Saturday, March 29, 2008

Oops, She Did It Again!

So I called my BFF Hillary Clinton the other day to see how she was doing after all the negative commentary about her little verbal slip. "Girlfriend, what on earth were you thinking! Have you lost your mind up in here?"

Oh, wait a minute, I don't really know Hillary well enough to address her as girlfriend. We're not really BFFs either (that's shorthand for best friend forever).  Actually, Hillary and I have never met, but I've seen her on television. Oops, I think that I misspoke.

There has been a lot of misspeaking in the Clinton campaign. A few weeks ago, Senator Clinton released a television commercial asserting that based on her 35 years of experience, she was more qualified than Senator Obama to answer the phone at 3:00 a.m. and deal with some hypothetical foreign policy crisis. Unfortunately, at least for Sen. Clinton,  subsequent research revealed that her foreign policy experience was questionable at best, and possibly nonexistent. After a little personal research, I wrote a little blog entry about what appeared to be a general consensus--Sen. Clinton didn't play a significant role in bringing peace to Northern Ireland; nor did she broker the deal that resulted in Macedonia opening its borders to refugees from Kosovo (official records confirm that the Macedonia accord regarding the Kosovo refugees was signed the day before Hillary arrived in the country).

The media enjoyed the circus constructed around Sen. Clinton's exaggerated foreign policy experience claims and next became entranced with sermons from Sen. Obama's ex-minister. Just when I thought that perhaps the campaign was finally getting back on track, dealing with the issues--the recession, unemployment, access to health care, 47 million people without health insurance, the war in Iraq, global warming, etc., etc., Sen. Clinton dropped another example of her qualifications to be commander-in-chief, citing her March 1996 landing at Tuzla Air Base in Bosnia in the midst of sniper fire. Her words, spoken at George Washington University on March 17, 2008, have been published in newspapers around the world, and played repeatedly on radio and television news stations.

“I remember landing under sniper fire. There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base.”--Senator Hillary Clinton

 

Based on the photo, before ducking and running for cover, Sen. Clinton and daughter Chelsea took time to accept greetings from the eight-year-old girl who was a part of the official  greeting committee in March 1996, a group that also included Bosnia's acting president. Not wanting to frighten the child, Hillary also decided that she and Chelsea should abandon the flak jackets that she asserts that they wore to protect them from sniper fire while they were running with their heads down. Suffering from some memory loss, no doubt due to post traumatic stress disorder after being subjected to sniper fire, comedian Sinbad, who was a part of the group visiting US troops in Bosnia with the then First Lady back in 1996, has responded that he does not recall there being any sniper fire when the travel group landed.

 

Normally, I would agree with Sen. Clinton's protestations that she made many speeches and many journeys while First Lady, and that it is only human to confuse the details from a trip that she made 12 years ago. However, generally, most of us confuse the details as to when something happened, but remain clear as to whether or not something happened. For example, I'm not certain when I first became obsessed with Denzel Washington, however, I'm certain that he has never promised to leave his wife and marry me.

 

Sen. Clinton, girlfriend, you have not been under sniper fire during any of your travels as First Lady. You made it up! You didn't misspeak; you lied.

 

You lied because you are desperately trying to distinguish yourself in the minds of the voters as having 35 years of critical experience, including foreign policy experience, that makes you a superior choice for the Democratic Party nomination. You have invented your own pet campaign issue that makes about as much sense as the pet rock phenomenon of the 1970s. What really frightens me is that some of the public, just like the folks that spent good money for a pet rock, are succumbing to the nonsense of this non-issue. Let's have a simplified civics lesson. 

 

Under the U.S. Constitution, both the Congress of the United States and the president have the responsibility for setting U.S. foreign policy. In general, the president shapes foreign policy with advice from the state department, the secretary of state, and a bunch of other national security officials in the executive branch.  Congress approves the funding needed to carry out the foreign policy. The United States Senate has to approve by a two-thirds vote, any treaties with foreign governments that are  negotiated by the president. Congress and the president don't always see eye to eye on foreign policy, but the president has the principal authority to create foreign policy. Both the Congress and the Courts defer to the president on matters of foreign policy, a position further solidified with the end of WWII in 1945.

 

If you stayed with me through Civics 101, then you are probably recognizing that unless Clinton, McCain, or Obama have previously served as president of the United States, none of them have any substantive foreign policy experience. Neither congressmen/women, nor the First Lady gets to make foreign policy decisions in our governmental structure. Condoleeza Rice has experience in the ins and outs of foreign policy, as do members of the Cabinet and the executive branch of government, but hey, Hillary, you don't. Drop the empty rhetoric about foreign policy experience and focus on the significant domestic and international issues that should be the focus of this campaign, not your imagined turn as Rambo.

