Newsweek: Well, What Do You Know? (Clinton/Obama and the experience question)

[babylonsister]

Well, What Do You Know?
The Clinton-Obama dustup wasn't just the usual campaign sparring. It raised key questions about what 'experience' means when it comes to being president.


By Richard Wolffe
Newsweek

Aug. 6, 2007 issue - Does Barack Obama have have enough experience to be president? This is the question Hillary Clinton would like to spend the next seven months debating. Her slogan is that she's "ready to lead"; she cites her extensive foreign travel and sessions with world leaders. For his part, Obama prefers to talk about living overseas and the good judgment he displayed in opposing the Iraq War from the start. For months, Clinton and Obama have taken subtle digs at each other's résumés. But there's nothing subtle about it now.
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At last week's contentious presidential debate, Obama was asked if he would meet with hostile foreign leaders like Hugo Chávez of Venezuela and Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad without preconditions in the first year of his presidency. Obama said he would. He said George W. Bush's policy of shunning those leaders had failed, and he would bring about change. Clinton turned the answer against Obama. She said she would not meet with the hostile leaders without preconditions, and suggested that anyone who did would be "used for propaganda purposes." The fight didn't end there. In the days that followed, Clinton called Obama "irresponsible" and "naive"; Obama labeled her "Bush-Cheney lite."

On one level, the dustup was just the usual campaign tit for tat, and it showed that both sides have skilled professionals on staff readying their sound bites. But beyond the nasty one-liners, there still remains the real question that neither candidate has seriously addressed: when it comes to being president, what does "experience" mean—and how important is it in picking a commander in chief?

Both Clinton and Obama have called on foreign-policy heavyweights to educate them on the issues and help shape their approach to world affairs. But neither candidate would bring much in the way of hands-on foreign-policy experience to the Oval Office. Their efforts to promote their credentials can seem strained. Clinton's aides point to her extensive travel to more than 80 countries as First Lady and her 1995 speech at a U.N. conference on women in Beijing. "She helped represent the United States abroad throughout the '90s," says Howard Wolfson, Clinton's communications director. "Obviously, that's an important qualification. She went to China and gave a very famous and important address when she declared that human rights are women's rights and women's rights are human rights. That electrified the world." But these sanitized, ceremonial trips abroad are hardly preparation for the middle-of-the-night call from the Situation Room. After all, Laura Bush has also traveled extensively as First Lady, taking in 68 countries either with her husband or on her own. No one is saying she has the experience to be commander in chief.

CONTINUED

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20010704/site/newsweek/

[Buzz Clik]

1. LOL! And when did Hillary Clinton suddenly become the grizzled veteran?

Too much.

[illinoisprogressive]

2. Like cheney, you can have 30 yrs experience but, lack basic judgement

I want someone with judgement as no matter the amt. of 'experience', you can have lousy judgement like Cheney and the neocons.

[Ethelk2044]

3. I have been saying this for awhile. Just because she was First Lady

that does not give her experience. She was a wife for God's Sake. Making a couple of speeches does not give you the ability to make good judgment. If that is the Case the republicans should nominate Laura Bush she qualifies with this logic.

[mrcheerful]

4. Excuse me but the biggest right wing nut bitch is that they don't want leaders with experience

they want someone who isn't a Washington insider or politician. Don't ask me were they get that ideal from as clearly the puke party of puking morons has been nothing but politicians or Washington insiders of the worst sort. But then your dealing with people that haven't a thought in their numb skulls unless someone put the thought in there for them. To much experience or not enough, which baffles the hell out of me, how can anyone measure up to their standards if either they have no experience or too much. God americans can make a person ashamed of being born in a country that makes about as much sense as the people in North Korea. Lets all kneel down and worship our great neo con gods the same way N.Koreans worship lil Kim. So when Shrub finally kicks the bucket will all the Eagles pay a tribute to him too?

[TankLV]

5. I don't like Obama very much - but I liked his answer on this one...

Let's see - that makes it about 2 or 3 things I agree with as opposed to the dozens of stupid or plain wrong things he's said otherwise...

A broken clock can be right twice a day...

I'm not too enamored of Hillary, either...

[Kingstree]

6. Being First Lady is not the same as sitting behind the President's desk.

[Rosa Luxemburg]

7. There's nothing like a breath of fresh air

as Capital Hill is stagnant

[beachmom]

8. I was wondering when someone was going to bring this up.

Sen. Clinton is running, in part, on her job as FIRST LADY. A ceremonial job. As to what else she did after the health care debacle, we know less. Let's face it -- the top 3 candidates are considerably LESS EXPERIENCED than the '00 and '04 candidates, and frankly, that makes me nervous.

[karynnj]

9. Same here

This time in the 2004 cycle, I was extremely happy with 3 of the possibilities and later liked a third who was late to enter. Each had a wealth of experience - all different - but all real and substanitive.

In 2000, I prefered my former Senator (Bradley), but saw Gore as eminently qualified. I prefered Bradley, who was more liberal - for that reason and because I did buy Bradley's argument that Gore, whether he wanted it or not, was too closely tied to Clinton.

This year, I long for the quality of candidates we had then.