Monday April 4th 2011 Appointments: Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
April 4, 2011
9:15 a.m. Secretary Clinton meets with the Assistant Secretaries, at the Department of State.
11:15a.m. Secretary Clinton meets with the participants in the April 2011 Ambassadorial Seminar.
2:00 p.m. Secretary Clinton meets with Secretary of Defense Bob Gates and National Security Advisor Tom Donilon, at the White House.
4:00 p.m. Secretary Clinton meets with President Obama at the White House.
4:40 p.m. Secretary Clinton holds a bilateral meeting with Israeli President Shimon Peres, at Blair House.
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The Washington Post – The Fact Checker
An article written by Glenn Kessler – Hillary Clinton’s uncredible statement on Syria
The author is trying to hold Hillary accountable for other people’s opinion.
Seems like another attack to discredit Hillary.
Hopefully stacyx is able to do something about it.
Yeah, I saw that. I’ll take it on in a post but it will unfortunately have to be later when I get home from work.
Congress wants to have it both ways and once things start to go down the crapper they pretend like they knew all along things wouldn’t work out. 13 GOP Senators went to Syria recently- they didn’t go there to play Bridge, they went there hoping Syria would play a constructive role in Israeli-Palestinian peace, among other things. If they thought Syria was incapable of reform and that Assad was evil incarnate, they wouldn’t have gone.
Oh, for goodness sake! Kessler is really reaching here. He nitpicks about whether visits from 13 Congressional leaders — most of whom have made MULTIPLE visits to Syria, as he himself notes — constitute the “many” visits referenced by Hillary. Most of the quotes he cites back up Hillary’s statement that Congressional leaders have suggested Assad son may be more of a reformer than his father ever was.
But in any case, I’m getting a little tired of all the finger-pointing (particularly from republicans, when it’s politically convenient) about the “hypocrisy” and “inconsistencies” in our foreign policy, as if there exists a one-size-fits-all way to respond to popular uprisings in every single country across the globe, and as if our government’s public pronouncements have anything to do with actual behind-the-scenes diplomatic efforts — witness what’s going on in Yemen. Today, the Obama administration finally announced the US supports Saleh’s exit (after weeks of his security forces firing on and killing peaceful protesters). Turns out that for at least the past week, we’ve been actively involved in negotiating his safe passage out of Yemen once he resigns.
Yes, it’s nonsense. Those GOPers went to Syria because we have pinned our hopes on some reform taking place, just like we have over the years in Bahrain, Egypt etc. Syria is too important geopolitically to just tell to f*ck off. It’s too bad diplomacy with Syria hasn’t worked as well as the administration hoped because at times Syria has shown interest in rapprochement with Israel, which would be great. Of course, the GOP and even the Israel Lobby (per MJ Rosenberg and others) did everything it could to undermine the administration’s efforts at working with Syria- they held up allowing the new Ambassador being confirmed and did a lot of political showboating which was not constructive. We have a better chance of encouraging Syria to enact reforms by using diplomacy rather than simply through threats. But the GOP and even some hawkish dems preferred to pander to certain constituencies. Now, diplomacy will be almost impossible if Assad keeps killing protesters.
It’s easy to pick apart everything the administration is saying as though the GOP had a track record of decades of successful foreign policy in the region- NOT! I’m glad Hillary is handling this crisis rather than a McCain/Palin Secretary of State- we’d be at war with everybody!
What’s happening is truly historic and the idea that there is some quick fix or right answer or one size fits all approach right now is naive. Basically, some in the GOP will complain about Hillary/Obama no matter what they do.
I also love how Defense Secy Gates always seems to skate through all of this even though he’s in charge of our military policy (after the POTUS)- no one ever criticizes him.
Ok, I’m rambling at this point…
Kessler’s piece looks silly. Before the killings of protesters in Syria in the last couple weeks, I read in international press that Assad was quite popular in Syria and that although many Syrians want economic and political reforms, they’re not after regime change. There were quotes of Syrians who said they thought Assad wanted reform, but that he was moving too slowly and that he was surrounded by corrupt, incompetent people.
Since that was before the last few weeks, I’m sure many of those journalists’ and Syrians’ opinions have shifted. – The events in ME countries continue to unfold. They will not be predictable. What hurts the US I think is the inconsistent standards we apply to countries depending on what they do for us (and/or Israel). I’m not saying we should insist that all the rulers “must go”, as Obama said of Gaddafi. But we need some consistency and moderation. And that has to come from Obama, because the WH could undermine any attempts by Hillary at consistency.
@SA- I agree. I am all for consistency and it drives me nuts how we hold different countries to different standards based on whether we need them or like them. For example, look at our Cuba policy- this administration has demanded Cuba release all political prisoners- hello? Don’t get me wrong, that would be WONDERFUL if they would do that but we aren’t calling on China to release the tens of thousands of prisoners they have unjustly imprisoned. Why? Politics. We need China and the Cuban diaspora community is staunchly anti-Castro and has a lot of political clout.
Some would say it’s unrealistic to have a consistent policy because we need certain countries like Yemen, Saudi Arabia, etc. to protect some of our national interests and thus we can overlook their abuses. I guess I would argue that given what’s happening in the Middle East, perhaps the whole stability vs. freedom/democracy paradigm was a false sense of security? Perhaps bolstering corrupt regimes has a positive short term benefit but a very dangerous long-term cost in that once people obtain their rights and have a democratic system, they may turn against us because of how we aided and abetted their oppression?
The problem for this administration is timing is everything and they happen to be the ones in power when the Middle East is undergoing historic change- this administration did not create our inconsistent, often hypocritical foreign policy and the GOP and even some on the left would do well to remember that.
One thing I worry about and I’ve said this over and over again here- I really hope this is a wake up call for the Beltway foreign policy community. Our Middle East policy has been incredibly unproductive and self defeating at times and now would be a GREAT time to chart a new course- people like Steve Clemmons of the New America Foundation have been arguing for that.
Unfortunately, most of the influential foreign policy think tanks, lobbyists, consultants, foreign service personnel seem to be allergic to changing anything. The folks at the Council on Foreign Relations, AIPAC, The Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Brookings etc. are in love with the status quo and have little new to offer. Just look at how we are handling Israel-Palestine- we are regurgitating the same failed strategy we’ve tried for decades and the same faces are involved on the American side, the Palestinian side and the Israeli side. It’s really frustrating.
I still can’t get over how good she looks for her age.