?????????????????? Um, New York Times .... HUH????

[beachmom]

This is the biggest bunch of spin I have ever read, and I say that while hoping Sec. Clinton succeeds in getting Karzai to clean up the corruption.

But damn, this is the most obvious erasure of John Kerry's contributions to this country I have ever seen. This reminds me of "Working Girl" when Sigourney Weaver takes Melanie Griffith's idea and acts as if it is her own.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/20/world/asia/20clinton.html?_r=1&src=twt&twt=nytimes

Clinton Emerges as Obama’s Key Link to Afghan Leader

KABUL, Afghanistan — It is far from clear that President Obama can depend on President Hamid Karzai to bring order to this violent country, but it is becoming clear that he will depend on Hillary Rodham Clinton to be his go-between in dealing with the mercurial Afghan leader.

In a visit to Kabul, during which she held a 90-minute, one-on-one session with Mr. Karzai on Wednesday, and in an intense telephone call a few weeks ago in the aftermath of Afghanistan’s election, Secretary of State Clinton has built an unlikely rapport with the Afghan leader, according to administration officials.

They go into how risky it is, blah, blah, blah. Then this:

“When I came into the administration, I was one of the few people who had a long-term positive relationship with President Karzai,” Mrs. Clinton said in an interview on Thursday, hours after seeing him get sworn in. “I continue to believe he has a tremendous historical opportunity.”

...

Mrs. Clinton “combines the hard-headed strength, the political clout and the human understanding to do it right,” said Mr. Riedel, who is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.

Of those qualities, her political bona fides may be the most relevant. When Mr. Karzai was wavering about whether to allow a runoff vote after almost a million of his votes were disqualified, she implored him to acquiesce, arguing that he would emerge with a stronger hand. (In the end, Mr. Karzai’s rival, Abdullah Abdullah, pulled out, making a second round unnecessary.)

In case Mr. Karzai did not get her point, Mrs. Clinton reminded him of her own bitter experience in the 2008 Democratic primaries, losing to Mr. Obama, who later named her the nation’s chief diplomat.

How odd that suddenly everything John Kerry did and said, it was actually Clinton did it all from thousands of miles away!!! A hundred cups of tea via telephone, eh?

Look, I don't mind all the pressure of Karzai's unpredictableness being put on Clinton's shoulders, and decidedly OFF Kerry's who does not even serve in the Executive branch. But are we talking Bosnia all over again here? No doubt Clinton talked to him on the phone but using the same lines as Kerry? Hmmm. Regardless, shame on the New York Times for not even mentioning Kerry's pivotal role. HE is the one who made it happen. Or has the traditional media decided to erase history to prop up Clinton?

[karynnj]

1. This is ridiculous, but in some ways better than what I feared

I thought they would position Kerry as tolerating Karzai's corruption and Clinton against it.

The NYT for some reason has many reporters who arevery strong Clinton allies. They were in the forefront of the "she took a humble backbench role when she came to the Senate and rose by hard work to being the one of the true Senate leaders" - when neither part was remotely true. She never was treated as say, Bennett of CO or NM, were. There is also absolutely no significant bill that she can point to that as hers (not even key elements accepted into a bill.) For the most part, they ignored when she lifted Kerry's arguments and even words near verbatim on Iraq and global warming in 2007 and 2008. (On Iraq, it was most headspinning because just 7 or 8 months earlier, she blasted Kerry for that position. )

In the primaries, they were a leader in the "inevitable" theme, writing many articles that sound like those typically written before a convention or after they won the Presidency. They also ignored their own files when Ted Kennedy finally said that she was overstating her role on SCHIP.

As to Kerry, they used the opposite approach, giving him credit for nothing that did not list him as the lead sponsor. The fact is watching any major bill, the lead sponsor is often not the author of every provision and may have even reluctantly accepted it. I think Reid will be listed as the lead sponsor on the Health care bill, but he is clearly not the person who most deserves credit.

Here, Kerry's involvement was so highly publicized that I doubt it can become public consensus that this accomplishment was primarily his. It helps that many derided the achievement when Abdullah pulled out - even though there is a huge difference in Karzai refusing to allow the runoff to go forward and the runoff not happening as Adullah pulled out.

