Tuesday November 30th Travel Schedule: Hillary Rodham Clinton
November 30, 2010
SECRETARY OF STATE HILLARY RODHAM CLINTONSecretary Clinton is on foreign travel in Astana, Kazakhstan (EST+11 hours).
8:15 p.m. LOCAL Secretary Clinton meets with women civil society leaders, in Astana, Kazakhstan.8:30 p.m. LOCAL Secretary Clinton hosts a town hall on “Empowering Civil Society for Central Asia’s Future,” in Astana, Kazakhstan.
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GO HILLARY! You are the most inspitarional leader in the world! That’s what a great woman is all about! We’ve got your back! Bless you!
The plot thickens. Now, WikiLeaks is saying they will be releasing massive info from a major US bank in early 2011. And coincidentally (not) Interpol has put Assange on their most wanted list, for rape. I am a strong supporter of women’s rights, but that rape charge is very suspicious. What timing – he commits rape in the midst of all the releases of data, the judge throws out the charges for insufficient evidence, and then they issue another warrant?
To move on from data leaks on the US military and state dept to a major US bank. Think he’ll live to see 2012?
I want to share this article by Marc Ambinder that tries to explain the links between spying and diplomacy: “What Hillary Clinton Didn’t Do” (http://www.nationaljournal.com/whitehouse/hillary-clinton-didn-t-turn-diplomats-into-spies-20101130)
Great article!
In response to Shafer and Corn’s insinuations that Clinton is seen as damaged goods in the wake of the WikiLeaks revelations, I offer these reactions from two prominent Kazakhstani women who came to hear Hillary speak at a local university:
“It’s very entertaining reading,” said one of them, Aigul Soloyeva, a member of Parliament who credits Mrs Clinton with inspiring her to enter politics. The other female politician, Battalova Zauresh, went further, saying, “It’s a confirmation of American leadership in global political issues.” [NY Times, 11/30/10]
Yes, I saw that NYT article; and I like this part, too:
In another Wikileaks-related news, the State Dept has removed its cables from the Pentagon’s SIPRNet — “One military network cut off from cables” (http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6AS3WJ20101130). And this is how Robert Gates spins the diplomatic fallout:
I’m glad Hillary is the Secretary of State.
Thank you so much for posting that link. Nice job by Marc Ambinder.
It does provide much more context than we’ve seen before. I’m usually not a huge Ambinder fan but props to him.
I wonder if Hillary will hit the nightclubs with the Kazhak PM. According to wikileaks, he loves clubbing, and is a great dancer.
If she does, I hope she also challenges him to a drinking contest and drink him under the table the way she did with McCain
If this was the Bush administration you’d all be outraged but because it’s Hillary you are all making excuses.
Never mind the “everybody does it, diplomats are just doing what diplomats do and Condi Rice did it defense.” Is it legal? Is it moral? Does it blur the lines between espionage and diplomacy? Biometric data, DNA in some cases? This is not run-of-the-mill information gathering from diplomats. From the Guardian:
“The leak of the directive is likely to spark questions about the legality of the operation and about whether state department diplomats are expected to spy. The level of technical and personal detail demanded about the UN top team’s communication systems could be seen as laying the groundwork for surveillance or hacking operations. It requested “current technical specifications, physical layout and planned upgrades to telecommunications infrastructure and information systems, networks and technologies used by top officials and their support staff”, as well as details on private networks used for official communication, “to include upgrades, security measures, passwords, personal encryption keys and virtual private network versions used”.
The UN has previously asserted that bugging the secretary general is illegal, citing the 1946 UN convention on privileges and immunities which states: “The premises of the United Nations shall be inviolable. The property and assets of the United Nations, wherever located and by whomsoever held, shall be immune from search, requisition, confiscation, expropriation and any other form of interference, whether by executive, administrative, judicial or legislative action”.
The 1961 Vienna convention on diplomatic relations, which covers the UN, also states that “the official correspondence of the mission shall be inviolable”.
I think what’s sad is we’ve lost our ability to be outraged because we expect government officials to abuse their authority. Unless it impacts us personally, we clearly don’t give a damn. If the UN were spying on American officials we’d be outraged, right?