 

The beauty of the structure of our government is that no one enters the office of president as a solo act. All those cabinet members, all those secretaries of this and that, are there for a purpose--to advise the president, to present him/her with the information to make reasoned, well-thought out foreign policy decisions, if he or she chooses. Or he can declare himself to be the Decider and make the dumbest decisions ever, but that's another post.

 

Footnote: What exactly is foreign policy? The generally accepted definition identifies foreign policy as a course of action or set of principles adopted by a nation's government to define its relationships with other countries or groups of countries.

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

Ahh, Sheria. <shaking my head in delighted amazement>

You're a peach. Well said.

Beth

Anonymous said...

I need only say I agree with you. Nuff said.

Spencer

Anonymous said...

Just a thought why would Hilary be answering the phone at 3am, to deal with Foreign policy when her husband was the then President(or perhaps he was out with one of alleged lady friends and Hilary was manning the phones...lol) As for that nonsense in Kosovo....... When they visited the UK not much attention was paid to her, and Condoleeza didn't get a great reception here either.
Shame about Denzil he's a catch.

Take care

Yasmin
xx

Anonymous said...

What slayed me a few weeks ago is that she tried to get points for how she "like so many other Americans" hasn't been able to master a foreign language. Thanks Hill, for bringing yourself down to the level of the current idiot-in-chief.  And the press gave her a complete pass. You wanna impress me Hillary? Address a foreign parliament in their native tongue.  It's very hard to understand how other people think if you've never had to think in another language.  That's why Obama's early life abroad IS so important.  His horizons have been much wider from the get go. The man can empathize with other poeple with a range that far outclasses any other candidate out there.
It doesn't bother me that politicians lie. But all she has to do is cite is weathering her marriage after Monica to convince us she can survive intense sniper fire.

Anonymous said...

Thanks for a brilliant piece of observation !!!  As I have said I am not really able to write about US elections  but again I do !! occasionally !!  Let the best Man win is what I say.  Love SYbil xx

Anonymous said...

Spot on Sheria.  I have not gotten to write my e-mail to you yet.  I have not fogotten!
Marie
http://ayearatoakcottage.blogspot.com/

Anonymous said...

Well stated.  I wish more people would actually THINK about what is being said versus just hearing a snippet and then running of on a tangent.  :o)  http://journals.aol.com/buckoclown/Bucko

Anonymous said...

Sheria, well you convinced me, I wil not be voting for that evil woman. She scares me. Bill

Anonymous said...

I dislike politics for the simple reason that during election campaigns they behave like tomcats in March. Promises of everlasting fielty, conveniently forgotten or proven false after the evil deed is done.

Anonymous said...

Wait, so when are you marrying Denzel Washington?  Any sooner than my wedding to Patrick Dempsey?  I have a photo, honest -- being that every movie theatre near us right now has a cut out where I could stick my face into, as if I'm wearing a wedding dress, and Mc. Dreamy is right next to me:0

Oops, did I misspeak?  

(Yeah, this was a lie.  I've lost respect for Hillary Clinton.)

Anonymous said...

some good points...and delivered with a wonderful sense of humor.  :)
gina

Anonymous said...

I did think that Hillary risked losing credibility about something that was not that important in her experience in the first place.  It sounded like she was trying to spice up the experience for one thing.  Probably a lot of us who have lived in the ghetto have experienced a lot more gun fire around our apartments that scared us into the hallways to lie on the floor and keep calling the police.  I saw somebody get shot running across my front line, and as he lay on the ground, his girlfriend sobbed over him. For all she and I knew he was dead. I used to think oh doesn't anybody care that women and chiildren have to live in this kind of gang war fare?  God knows our presidents have had to risk an assassins bullet just from being president, but usually president's wives are in little danger.  As a black man running for president, Obama has placed himself in danger at once, which Hillary is unlkely to be in.  I have started worrying about some racist getting Obama in his sights.  And Hillary has to clutch at straws to claim danger to herself.  She obviously does not know what it is to be a racist's target just from being a black man who dares to run for president!  This is not going to be easy.  Gerry  

Anonymous said...

She talks some serious shit as we say over here. That means, sh'es talking crap!
Gaz xxx

Anonymous said...

Your take on Hillary Clinton and the increasingly troublesome issues clouding her candidacy and credibility is brilliantly stated. I was in Hillary's camp for quite some time during this campaign but she has done her best (or worst, depending on how you look at it) to undermine herself.  It's not a trainwreck but an accident happening first at a slow speed and then continues to accelerate..the ball of yarn that starts to unravel; you don't notice it at first, and then it becomes faster and faster until it's too late.  As you so sharply surmise, she's not the one to hold our future. I wanted to like more than I do and I wanted to believe and now I don't. You said it all, better than I ever could...forget Hillary, you get my vote..!  CS