Hillary Clinton Faces Test of Record as Women’s Advocate

[NYC_SKP]

This discussion thread was locked as off-topic by Raine1967 (a host of the Latest Breaking News forum).

Source: New York Times



MIAMI — It was supposed to be a carefully planned anniversary to mark one of the most important and widely praised moments in Hillary Rodham Clinton’s political career — and to remind the country, ahead of a likely 2016 presidential campaign, about her long record as a champion for the rights of women and girls.

Instead, as Mrs. Clinton commemorates her 1995 women’s rights speech in Beijing in back-to-back events in New York, she finds herself under attack for her family foundation’s acceptance of millions of dollars in donations from Middle Eastern countries known for violence against women and for denying them many basic freedoms.

This was not how she intended to reintroduce herself to American voters.

Mrs. Clinton’s glide path to a likely April announcement that she will seek the presidency was built around women’s issues. Advancing women has been her central life’s work, as she and her admirers say proudly; she made it a priority as secretary of state and focused on it as a philanthropist. But that focus also allowed Mrs. Clinton, who played down her gender in 2008, to frame her second attempt at the White House in what could be one way to make it special and new: as a shot at history for her and for all women.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/09/us/politics/hillary-clinton-faces-test-of-record-aiding-women.html?_r=0

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Well, it's hard to argue with someone speaking out for womens' rights without sounding very cynical, but this seems like pretty "low hanging fruit" and not the kind of work that takes very much courage.

Add to that the very real problem of perceptions and the disconnect between SOS Clinton's rhetoric and her record and some cracks begin to appear, and widen.

I'm known to be a Clinton detractor around her, I'm more of a Jerry Brown Liz Warren kind of Progressive, but I feel that the former SOS is calculatingly exploiting womens and childrens' issues to political ends. If she becomes president, I don't doubt that she'll follow through on a lot of promises related to these issues.

But what would really take courage and really lift all of us up would be to take on the corporate interests that have kept us down.

And I just don't see that happening, ever, with her.

[leftofcool]

1. Another NYT Hillary hit peice.

[NoJusticeNoPeace]

2. Not ideal if true, to take money from such places, but if the money is then used to support

women, I say take their money and take as much as you can get.

The nonstop hate of Hillary will be entertaining to watch here on DU

[antiquie]

7. Agree, and I am a Hillary non-supporter

due to her support for war and Wall Street.

[peacebird]

3. Jobs that pay a living wage are a womens issue, PEACE is a womens issue, environmental protection

Is a womens issue.

She is not strong on any of those. She supports TPP. She supports FRACKING. She is a war hawk.
None of those positions support womens issues.

We need to be able to feed our families, know our water is safe to drink, know our children will not be crucified for corporate oil in foreign lands.

[NYC_SKP]

5. Exactly.

This is theater.

[tularetom]

4. You can bet that every action taken by a Hillary Clinton administration

Will be focus grouped, trial ballooned, and poll tested to death before it ever officially sees the light of day.

She's the very model of timid cautious centrism. She lacks the vision or courage to be a "transformational president". So if I were you, I wouldn't worry about whether she might take any action that would restrict the rights of corporations. She won't.

And I think she hoped to never be pinned down on what she stood for. She expected a coronation because she's female and the wife of a former president, and all these revelations are sort of getting in the way.

[840high]

6. Thank you. On another

note I read that her female staffers are paid less than her male staffers.

[Raine1967]

8. Locking. From the LBN SoP:

Post the latest news from reputable mainstream news websites and blogs. Important news of national interest only. No analysis or opinion pieces. No duplicates. News stories must have been published within the last 12 hours. Use the published title of the story as the title of the discussion thread.

I'd suggest a redirect to Politics or GD.

Raine