@Sir John – you make a valid point (that we’re going easier on Hillary about this than we would if the directives had gone out under, say, Condi’s name). There’s alot about US intelligence gathering that makes me uncomfortable — the stuff we know about, the stuff we suspect, the stuff we don’t want to believe (Obama ordering a HIT on a US citizen?!), the stuff we haven’t even imagined (would you have believed us capable of waterboarding? I always assumed we sent prisoners elsewhere to be tortured,
to keep our hands clean…). I’m
uncomfortable how little our own
Congressional leaders know about our
intelligence gathering activities — I gather
Congress may finally be passing
legislation to change that. But to hold Hillary exclusively accountable for a complex, longstanding system of espionage because of cables she probably never read, emamating from the CIA and passed along by the State’s intelligence officer? I thought SOMEONE should be held accountable for waterboarding, but where did that go? And what’s the answer exactly? Make public every diplomatic cable here on in? Have all CIA ops subject to Congressional approval? There’s no easy answer. All I know is I breathe a sigh of relief when another year passes without my kids having to witness — again — the unimaginable horror of people on fire jumping from skyscrapers to certain death. And I say a little prayer of Thanksgiving whenever a plot is foiled and another bullet dodged. And I don’t put too much thought to how that particular piece of intelligence was gathered.
The best argument against torture- other than the moral/ethical/legal argument is that it’s not effective:
http://georgewashington2.blogspot.com/2009/04/top-interrogation-experts-say-torture.html
The Chinese are experts on torture and the reason torture is so important to authoritarian regimes is because torture results in false confessions – this makes it easier to throw innocent, but politically problematic, people in prison (for example political prisoners).
One of the troubling things in the WikiLeaks cables is the bit about how we strong-armed Germany not to make a fuss about the German citizen we detained and tortured- for a long time- before realizing we had him mixed up with someone else who had a similar or the same name. I don’t like reading that and if you think it’s something that doesn’t happen often, think again. I highly recommend the documentary “Taxi to the Dark Side” about someone who was tortured to death by the US and the person was not a terrorist and had nothing to do with terrorism.
There is a lot of evidence to show that torturing people actually radicalizes not only them but members of their family who become enraged at the unjust treatment. I can’t imagine how I would respond if someone I cared about was rendered and tortured.
“The Chinese are experts on torture and the reason torture is so important to authoritarian regimes is because torture results in false confessions – this makes it easier to throw innocent, but politically problematic, people in prison (for example political
prisoners).”
Oh, I don’t think the Chinese have needed a “confession” to falsely imprison people but it has legitimized executing them.
“Never mind the “everybody does it, diplomats are just doing what diplomats do and Condi Rice did it defense.” Is it legal? Is it moral? Does it blur the lines between espionage and diplomacy? Biometric data, DNA in some cases?”
My response, via John W. Smart (http://johnwsmart.wordpress.com/2010/11/30/should-clinton-resign/)
The New York times kept emphasizing Iran, but hardly devoted space on the covert operation that the US is carrying out in Yemen, and had nothing but a minor slap in the wrist for the spying in the UN: “WikiLeaks and the Diplomats” (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/30/opinion/30tue1.html?_r=1&ref=opinion)
Embarrassed?
But the Times consoled itself with this delusional thought:
The US media has highlighted the spying in the UN, but not the repeated cables from former US Ambassador to Pakistan Anne W. Patterson strongly expressing doubts that the billions of dollars eventually extended by the administration to Pakistan could wean the latter’s military and intelligence officials from supporting home-grown extremists, or that US Special Forces are now operating inside Pakistani territory bordering Afghanistan.
I’ve never had illusions about US foreign policy. After all, it was in the effort to suppress the Moro Rebellion in southern Philippines during the Philippine–American War that the .45 Colt was invented for use by the US Cavalry. But I’ve also lived long enough to have grown cynical after my own days of Third World radicalism — “the revolution devours its own children.”
“I think what’s sad is we’ve lost our ability to be outraged because we expect government officials to abuse their authority. Unless it impacts us personally, we clearly don’t give a damn.”
I don’t think it’s about having lost the ability, but most Americans really don’t care about the rest of the world, period. That’s why the US has had a very long history of propping up dictators in the name of “defending the free world.”
I agree with you- if torture was wrong under Bush it’s also wrong under Obama.
