Hillary Poses as the Militarist to win votes

[illinoisprogressive]

WHAT IN the world was Sen. Hillary Clinton thinking when she attacked Sen. Barack Obama for ruling out the use of nuclear weapons in going after Osama bin Laden? And why aren't her supporters more concerned about yet another egregious example of Clinton's consistent backing for the mindless militarism that is dragging this nation to ruin? So what that she is pro-choice and a woman if the price of proving her capacity to be commander in chief is that we end up with an American version of Margaret Thatcher?

In response to the 9/11 hijackers, armed with weapons no more sophisticated than $3 box-cutters, American military spending, with Armed Services Committee member Clinton's enthusiastic support, has catapulted beyond Cold War levels. Clinton has treated the military budget as primarily a pork-barrel target of opportunity for jobs and profit in New York state, supports increased money for missile defense and every other racket the military-industrial complex comes up with, but still feels no obligation to repudiate her vote for the disastrous Iraq war.

Given her sorry record of cheerleading the emergence of a new military-industrial complex, do we not have a right, indeed an obligation, to question Clinton's commitment to creating a more peaceful world? Don't say that we weren't warned if a President Hillary Clinton further imperils our world, as she has clearly positioned herself as the leading hawk in the Democratic field. What other reason was there for first blasting Obama for daring to state that he would meet with foreign leaders whom President Bush has branded as sworn enemies, and then for the attack on Obama's very sensible statement that it would be "a profound mistake" to use nuclear weapons in Pakistan and Afghanistan, in the attempt to eliminate bin Laden?

Isn't that a no-brainer - or can Clinton conceive of an occasion where even the threat, let alone the actuality, of a nuclear attack in the immediate neighborhood of nuclear-armed Pakistan and India would send the right message? And what about the dangerous message of Hillary's assault on Obama; "I don't believe that any president should make any blanket statements with respect to the use or non-use of nuclear weapons." Huh? Just exactly how does one make a compelling case to other nations against the proliferation of nuclear weapons when members of the nuke club, particularly the president of the one nation that has killed hundreds of thousands of people with one of these ungodly weapons, will not, at the very least, promise to abstain from first use of a weapon that could quite easily eliminate most life on this planet?

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2007/08/15/EDASRIF5P.DTL

[Ethelk2044]

1. Good Article.

[jgraz]

2. Hillary Poses as 'X' to win votes

Who'da thunk it? :shrug:

[MethuenProgressive]

3. She's right to scold Obama on his ignorance.

"WHAT IN the world was Sen. Hillary Clinton thinking when she attacked Sen. Barack Obama for ruling out the use of nuclear weapons in going after Osama bin Laden?"

She was thinking somebody should bitch slap Barack "No Foreign Policy Clue" Obama before he becomes completely impossible for her to take on as her VP candidate...

[illinoisprogressive]

4. Except she is the ignorant one. Has no policy, no substance and loves failed policies of neocons

[MethuenProgressive]

5. Right... Have you ever posted a positive thread about your own guy?

Perhaps you're afraid to look too closely?

[zulchzulu]

8. Attack Obama and then expect us all to wait for the invitation to the Coronation?

Sorry. I want to win the White House. The GOP doesn't deserve a freebie.

[Laurab]

16. They've posted many, many positive threads about him

I've seen them. That said, although I too prefer Obama, I don't like the constant bashing threads toward other candidates. I do find them far more from Hillary supporters than anyone else, so maybe some of those posters should ask themselves the same question.

[MethuenProgressive]

17. Not asking "they", asking illinoisprogressive, thank you.

And yes, I've done a search.

[Laurab]

20. I was talking about illinoisprogressive - I just didn't know if it was

a he or she, so used "they".

[beastieboy]

35. "It" would be fine

[Laurab]

36. Oh, I don't think so but thanks. n/t

[zulchzulu]

6. Funny how Clinton supporters don't even know their candidate's words and record

Hillary Clinton is on record saying that nuclear weapons were off the table before she market-tested and did poll-tested Carville-approved answers saying it's a bad thing to have nuclear weapons off the table.

Any sensible Democrat would jettison their support for someone who thinks nuclear weapons should possibly be used...period....but no...

[IndianaGreen]

9. Your "girl" said the same thing Obama said, back in 2006

Hillary is following Karl Rove's playbook that was so successful in convincing people in 2000 that George W. Bush was a "compassionate" conservative. What was it that your "girl" called herself the other day, a "moderate" progressive.

Early this year, Hillary told the AIPAC warmongers that all options were on the table on Iran, including nukes. I suppose Hillary wants to show that she is just as crazy as Cheney in bringing about Armageddon.

[IndianaGreen]

7. According to the author, Robert Scheer, Hillary is the militarist, the war hawk

and she has been a friend of the military-industrial complex.

