Hillary’s Next Mission?
Posted on December 2, 2011 by Lou
If you want to see someone with extraordinary political skills, divert your attention for a minute from Newt Gingrich’s takeover of the republican presidential nomination.
Look instead halfway around the world to Myanmar, where Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is displaying remarkable diplomatic talent in her meetings with that nation’s leaders and, in particular, its dissident human rights activist Aung San Suu Kyi.
In this NPR clip, Clinton delicately but forcefully prods this small Asian nation – formerly known as Burma – away from totalitarian rule.
If Gingrich is our opponent next year, it certainly would be helpful if Barack Obama – as many have urged – make Hillary his running mate.
The president could definitely use her political instincts and intelligence in his fight against the belligerent – but intellectually formidable - former speaker of the house.
Comments (3)
Since she’s in the Far East, she ought to be paying a visit to Sri Lanka and tell that government in no uncertain terms that the United States will support Ban Ki Moon’s request that the United Nations Human Rights Council independently and impartially investigate the massacre of approximately 40,000 civilians, the use of rape as an instrument of social control of dissent by Tamil civilian women, and the systemic discrimination against Tamils that led to the civil war in the first place.
RR Donnelly, Ramada Corporation, the Gap, the Limited and other corporations do business there and should be boycotted. Victoria’s Secret was not content to use California prison labor (at less than minimum wage) to manufacture its products, so its largest factory is in Sri Lanka, benefiting from exploitation and propping up the corrupt, racist, and authoritarian regime.
I agree with you, Lou.
I think Hillary would be a great choice for VP, bring her former supporters forcefully to the polls, and possibly some undecided women voters.
Also agree with Jan, though her post is less about her potential upside to a Dem. ticket, than the admin’s continuing hypocrisy around who we castigate for human rights abuses and who we willfully ignore, prioritizing business as usual.
Hillary Clinton is among the last exemplars of cold war liberalism that at root is characterized by advocacy and defense of imperialism in the name of “spreading democracy.” Her latest gambit is to help facilitate US “reentry” into the Pacific rim with the objective of protecting sea lanes carrying oil from the Middle East, exploiting regional and underseas resources and crucially — encircling China. She has been consistently gutless in standing up for Palestinian rights, has been a major mouthpiece for selective interventionism (Libya, but not Bahrain as just one example) and has been a leading voice for an expansive military. She would hardly be a better, more progressive voice than Biden — and marginally at least would be worse.