Newsweek: Hillary Clinton was no spectator at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue

[wyldwolf]

Wait a minute! Her time as first lady doesn't count as experience, right?

Hillary Clinton was no spectator at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. In campaign speeches, she often talks about what "we" thought and achieved—an acknowledgment that she and her husband have operated jointly for decades. And indeed she was uniquely immersed in the policies and politics of Bill Clinton's administration. Hillary was the first presidential spouse to have an office in the West Wing rather than the traditional First Lady's domain of the East Wing. She had no official position or specified duties, yet she was so involved in decision making that the president's staff called her "the Supreme Court" because they knew she was the last person he consulted before making up his mind.

"She was the absolutely necessary person he had to have to bounce things up against, and he was that for her," said White House counsel Bernard Nussbaum. "They would talk continually every day." For all the strain and heartache in other areas of their lives, the Clintons have a long history of working together privately on issues and political strategy. Hillary enjoyed operating as a hidden hand. While giving instructions as First Lady, she was known to tell her staff, "Don't leave any fingerprints." White House adviser George Stephanopoulos recalled her explaining, "You have to be much craftier behind the scenes."

Hillary oversaw the hiring of White House staffers and pressed her husband to fill half the top positions with women. In particular, she insisted he choose a woman as attorney general, which led to the derailed nominations of corporate lawyer Zoe Baird and federal Judge Kimba Wood. The president finally settled on Janet Reno...

Wait a minute! Her time as first lady doesn't count as experience, right?

Her influence over foreign policy is less clear. When asked in a debate in early December whether she had advised her husband on foreign matters, Hillary replied, "I certainly did." Recently Bill Clinton said that in 1994 Hillary urged him to send U.S. troops to stop the slaughter in Rwanda. He never did, and still regrets it. Yet if she did exhort him privately, she evidently failed to persuade him...

... There is no doubt that Hillary's proximity to the Oval Office has given her a familiarity with the presidency that is unsurpassed by any of her rivals. She knows the mechanics of the White House and the demands of the job. She also has plenty of firsthand experience managing political crises. Would that make her a better president? The answer to that may turn on larger concerns—whether her vision suits the times, whether she can handle the pressure when the buck truly stops with her and whether she has learned to learn from her mistakes.


Wait a minute! Her time as first lady doesn't count as experience, right?

http://www.newsweek.com/id/81600/page/3

[Tellurian]

1. Not a stretch at all.. both are experienced attorneys..

of course the naysayers choose to believe Hillary was approving dining menus and busy redecorating the White House.

I have no qualms President Clinton gathered all the info he could on a particular issue and bounced it off of Hillary to get her opinion then debate the issue to a unanimous conclusion if there were any differences.

[jakem]

12. Wait a minute-

"She was the absolutely necessary person he had to have to bounce things up against, and he was that for her..." "They would talk continually every day.." For all the strain and heartache in other areas of their lives, the Clintons have a long history of working together privately... enjoyed operating as a hidden hand... "Don't leave any fingerprints..." White House adviser George Stephanopoulos recalled her explaining, "You have to be much craftier behind the scenes."

Doesn't all that apply to Monica as well?! Is she campaigning too?

[pretzel4gore]

2. Newsweek was part of the mob that tried to get Clinton...

somehow, Newsweek's reactionarky spirit debunks anything they say (cuz they're tricksters)...the constant effort by the ass peddlar press to wave off the stench of their past actions and pretend they're just newsmen trying to inform the people etc just reinforces the suspicion that they're still plotting to sell our children to perverted molestors and hook all our women on evil dope, besides the really nasty political stuff you just know they're hiding!
the medium is the massage

[Bonobo]

3. You're right.

Oh, I have to go and call my Doctor's wife now. You see, I'm ill and I need help but my doctor is too busy. It's ok though, I'm sure his wife (married 40 years) already has enough "experience" by talking about his cases with him.