Pundits for the National Review, The Weekly Standard and other pro-war outlets have come to applaud Clinton. A host of political scientists and other campaign hustlers have also approved this image makeover; as a recent Boston Globe headline put it, “Tough talk drives Clinton effort: National security stance seen adding to image of strength.” One political scientist from Texas stated: “She’s come off as credible and serious on national defense-an issue that two years ago most of us would have thought would be a liability for her.” The Globe noted that “When Geraldine Ferraro was the Democratic candidate for vice president in 1984, she was dogged by questions about whether she could ‘push the button’ to launch an attack if the Cold War turned hot.” The paper then quoted Ferraro as saying that Clinton, whom she supports for president, has passed that test: “You can’t do that with Hillary Clinton. Hillary is in a totally different place.”

Great, so forget the hope that a woman president might prove to be more enlightened than macho men in the matter of peacemaking, and instead rest assured that Hillary would have the cojones to “push the button” that would kill us all. Once again, the old Clintonian tactic of triangulation: positioning oneself politically instead of taking a position of integrity.

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/08/15/3179/

[MethuenProgressive]

10. "If George Bush won't end this war, I will" - HRC

Darn, those facts always get in the way of the Right Wing's attacks on Clinton, don't they?

[IndianaGreen]

11. Hillary says she will continue the occupation of Iraq long beyond 2009

Like Nixon, Hillary can talk from both sides of her mouth. Hillary will say one thing to one group, then say quite another to a different group. I already posted on this thread the bellicose speech she gave to AIPAC about Iran. Here is what she told the NY Times, but don't let the facts get in the way of your Evita-like worship of Hillary):

The United States’ security would be undermined if parts of Iraq turned into a failed state that serves as a petri dish for insurgents and Al Qaeda. It is right in the heart of the oil region. It is directly in opposition to our interests, to the interests of regimes, to Israel’s interests.

-- Hillary Clinton

Published on Thursday, March 15, 2007 by the New York Times

If Elected... Clinton Says Some G.I.’s in Iraq Would Remain

by Michael R. Gordon and Patrick Healy

WASHINGTON — Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton foresees a “remaining military as well as political mission” in Iraq, and says that if elected president, she would keep a reduced military force there to fight Al Qaeda, deter Iranian aggression, protect the Kurds and possibly support the Iraqi military.

In a half-hour interview on Tuesday in her Senate office, Mrs. Clinton said the scaled-down American military force that she would maintain would stay off the streets in Baghdad and would no longer try to protect Iraqis from sectarian violence — even if it descended into ethnic cleansing.

In outlining how she would handle Iraq as commander in chief, Mrs. Clinton articulated a more nuanced position than the one she has provided at her campaign events, where she has backed the goal of “bringing the troops home.”

She said in the interview that there were “remaining vital national security interests in Iraq” that would require a continuing deployment of American troops.

The United States’ security would be undermined if parts of Iraq turned into a failed state “that serves as a petri dish for insurgents and Al Qaeda,” she said. “It is right in the heart of the oil region,” she said. “It is directly in opposition to our interests, to the interests of regimes, to Israel’s interests.”

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines07/0315-02.htm

[MethuenProgressive]

12. "to fight Al Qaeda, deter Iran aggression, protect the Kurds & support Iraqi military"

One of the many thing Obama agrees with her on.
From the OP's link:
“So it will be up to me to try to figure out how to protect those national security interests and continue to take our troops out of this urban warfare, which I think is a loser,” Mrs. Clinton added.

[IndianaGreen]

18. Hillary mentioned OIL, and ISRAEL, as reasons for continuing Iraq's OCCUPATION

How many decades has Israel occupied Palestine? Do you wish the same for US troops?

There was no Al-Qaeda in Iraq before the US invasion. They are there because we are there!

[MethuenProgressive]

23. Iraq = Palestine?? That's a new one!

You're original, that's for sure.

[IndianaGreen]

24. Occupation = Occupation

That's the very reason why Poppy Bush did not go all the way to Baghdad during the Gulf War.

You go ahead! Make your "girl" President, and see how Bush's war becomes Hillary's war, and how Bush's crimes become Hillary's crimes.

[MethuenProgressive]

26. Genocide = You happy?

So, after we started this was, after we fucked up their country, just wave bye-bye?
And you'll be just fine with the result?
Who is your candidate again? Stalin?

[IndianaGreen]

29. Will you tell a rapist to stay with his victim until she "gets over it?"

We raped Iraq! According to John Hopkins Lancet Report, over 650,000 Iraqi civilians have been killed in America's "liberation." According to UN, one million Iraqis have fled the country we "liberated," and two million more are living as refugees in their own country. Talk about genocide, how about all the depleted uranium munitions we have used on civilian areas, or the white phosphorous bombs we have used in densely populated areas such as Fallujah?

We have destroyed their cities and their society. There isn't a single family in Iraq that has not suffered as the result of America's illegal, criminal, and cruel invasion and occupation. Yet, here you are shamelessly touting our brutal occupation as a virtue to be extolled. Do you wish on Iran the same thing we have done to Iraq? I wonder...

