Hillary - A Foreign Policy Expert?
Friday, December 21st, 2007I must have been distracted when Hillary Clinton was out getting all that foreign policy experience. In a recent speech in Iowa, she said,” Experience in foreign affairs is critical to ending the war in Iraq, averting war in Iran, negotiating a Middle East peace and dealing with North Korea”. This from a woman who voted to permit Bush to take us into the war in Iraq, who recently labeled the Iranian Revolutionary Guard (Iran’s national army) a “terrorist” organization, and who chortled at Barack Obama’s suggestion that we might actually need to engage our enemies in dialogue to prevent further conflict. This all sounds mighty pugilistic to some of us worry-warts on the sidelines. Frankly, I would think that someone so “well versed in foreign policy” might take the trouble to READ the Iraq Study Group Report, which specifically recommended that the U.S. talk to the leaders of countries like Syria, Iran, and Borth Korea. So, Obama wasn’t a spouse in the White House for eight years, ostensibly picking up foreign policy tidbits by osmosis. But he DID read the Iraq Study Group Report, and he opposed our giving Bush the keys to the tank to drive through Iraq. He appears to have a thirst for knowledge and a healthy skepticism - both of which seem to me to be essential characteristics for a presidential candidate. He also seems less eager to engage in saber-rattling than is Hillary, and probably less eager to take us further down that path toward potential conflict. I’m not sold on this “foreign policy experience” that Hillary touts - and her actions would indicate that she is the less experienced of the two candidates. Maybe she should pick a different fight.
