Thursday, January 19, 2006
Hawk Hillary
No, she's talking tough about Iran, and right in Tigerhawk's backyard.
A tough-talking Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton yesterday suggested she would back a military strike on Iran if that country's radical Islamic government attempts to build nuclear weapons.
Clinton's speech seemed to position her somewhat to the right of the Bush administration, which has stressed diplomacy without ruling out any other option. Most experts on the region say a military strike is not feasible and therefore unlikely.
"We cannot take any option off the table in sending a clear message to Iran that they will not be permitted to acquire nuclear weapons," she said.
Here's my favorite part:
She also blasted the Bush administration for allowing European countries to lead negotiations with the hard-line regime of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
"I believe that we lost critical time with ... Iran because the White House chose to downplay the threats and to outsource the negotiations," she said. "I don't believe ... in standing on the sidelines."
This would represent a decisive break from other prominent Democrats, like Jimmy Carter, who have claimed that, through unilateral actions of the Bush administration, the US has squandered the global good will built up in the wake of 911.
UPDATE from TigerHawk: Rather than twist up an addendum of my own, I highly recommend this perceptive post by Daniel Drezner, which exposes the political weakness in the "outsourcing" argument:
The approach the Bush administration has pursued towards Iran -- multilateralism, private and public diplomacy, occasionally deferring to allies -- is besotted with the very tropes that liberals like to see in their American foreign policy. I'm still not sure what the end game will be with regard to Iran, but to date I can't see how a Kerry administration would have played its cards any differently than the Bush team.
Now, without having parsed her record of public statements on the subject, my sense is that Hillary is one of the few Democrats in a position to attack the Bush administration from this perspective, which is essentially from the right. Hillary is is going to be hawkier than thou, which makes her the reconstructed Scoop Jackson of her generation and the only Democrat other than Joe Lieberman who could concievably earn my vote. This position is creative, too, since it dovetails well with one of the most widely-voiced (and most absurd) arguments of the Bush-haters: that notwithstanding the depredations of unilateralism in the case of Iraq, it was the preferred strategy in North Korea and Iran.
10 Comments:
By 
TigerHawk, at
Thu Jan 19, 10:17:00 AM:
Damn! You beat me to this story. I even bought the Trenton Times today because it had Hillary on the cover. I like the tie-in with the Hawkeye victory, though.
I have a couple of thoughts that I may add to the post in a bit.
By Charlottesvillain, at
Thu Jan 19, 10:34:00 AM:
Be my guest, TH, this is certainly fertile ground.
Of course I support Ms. Clinton's position here 100%. I only hope, after successfully deposing the Iranian regime, she resists the temptation to run the place like a plantation!
By Charlottesvillain, at
Thu Jan 19, 10:36:00 AM:
Be my guest, TH, this is certainly fertile ground.
Of course I support Ms. Clinton's position here 100%. I only hope, after successfully deposing the Iranian regime, she resists the temptation to run the place like a plantation!
By cakreiz, at
Thu Jan 19, 10:53:00 AM:
By Cardinalpark, at
Thu Jan 19, 11:39:00 AM:
So Hil/Bill splits the Democratic Party and gives GWB the political cover he needs to drop bombs on Iran.
Let's see the shooting start now. I mean domestic politics, not with Iran.
By Cassandra, at
Thu Jan 19, 12:20:00 PM:
I think Liberal Larry had the best take on this, vis-a-vis Al Bore:
The right-wing dominated media will, of course, attempt to make him look like a raving lunatic by printing everything he said word-for word. They pulled the same trick on Howard Dean.
Good God, let her talk. Please... just let her keep talking...
By Final Historian, at
Thu Jan 19, 09:10:00 PM:
Actually, to me this is a bad sign. It indicates that Hillary, at least, thinks that the possibility of such a strike isn't likely. This kind of rhetoric is most useful when you can cite it later, after Iran is publically known to have the bomb.
By Cardinalpark, at
Fri Jan 20, 09:02:00 AM:
Lots of potential theories. She may also have a sense that a war with Iran is immiment. If so, this would make her the only prominent Democratic presidential candidate who could credibly inherit the responsibilty of prosecuting a continuing war against Iran after January 2009. She could basically checkmate all other Democratic contenders and become the only "electable" Democrat - sailing through the primaries.
It would also put her on a competitive footing with any hoawkish Republican candidate, thus narrowing the differentiation to domestic considerations.
She won't win, but she ain't no dummy. Like most of her party's nimrods.
By cakreiz, at
Fri Jan 20, 09:23:00 AM:
I listened to some of her presentation and liked what I heard. But in terms of the nomination, she's exposed herself to a left flank attack from the likes of Feingold, for example. For the first time, I have doubts whether the McGovernized Dem Party will embrace her.
By Cardinalpark, at
Fri Jan 20, 04:03:00 PM:
Cakreiz:
If you're right, then the next president will be Republican.