I will say that someone who is absolutely consistent in his advocacy of human rights and constantly pointing out the legal (or illegal) implications of some aspects of the so-called War on Terror, is Glenn Greenwald. He clearly supported Obama for POTUS but as soon as Obama started to continue Bush’s most questionable policies he made clear it was unacceptable and he constantly calls out his fellow liberals about not speaking out on this issue. I really admire that sort of consistency and it’s something I aspire to. I think one of the problems with politics as usual is we get so hung up in defending certain political parties and certain politicians that we sometimes become hypocritical.
I will say- and this is not a defense of the left (of which I am a proud member)- but the media really doesn’t focus enough on these issues (rendition, detainee abuse, GITMO, torture, executive power, national security letters, etc.).
I think the reason the media doesn’t focus as much on these issues is because Americans are not as interested in foreign policy in the way they/we are in domestic policy. I also think the MSM is much more hawkish on foreign policy and they tend to not really question the government as much as they should, irrespective of whether its a GOP or democratic administration. The Iraq War is exhibit A for that. As Taylor Marsh said the other day, our politicians and media seem intent on keeping us “in a perpetual state of stupid” when it comes to FP. Heh.
speaking of Glen Greenwald, he quotes this incredible exchange with the NYT bill keller about WikiLeaks:
“Then we have The New York Times, which was denied access to the documents by WikiLeaks this time but received them from The Guardian. That paper’s Executive Editor, Bill Keller, appeared in a rather amazing BBC segment yesterday with Carne Ross, former British Ambassador to the U.N., who mocked and derided Keller for being guided by the U.S. Government’s directions on what should and should not be published (video below):
KELLER: The charge the administration has made is directed at WikiLeaks: they’ve very carefully refrained from criticizing the press for the way we’ve handled this material . . . . We’ve redacted them to remove the names of confidential informants . . . and remove other material at the recommendation of the U.S. Government we were convinced could harm National Security . . .
HOST (incredulously): Just to be clear, Bill Keller, are you saying that you sort of go to the Government in advance and say: “What about this, that and the other, is it all right to do this and all right to do that,” and you get clearance, then?
KELLER: We are serially taking all of the cables we intend to post on our website to the administration, asking for their advice. We haven’t agreed with everything they suggested to us, but some of their recommendations we have agreed to: they convinced us that redacting certain information would be wise.
ROSS: One thing that Bill Keller just said makes me think that one shouldn’t go to The New York Times for these telegrams — one should go straight to the WikiLeaks site. It’s extraordinary that the New York Times is clearing what it says about this with the U.S. Government, but that says a lot about the politics here, where Left and Right have lined up to attack WikiLeaks – some have called it a “terrorist organization.”
It’s one thing to redact names and use common sense to ensure information about military operations or truly dangerous info. isn’t released but you have to wonder- is part of the reason there is so much information on Iran because the US media has chosen to focus on that at the expense of other things in the cables? Has the US encouraged the NYT to focus on that over other things? How convenient is it that every time Wiki is mentioned Clinton, member of Congress, pundits, Benyamin Netanyahu and everyone else breathlessly proclaims that these leaks show they are right? Millions of pages of info. and we get the gossip and Iran, Iran, Iran. That’s pretty convenient don’t you think? I haven’t heard too much about how those same Arab leaders told John Kerry personally that the way the US constantly shields Israel from all criticism and consequence was hurting the US image in the Muslim world.
I’m not saying this is Hillary’s fault. I actually don’t hate Clinton but I’m also probably not her biggest fan at least not compared to you guys. But the govt has a vested interest in spinning this to its advantage and this seems to be just one more example of the media being all too willing to push an agenda.
One more thing then I’ll shut up. From the Economist:
http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2010/11/overseeing_state_secrecy
“The careerists scattered about the world in America’s intelligence agencies, military, and consular offices largely operate behind a veil of secrecy executing policy which is itself largely secret. American citizens mostly have no idea what they are doing, or whether what they are doing is working out well. The actually-existing structure and strategy of the American empire remains a near-total mystery to those who foot the bill and whose children fight its wars. And that is the way the elite of America’s unelected permanent state, perhaps the most powerful class of people on Earth, like it.”