Unlike you, I don't adhere to Colin Powell's discredited "we broke it, we fix it" philosophy. Iraq was a thriving civilization when my European ancestors were still living like savages. The first city rose in Iraq, Ur, from which the patriarch Abraham was from. We have done enough damage to Iraq and the Iraqis. If we have any human decency left, we would leave, and we would leave quickly.

[MethuenProgressive]

37. You'll turn your back and allow the murder & rape to increase?

How nice of you. We fucked Iraq up, and you want to say tough shit Iraqis, we're outta here, now you deal with the mess we made.

[IndianaGreen]

38. Some of the murders and rapes are committed by our own troops

or haven't you been keeping tabs on recent criminal prosecutions of GIs that killed and/or raped helpless Iraqi civilians?

Stop your obsession with "white man's burden," it is just a fearmongering excuse for justifying keeping troops in Iraq so that we can steal their oil.

Iraqis will do fine once we are all gone, together with our bases.

[Mutineer]

13. And I thought Fred Thompson was the actor

Seems Hillary is willing to be everything to everyone in order to win. And the sad part? It will no doubt work for her.

[geek tragedy]

14. Poses? Seems like the real deal to me. eom

[Donna Zen]

21. Yes

Senator Clinton has courted and endeared herself to the most "beefy" of the Democratic-leaning foreign policy types. For some sad reason she has decided that the only way a woman can be accepted by America is if she's a hawk. In her case, she is very hawkish. Imagine for a moment a major crisis in the world, and then imagine her response. That crisis will come.

[Az_lefty]

15. Hillary will pose with anyone if it improves her image...

unfortunately, it's all image.

[Muddy Waters Guitar]

19. This, alone, is pushing me not to vote for Hillary at all

As angry as I've been with Hillary about her prior stands, my predilection thus far has been to at least consider voting for her in 2008 if she were nominated. But this about clinches it. Nothing in our current tense world is more dangerous than the prospect of nuclear proliferation, and Hillary is encouraging this thoroughly with such an idiotic stand.

It was Dick Cheney's invocation of the threat to use first-strike tactical nuclear weapons on Iran that enraged the world 2 years ago, and continues to weaken us abroad while encouraging Iran and others to develop their own nuclear weapons as a deterrent. Now Hillary is basically agreeing with the Cheney doctrine.

That basically does it, I'm not voting for her, unless she revokes this insane aggressive foreign policy stand. I'll find a good 3rd Party candidate to support otherwise.

[bvar22]

22. Hillary IS a Warhawk.

She has reassured her contributors at AIPAC/MIC that she will keep killing Muslims and destroying the Middle East for YEARS.

And Chavez better watch out too.
Hillary ain't gonna do no negotiating with him either.

[IndianaGreen]

25. Hillary is not against the war. She is only against the way the war was managed.

She favors bombing Iran, with nukes if necessary. I also have no doubt that Hillary will use US troops to topple anti-neoliberal governments in Latin America, from Venezuela to Ecuador.

Hillary is an agent of the ruling classes!

[Muddy Waters Guitar]

27. The irony is, this won't win Hillary any votes, either-- this loses her votes

Threatening to invoke first-strike nuclear weapons isn't going to win Hillary any votes, if anything it makes her seem even more like a loose cannon-- even warmongering right-wingers (who hate her enough on other counts to oppose her anyway) have little respect for her from this stand. Independents and Democrats are even further turned off.

Hillary's losing even more votes with this stand. I had at least considered voting for her before, despite my displeasure with her stands, but now, she's also lost mine.

[Skip Intro]

28. well, the writer accuses her of being satan, but I see no specifics

and, btw, for the umpteenth time, the bruhaha over Obama's answer centered around the phrase in the question, "without precondition." And the nukes comment did have negative repurcussions half a world away, which you would think would be some indication that careles words do indeed have an effect.

But no, its not just enough to disagree with Hillary, there have to be hit pieces and nasty insinuations, and flat out distortion.


Not that there isn't anything to criticize about Hillary, but the obvious bias and distain, the sliming of her and her supporters, is little reason to vote for someone else.


Another hit piece.

[Gloria]

30. Is "posing" the right word? She's not posing, she's a hawk...

I'm nauseated at the thought of a continuation of Bushco....

[calteacherguy]

31. This is the great problem of a Hillary candidacy: she fears to look weak.

She knows she has to "act tough" and not give Republicans any opening to label her as weak, thus the potential for war increases.

[Muddy Waters Guitar]

32. One of the best summaries

That's also why I have fundamental concerns not just a Democrat, but as a human being and as a US citizen with Hillary now. She's so afraid of looking meek and weak, she has a propensity to support wars just to confront this image. This is a big reason that she supported the Iraq War, which has been an absolute catastrophe for the USA and for the Iraqis.

If Hillary had been a panderer on other issues, I wouldn't have minded so much. But war is deadly serious, literally, and it's not something you play politics with. It's something you show leadership on, and Hillary has manifestly failed that test of leadership.

[Jed Dilligan]

34. That's the same problem male republicans have,

except that they learn the act starting in infancy.

[DU GrovelBot]

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