exit strategy from this mess, Dickey explains how our withdrawel is playing around the world. The facts are grim - the terrorists will be emboldened.
Terrorists will indeed believe that all this is a triumph for their God, their vision, His design. But the United States and its friends would be repeating one of the egregious mistakes that got us into this sorry mess if we allowed the bad-guys’ opinions to dictate our strategy and tactics.
The signal error of the Bush administration was to embrace the terrorist rhetoric of war, and then to militarize a conflict that should have been handled all along as a matter for the police, the intelligence services and public diplomacy. The struggle ought to have been focused as a fight against malicious individuals, not their aberrant ideologies, against small criminal groups, not the vast civilizations they claim to represent. (A report from the James A. Baker III Institute and the Council on Foreign Relations in 2002 tried to make this point before we went into Iraq, but alas …)
Dickey again presents a powerful argument. We have to be smart about our counter-terrorism techniques.
Finally.
Update: Former CIA director Robert Gates will take over as the new Defense Secretary. This might signal a willingness by Bush to listen to his father’s old advisors. Bush also cited the highly anticipated report from the Iraq Study Group chaired by James Baker and Lee Hamilton.
Charles Krauthammer makes a powerful argument that the United States should consider the possibility of supporting a decision by Japan to go nuclear:
The immediate effect of Japan’s considering going nuclear would be to concentrate China’s mind on denuclearizing North Korea. China calculates that North Korea is a convenient buffer between it and a dynamic, capitalist South Korea bolstered by American troops. China is quite content with a client regime that is a thorn in our side, keeping us tied down while it pursues its ambitions in the rest of Asia. Pyongyang’s nukes, after all, are pointed not west but east.
Japan’s threatening to go nuclear would alter that calculation. It might even persuade China to squeeze Kim Jong Il as a way to prevent Japan from going nuclear. The Japan card remains the only one that carries even the remote possibility of reversing North Korea’s nuclear program.
Japan’s response to the North Korean threat has been very strong and very insistent on serious sanctions. This is, of course, out of self-interest, not altruism. But that is the point. Japan’s natural interests parallel America’s in the Pacific Rim — maintaining military and political stability, peacefully containing an inexorably expanding China, opposing the gangster regime in Pyongyang, and spreading the liberal democratic model throughout Asia.
Why are we so intent on denying this stable, reliable, democratic ally the means to help us shoulder the burden in a world where so many other allies — the inveterately appeasing South Koreans most notoriously — insist on the free ride?
The balance of power is shifting in Asia as China emerges as a major power. Japan is our ally, and it may be time to play this card with China.
Despite the chaos in Iraq, the neocons are itching for another war. Pat Buchanan destroys their arguments in his latest column.
Krauthammer is pointing out the obvious - the European plan to negotiate their way out of the Iranian nuclear crisis has been a failure. He also points out that Iran has most of the leverage with their threat to cut off their oil supply if attacked or if sanctions are approved.
Unfortunately, he doesn’t offer any solutions or a clear alternative. Furthermore, he can’t bring himself to criticize the Bush administration, which has gone along with this policy even though they would have preferred a push for sanctions.
Also, Krauthammer will not address the possibility that Bush’s disastrous policies in Iraq have completely undermined any chance of taking on Iran. Krauthammer loves to cite Lybia as evidence that the Iraq war has had a positive effect on other regimes in the Middle East, yet he says nothing about the current maniac running Iran. Did our policies in Iraq have any effect on the elections that brought him to power? Again, only positive effects are open for discussion aong supporters of the war.
Krauthammer is often very persuasive, but he loses credibility by consistently offering rough analysis on the Europeans or the opponents of the war, yet he seems incapable of aiming that same critical fire at this administration.
From Think Pogress:
Lieberman yesterday: “It is time for Democrats who distrust President Bush to acknowledge that he will be commander in chief for three more critical years and that in matters of war we undermine presidential credibility at our nation’s peril.” Murtha today: “Undermining his credibility? What has he said that would give him credibility?”