[superkia]

4. Didnt she get asked in the debate about opening up some records or something....

that would show us the roll she took, what she did and was a part of or something. If we have to take the word of a Clinton to make our presidential decision, they must think we are stupid. Has anyone found out anything on the bilderberg meetings the Clinton's took part in or is that something that they wont even share with the people that support them? Bill went for many years and I would love to know what the Clinton's and the other bilderberg elite have decided to do with the future of the world, I mean...the elite and powerful should be able to do whatever they feel is best for them and their world because they have the money and the power. I would like to at least know what they have in store for us. War, no health care, no more constitution, inflation, gas prices, food prices, abusive police and the north american union are allot for us to deal with in such a short time. Hopefully the Clinton's will give us an idea of what the elite have been talking about when it comes to our children's futures because right now the way things are heading, I don't think they have any good news for the majority of the country.

[JackORoses]

5. do you think you are doing yourself a service by spinning this article?

Each person who follows your link will find out more about your Candidate than you would like.

Editing out the Bad parts for your OP doesn't change the original article and the points it makes.

Wait a minute! Her time as first lady doesn't count as experience. Right.

[wyldwolf]

10. I think the spin job was done by you in your thread on it.

:rofl:

[HooptieWagon]

6. I conclude from your arguement

that Laura chimp would be a fantastic president also.

[Raster]

7. So HRC has plenty of White House experience as the other half of Bill and Hil?

I agree. And if ANYONE running for President today would have and should have known that Saddam Hussein had NO weapons of mass destruction it would have been HRC, after all, she had access to much of the same intelligence as good ol' Bill. And yet she voted to allow the murdering war criminals cheney*/bush* a free hand to rape an entire country, presumably knowing it was a lie. Go figure.

[vssmith]

8. I knew it all along

She was there for:
the passage of NAFTA; and
the passage of The Telecommunications Act of 1996.

[Perry Logan]

9. Here's some more stuff about Hillary's experience the anti-Hillarites just can't seem to learn...

HILLARY'S EXPERIENCE ON THE WORLD STAGE:

Her historic speech at the UN Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995 not only galvanized women around the world, it helped spawn a movement that led to advances politically, legally, economically, and socially for women in many countries over the next decade. Among other initiatives, she spearheaded the Clinton Administration's efforts to combat the global crisis of human trafficking. She persuaded the First Ladies of the Americas to use their collective power to eradicate measles and improve girls' education throughout the western Hemisphere. And she is widely credited with helping women in Kuwait finally win the right to vote.

As First Lady and now as a two-term senator who represents the most ethnically diverse state in the nation and who sits on the Armed Services Committee, Hillary Clinton has become a fixture on international issues over the past 15 years. She has traveled to more than 80 countries, going from barrios to rural villages to meetings with heads of state. She has consulted with dozens of world leaders - Nelson Mandela, King Abdullah, Tony Blair among them -- on matters as diverse as America and NATO's roles in Kosovo, eradicating poverty in the Third World, and the plight of women living under the Taliban in Afghanistan.

Today, she is one of the most influential voices in the world on human rights, democracy, and the promotion of a "new internationalism" in foreign affairs that calls for a balanced use of military force, diplomacy, and social development to strengthen American interests and security globally.

While American First Ladies historically have made great (and often overlooked) contributions to our nation, Hillary Clinton's wide-ranging experience on international issues as First Lady is unprecedented. Indeed, she is the only First Lady to have delivered foreign policy addresses at major gatherings of the United Nations, the World Bank, the Council on Foreign Relations, and the World Economic Forum.

Hillary Clinton has been fighting for the rights of children for special needs for decades. In her first job out of law school working for the Children's Defense Fund, she conducted research that led to Congress passing the Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 1975, the landmark bill mandating that all children with disabilities be educated in the public school system. later, she helped improve the education of children with special needs by working to reauthorize the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act. In 2005, she sponsored an amendment to increase funding for the act by $4 billion dollars. She also cosponsored the Personal Excellence for Children with Disabilities Act, a bill that promised to help schools recruit and retain new special education teachers, and better prepare general education teachers and staff to work with children with special needs.

Most recently, she has called for greatly expanded funding to the National Institute for Health to investigate treatments for children with disabilities. And she has put forth a comprehensive and detailed plan to help children and families affected by autism, with numerous elements that correspond very closely to what families in the autism community have been demanding for years.

[ArkySue]

11. K&R

:kick: