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Chan790
(20,176 posts)There's nothing that wasn't strongly suspected, nothing damning, nothing that honestly (as much as the anti-war left, Wikileaks and Anonymous hates it) isn't part of the job of a Sec. of State.
It's not all cupcakes, being chummy on foreign visits with small African girls, and diplomacy...sometimes it's poison pens, daggers in the back; promotion of the governmental and business interests of your own citizenry; and subversion of enemy interests and regimes. "Politics is war by other means" (Clausewitz)...Diplomacy is international politics by subterfuge, lying, theft and handshakes.
I have a lot of complaints about Hillary Clinton...but those complaints aren't about her performance as Sec. of State--at that, she was superb. It's a great fit for her. It's a shame that she has higher aspirations to jobs she's more poorly suited for.
highoverheadspace
(307 posts)Chan790
(20,176 posts)1.) It's not out of character with any former Sec. of State.
2.) A weak-kneed pacifist Sec. of State of the sort you seem to want would be highly ineffective at the job and a threat to our national welfare.
It's the job...the job is to do those things. Not hug small children and have your picture taken on diplomatic jaunts for the newspaper. What you are complaining about is, frankly, pretty much the job-description...and it is a necessary job that must be done in that way. The job is to represent America's interests abroad and manipulate to advance those interests...it's a job for a bloodless sociopath that doesn't care if they get 100,000 people there and there and there killed or steal from the global poor. It really is that simple and unavoidable unless you want to be reduced to the state of a third-world nation.
By virtue of being an American, you are automatically a barbarous monster that profits at the expense of the global poor. Heavy is the head upon which sits the crown. So, do I feel bad for the thousands dead in Libya? No more so than the thousands that will die this and every year everywhere else to maintain the American way of life.
It'll happen and continue to happen regardless who is President and who is Sec. of State. Every liberty and luxury you have in life has been taken at someone else's expense. It really is easier to live with it than to tear yourself apart over it when there is nothing you can do to stop it, short of moving to a global slum and becoming the exploited yourself.
leveymg
(36,418 posts)I think you captured the criminal mind set at the top, perfectly, that runs from from Kissinger straight through Hillary Clinton.
highoverheadspace
(307 posts)It sad that you think that taking other human lives to prop ourselves up is the best that we can aspire to.
leveymg
(36,418 posts)Chan790
(20,176 posts)Understanding the difference is necessary. We're going to continue to prosper as a nation necessarily at the expense of other people...we can feel bad about it or not; but we can't change or end it.
highoverheadspace
(307 posts)Congratulations on your lack of hope for humanity.
Chan790
(20,176 posts)Also, Hobbes, Locke, Rousseau, Nietzsche...pretty much everybody you're likely to cover in an introductory curriculum in political theory except J.S. Mill and Jeremy Bentham.
Mill might be a toss-up...he'd probably see a lot of his proposed panopticon in US foreign policy. Basically, the US as a jailor state to a mad world.
zeemike
(18,998 posts)They teach the virtues of sociopath y in school.
I kind of suspected that.
GoneFishin
(5,217 posts)Just wow.
noamnety
(20,234 posts)Gotta wonder how you feel about slavery.
angrychair
(9,685 posts)At Least I would hope so.
Yes, it is the job of a SoS to push American interest across the globe, the paraphrased job description.
That being said, there are still laws and ethics of professional conduct that must be maintained.
Just because it's been done in the past or others do it does not forgo higher ideals. We are who we are by being better than than the person before us.
kristopher
(29,798 posts)Explain how the invasion of Iraq helps the US "prosper as a nation".
From where I'm sitting, the type of activities described are pure evil that destroy not only the nations we target, but the security, economy and national spirit of the United States.
chervilant
(8,267 posts)You must not have read The American Age. given your opinion about the "job" of Secretary of State. But, never mind. I think I'll just update my IL.
Chan790
(20,176 posts)I think he takes a distorted view of the field and history to confirm his hypotheses.
brush
(57,272 posts)Presidents can, if they chose, present themselves to be above the fray as statesmen or stateswomen for optics while sending the SOS out to be the "heavy", but ALL candidates running for President of the United States have to know what that office represents in terms of realpolitik, even Bernie Sanders.
Once president they can rein in our avaricious imperialism somewhat, as Obama has tried to do, but the MIC, with their bought-and-pair-for reps in Congress, will not stand being denied for long, as the American lifestyle is at stake.
It would take a revolution to change that, which is where Bernie Sanders comes in.
I wonder how he would deal with the demands that come from being President of the United States, or maybe a better question would be, would he survive being President of the United States?
MrMickeysMom
(20,453 posts)Your description and acquiesces as to the establishment character of a SoS are diametrically opposed to everything in your sig line. Oh, yeah... I believe you...
jwirr
(39,215 posts)pnwmom
(109,504 posts)thesquanderer
(12,326 posts)Two things...
1. there is space between "weak-kneed pacifist" and the more severe qualities you admire in Hillary's approach, but even if I grant you that those severe qualities are admirable in a SOS...
2. there is a question as to whether you think those more severe qualities you see as necessary in an SOS are necessarily the same qualities we ideally want in a President.
greymouse
(872 posts)Hillary's handiwork in Libya -
Before: a stable country reaching out to the West, with free healthcare and free education through college for its citizens and a semblance of equal rights for women.
After: A country with no central government, in civil war chaos, a total lack of safety for its residents, with ISIS bases within striking distance of Italy, and equal rights for women set back centuries.
She ruined the lives of six million people. Six million, where have I heard that number before...
AgerolanAmerican
(1,000 posts)It's actually quite extraordinary the powers she took upon herself in that position. To my knowledge, never before has the US gone to war at the initiative of an appointed official.
Also, in open defiance of the expressed will of the people when we said NO to war in Syria, she went ahead and fueled the war anyway.
Her policies on Libya and Syria as SoS should each individually be a campaign killer. I feel like I am in bizarro world watching someone like her not only compete but actually be leading in the Democratic Party.
"War, war, what is it good for?"
Lining the pockets of the Clinton Foundation, apparently... and little else.
FlatBaroque
(3,160 posts)ejbr
(5,869 posts)could shoot someone on a busy street in broad daylight and lose minimal support. Her change of positions for political expediency, ties to the thieves that wrecked the economy, and numerous lapses in sound judgment do not seem to affect her level of support. Her cheerleaders are either indifferent to or ignorant of her piss poor qualities. She's a woman who dresses well and tells people what they want to hear.
sharp_stick
(14,400 posts)thereismore
(13,326 posts)drm604
(16,230 posts)That seems to get added to a lot of stories like this and, to my knowledge, it's always been false.
ToxMarz
(2,241 posts)There is no other way to release information. If only there was another way, then people would know.
SoapBox
(18,791 posts)I heard about this, online, a couple times last night...being said that FB (or better, persons at FB) had removed multiple posting about some of the emails.
Seems...odd. If there is nothing there, then why remove the emails posted?
Orrex
(64,033 posts)Someone could as readily claim that Sanders has participated in illegal whale hunting excursions in 2007. If he didn't then why not post his emails from 2007 declaring that he didn't participate? Does he have something to hide?
As always, the assumption in any anti-Clinton fishing expedition du jour is that she must have done something terribly wrong, so it's up to her to prove that she didn't. Instead of, you know, requiring her accusers to make their case.
Orrex
(64,033 posts)Not "surprising news" or "an unexpected revelation" or "new information," but always "a campaign killer."
Hmm...
GoneFishin
(5,217 posts)a shocker.
Betty Karlson
(7,231 posts)brush
(57,272 posts)for forever. It's a job requirement.
Will it change?
It's doubtful but I'd like to see a president implement policies that would change the job description of the SOS and survive.
But that's doubtful too.
Betty Karlson
(7,231 posts)brush
(57,272 posts)Google it.
kristopher
(29,798 posts)Do you understand what fascism is?
Do you understand what the bad aspect of it is even without it being in the shadow of the Holocaust?
brush
(57,272 posts)Do you understand the term realpolitik?
Get to your point, please.
jwirr
(39,215 posts)Cryptoad
(8,254 posts)how can u say anything about this much BS that doesn't rhyme with Dooky? Somebody needs to find another Political Party to save.
Dr Hobbitstein
(6,568 posts)Not Good Reads. But I'm sure you already know that.
Orrex
(64,033 posts)Dr Hobbitstein
(6,568 posts)It's childish and assholish of those that try to circumvent Skinner's new rule so they can get their drivel on the front page. I've noticed that Video & Multimedia is another dumping ground.
Duval
(4,280 posts)Drip, drip, drip. Our Country needs someone who will bring us together and that someone is Bernie Sanders.
laureloak
(2,055 posts)Since when are we responsible for the content of the mail we receive??
IdaBriggs
(10,559 posts)The hacker has been extradited here so we will know soon.
Hiraeth
(4,805 posts)hueymahl
(2,640 posts)Give me an f'ing break with these posts with over-the-top Drudge Report headlines. Hillary has her issues, but you are playing into the rethug talking points, hook, line & sinker.
I don't alert, but this one I'm tempted to on.
Goblinmonger
(22,340 posts)Please feel free to re-post this in GDP.
Thanks.