This sums up the entire issue, and Democrats need to pay attention. These arguments that criticism is undermining the troops needs to be addressed. The troops are being undermined not by criticism, but by the fiasco this administration has created.
Murtha is correct. Bush has no credibility. His entire team has no credibility. Rumsfeld and the rest of the war architects have made numerous miscalculations in Iraq, yet the he and the others are still in charge! How can we trust them to get us out of this mess?
Over at BuckeyePolitics.net, our sister site, Tim Russo has an excellent post explaning the parallels between the mess we created in Iraq and the disaster in the Balkans following the removal of the Communist dictatorship on Yugoslavia. Tim cites Peter Galbraith, former US ambassador to Croatia during the Clinton administration, who sums this up in a recent interview on NPR. Money quote:
Democracy killed the Soviet Union, it killed Czechoslovakia, it killed Yugoslavia, all multi-ethnic states that had been held together by dictatorship. The same thing is happening in Iraq.
This describes the dilemna we are now facing in Iraq. This is what happens when you have a president who knows nothing about a region but tries to transform it through an invasion.
Lindsay Graham is becoming one of my favorite Republicans (there aren’t many). I don’t agree with him very often, but he has a knack for taking principled stands, many of which contradict GOP orthodoxy and GOP talking points. This independent streak has made him one of our most interesting and important Senators.
Graham is currently pushing two amendments that are critical to our fight against Islamist jihadists. In support of the McCain amendment agaist torture, Graham writes in the Washington Post:
Even during a time of war, we have chosen to be a nation of laws, with a different, higher set of values than the terrorists. We should always remember that we are Americans, possessing values superior to those of our enemy, and that there is a proper balance between the protection of our troops and the humane treatment of detainees. This value system is our national strength, not a weakness.
He also argues that Congress has been “AWOL on the status of enemy combatants.” He’s right,though it should also be pointed out that the Bush administration has offered no leadership whatsoever on this issue, instead arguing for virtual unlimited power on the part of the executive branch to hold these combatants. The result is a mess in the courts, so Graham is arguing for passage of the Graham-Levin-Kyl amendment.
These actions make sense and it’s time to get serious about these matters.
Former Reagan advisor and Nationa Security Agency Director Lt. Gen William Odom gave a sobering assessment of the situation in Iraq last night on Hardball. Responding to a question from Chris Matthews on whether we should leave Iraq, Odom responded as follows:
The longer we stay, the bigger mess we create. Once we invaded, we set in motion a group of forces that inexplicably has taken us to this point. We can‘t change that by staying longer. We can make it worse.
We essentially invaded for other peoples‘ interests without understanding it. We made Iraq safe for al Qaeda, therefore, we really encouraged or pleased Osama bin Laden.
The Iranians detested Saddam‘s regime. He had invaded them and fought them for eight years. Therefore, seeing Saddam and his regime overthrown greatly pleased the Iranians.
It has also created a situation inside Iraq, fragmentation, that‘s leading to the creation of a regime that will almost inexplicably will be an Islamic republic much closer to Iran than to the U.S. or anyone in the Arab world.
Odom aslo challenged the administration’s claims that withdrawel would result in handing over Iraq to al Qaeda:
It may not be so bad for us. One of the things you can almost be certain would happen if we leave, al Qaeda will be thrown out. Al Qaeda does not operate in Kurdistan today. The Kurds don‘t like them and won‘t let them in.
The Shiites barely tolerate them because they are helping the Sunnis. And the minute we‘re out, you can bet the Sunnis will find al Qaeda uncomfortable bedfellows and they will be facing the Shiites in a very serious deadly confrontation.
And so when that is settled, al Qaeda has no place in Iraq. So it will be—we will get rid of al Qaeda that way. It might be a better solution than what we had with Saddam. We just don‘t know. We have to wait and see how that government works out.
Odom is not a dove and he’s not a liberal. He’s just one of many foreign policy experts, conservative and liberal, who recognize the mess that this president has created b invading Iraq. He does not have a political axe to grind. He’s simply giving his honest assessment, which is consistent with John Murtha’s argument that we have to withdraw.