I suspect that this is another attempt to build up Clinton, who really has yet to have a real triumph anywhere. In fact, this may be being used because it is the clearest example of successful diplomacy.


---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
edited to add:
Here is how I responded:

I hope that Hillary Clinton will succeed as the main administration connection to Harmid Karzai as it is clear we need one. However, it is truly strange that in your description of how Karzai was pushed to agree to a runoff, there is no mention of John Kerry and the role of Karl Eikenberry is played down.

The President in his public comment announcing that decision thanked only Eikenberry and his team and John Kerry for their work on this. In a CNN interview, Karzai himself complimented John Kerry for his role. The media across the world has credited John Kerry as being the one, who at the request of the Obama administration, was the key diplomat in making this happen. Senator Kerry himself graciously made the point that he did not do this alone and that he was in contact with Clinton and Holbrooke. (The NYT article is here - http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/21/world/asia/21afghan.html?scp=1&sq=Kerry%20Karzai&st=cse ) This was a team effort and she was on the team. Her best decision may have been to give Kerry the task of persuading Karzai this was needed.

It seems to me that this is an attempt to attribute a major personal diplomatic breakthrough to Hillary Clinton, who other than in Armenia, where the NYT credited her with keeping the agreement with Turkey from falling apart, she has yet to have one. This actually does a disservice to the truth and to Hillary Clinton. It may be that her strength is more behind the scenes than in personal diplomacy. By giving her complete credit for something that should at minimum be shared by John Kerry, you imply that what she did do needed embellishing

(This is as even handed as I can be to HRC - I left out that when Kerry met with Obama on his return, HRC was not included in the meeting. I now concede that Wisteria was right when she claimed the Clinton people will try to claim this. Fortunately, it was more in public view and more recent than SCHIP, which she did not initiate!!)

[karynnj]

2. Necessary correction

Here, Kerry's involvement was so highly publicized that I doubt it can become public consensus that this accomplishment was NOT primarily his.

This may be a counter to the rather schizophrenic Time cover story that bounces back and forth between HRC's promise and many examples of her gaffes. (She really has had many tone deaf gaffes in important places on important issues. I am not sure if Israel/Palestine where her praising Netanyahu for doing something against US policy and saying it was "unprecedented" or her lecturing Pakistan publicly on possibly knowing where OBL was when they had their noses out of joint because they thought we were not praising them enough for the difficult fight against the Taliban, which has created over a million internal refugees is the worst, but it is a very close contest. ) I suspect if her name were not Hillary Clinton, she would be out.

[beachmom]

3. Well, again, I wish to be wrong about everything.

I want Hillary Clinton to succeed as Secretary of State, because that is good for the country, and would be a real triumph for her personally, after going through a lot (i.e. her husband & his role in costing her the presidency). I also thought she was treated badly in Pakistan, and am skeptical of the spin that it was a successful trip. The press reports in Pakistan were 100% negative (as were the reports of Kerry's trip, as Pakistanis are extremely mad at America at the moment), so how was this a public boost?

I think there is a compare and contrast going on. The New Republic, a publication I feel schizophrenic about (sometimes they have really good articles, other times their coverage is almost right wing), is not spinning her performance:

http://www.tnr.com/article/politics/reset-button

Joe Klein acknowledges a few gaffes, but then says she has "potential". Now in his defense, this was a Time magazine cover. Normally these are largely positive articles with some light criticism. It might have been a bit much for him to wriggle out of that formula.

http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1934843,00.html

I do have to say that there is a major disagreement among various pundits on whether her trip to Pakistan was a success or not. Those who are positive say it was good she allowed herself to be asked tough questions (democracy!!), but I just don't think she handled it that well with her al Qaeda remark which was odd. But that is a perfectly fine debate. What the NYT did was pretty bad -- giving her the credit for what others physically there did. She played a role, of course -- no one is disputing that -- but it was a spin doctor job IMO.

[karynnj]

4. The NYT is by far the worst I've seen

The earlier ones at worst had HRC as the master strategist sitting in DC determining who could do what and telling them what to do and possibly who to do it. Now, that I can't prove is untrue. Kerry, for example, did meet with Holbrooke before he went, which is standard for Congressmen going to other countries.

But, saying "it is clear we have a crisis - the election was riddled with fraud and their constitution clearly calls for a runoff" is something any number of people with nothing but the news likely posted. HRC agreeing is not that spectacular a feat especially as about a week before she announced that the US was considering him the winner. Though Galbraith hadn't gone public, you can bet that people in DC had heard from him. He had links to Biden, Kerry and I think most Democrats involved in foreign policy. So, in reality the ONLY new piece of information HRC had was that Galbraith's comments were public. This did not give her a strong position. Kerry, on the other hand, had spoken of concern that the elections had massive fraud.

As to who to send - I think she was compromised by her comment, Holbrooke was not on pleasant terms with him, Biden had stomped out of a meeting, and sending any military person smells wrong. Clearly she originally turned to Eikenberry to do it and, I suspect, that though Kerry had a standard briefing before he left, it was when Eikenberry signaled that he wasn't getting agreement, that Kerry was pulled in. (That seemed to fit the original comments by Kerry and Eikenberry and the timeline. If this were determined in DC, Kerry's schedule would have been far different and his talks with Karzai wouldn't have begun in the evening of the second day.). The fact is Obama and Clinton were incredibly lucky that Kerry was there, as there was no obvious alternative positioned as well.

The fact is the personal diplomacy was Kerry's and represented a huge physical, mental and like emotional focus. It also was the first major effort since 2004 - out of the many he succeeded at - where he got the attention and praise he deserved. It also ignores that though the Clinton allies try to ignore it, Kerry, far more so than HRC, has the well developed ties with leaders across the world - possibly because he listens to themand has for decades.

[blm]

5. Yes, it IS spindoctoring - and THAT is a big part of the problem with having Clintonites

serve in ANY capacity. Clintons and their camp see everything as a political spin game intent on glorifying themselves and diminishing the accomplishments of those who actually do the heavy lifting.

The Clintonites can still pull strings in every newsroom considered mainstream.


And ALL these articles repeating the same set of BULLSHIT talking points about Hillary is proof that the PR push is clearly from HER CAMP. They want history to be written THEIR way - embellished to make themselves into heroes they never were - just like the Bushes.

[karynnj]

6. Ha Ha - look what their ONLY non anonymous senior administration person quoted had to say!

Here is my new comment that may or may not get posted:

It is interesting that you did not ask the only non-administration person to comment, on what Hillary Clinton has achieved to date through her relationship with Mr Karzai. He spoke only on the need for a channel and spoke of qualities he attributes to Hillary Clinton that make it possible.

I would assume that he would not credit Clinton with being the one who used personal diplomacy to get Karzai to concede to have elections -- because he said this in the NYT:

\"NATO cannot succeed without an Afghan partner who has Afghan support and can led the majority of Afghans who reject the Taliban. Senator Kerry has given President Obama and NATO a second chance to get this right. We cannot afford a second fiasco. We should not expect perfection but we should expect much greater oversight. \"

http://roomfordebate.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/10/21/is-a-fair-election-in-afghanistan-possible/

[wisteria]

8. I have to agree with what you write. How wrong it is to accept the glory for others efforts.

She and her PR people are out to make her the greatest SOS of all time, with little effort on her part.

[wisteria]

7. OMG, revisionist history. I'm thinking though, Sen. Kerry showed her how to be a diplomat.

I am shocked that the NYT could rewrite this story and insert Clinton's name so that she gets credit where credit is not due. She must know about this-her and her ego. But, thats alright, we know the truth and she nor the NYT is going to fool many with this rewrite.

[wisteria]

9. I found some honestly reported story buried deep below the Clinton BS.

By mid-October, when it became clear that the number of votes disqualified because of suspected fraud would push him below 50 percent, the administration scrambled for a way to get Karzai to agree to a second round. Holbrooke could not go because the relationship was still too raw, and Clinton said she wanted him in Washington to participate in Afghanistan strategy meetings. The administration pressed into service Senate Foreign Relations Chairman John F. Kerry (D-Mass.), who was traveling in the region.

It took more than 20 hours of talks over four days, but Kerry persuaded Karzai to accede to the runoff. To critics of the forceful approach, the senator showed that patient diplomacy -- drinking copious cups of tea, flattering his ego and going for long walks in the palace garden -- could still get Karzai to bend.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/11/20/politics/washingtonpost/main5722603.shtml


After what you posted Beachmom, my opinion of the NYT have spiraled downward in a very negative direction.

[beachmom]

10. The writer is Mark Landler. He contributed to stories that pushed the idea

that Obama was going to send 30K more troops to Afghanistan.

Here is his page:

http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/l/mark_landler/index.html?inline=nyt-per

Based on the articles, it seems he is on the State beat, and that is where all his stories focus. Someone needs to tell him that his job is to print the truth, not press releases for a government agency.

[wisteria]

11. Thanks. I am going to send him an e-mail. He should know that people want to read the truth. n/t

[karynnj]

12. The NYT is not alone - this is the BBC

Similar to the NYT, ending by saying that HRC might be the only one Karzai will listen to?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8370176.stm


The media is shameless.

[beachmom]

13. They may be British, but their DC beat reporters .... live in DC

and can succumb to the Village mentality just as easily as an American journalist.

[wisteria]

15. Obviously she was feeling unimportant and upstaged by JK who did all he could to credit her for her

efforts.

[sandnsea]

14. lol, that last paragraph is almost a verbatim duplicate

of what they wrote a few months ago about Kerry and relating to Karzai because of the 2004 loss.

The reporters writing this gibberish is bad enough - but where the hell are the editors?

And I also say that while hoping Hillary figures out how to make progress in Afghanistan and improve the lives of women and children, which I think she genuinely cares about.

[wisteria]

16. I agree. I do not want to see her fail, but I only want her to receive credit when that credit is

due to her. I don't like at all this Clinton habit of doing very little, but taking the credit for much of what transpires.

[karynnj]

17. The NYT had editors working on how they can survive long term

[karynnj]

18. Long term, this hurts Hillary Clinton, not John Kerry

Although this article tries to steal Kerry's real accomplishment, the fact is that it is too widely known to have been done by Kerry by all those who really care about diplomacy or foreign policy. But, thinking especially of the last line of the BBC article - this is placing Clinton as the "only" person who Karzai will listen to. (This does not discredit Kerry, he, as a Senator, can not be the administration's link.)

The test for Hillary Clinton now is whether she can persuade him to reform. The fact is Kerry had the nice self contained task and did it brilliantly. Given the culture, it is very unlikely that Clinton can easily succeed at the task she now has. In addition, it has few clearly definable moments that others will hail as success.

The fact is that anyone following foreign policy knows:
1) Kerry was the one who averted that crisis.
2) Clinton on last Sunday's talk show repeated Kerry's "testing the assumptions" words in defending that Obama is correctly taking time to examine everything. That phrase is not simply the standard words that anyone would use, so it is fair to say that the administration is using the language Kerry used in spelling out a procedure and arguing that leaders needed to do this before asking people to risk death. Anyone closely following the process here would have seen Kerry's op-eds and statements.
3) Kerry put out the only detailed, explained alternative to the McChrystal plan and pure counterterrorism. It sounds like some of his ideas will influence President Obama. Clinton seems more on the "numbers" level here than on a policy level.
4) Bill Clinton introduced HRC at his Foundation's forum as having re-designed how the US will deal with world hunger. Yet, the bill was introduced by Lugar and Casey in the first week of February, marked up in early spring and quickly included in an appropriation bill. I heard Casey speak of this bill at the Holy Cross Graduation in May 2009. This was a change initiated by the SFRC. HRC's state department obviously has worked to implement it, but neither he or Bill mentioned Lugar or Casey.
5) Kerry and Lugar have gotten their ideas on reforming foreign aid codified in a bill that will form the basis for change. If what they are proposing is accepted by the Development groups, it seems unlikely that this bipartisan bill won't be the bill that restructures foreign aid. It will likely have changes recommended by the state department, but it is hard to imagine that a drastically different approach can be written into a bill and passed. (Who would introduce it? Not to mention, it would be sent to the SFRC.)

So, from that, though the Hillary bandwagon, that has gone on since 1992, is writing that she is the best SoS ever, and really should have been President is a not well hidden undertone;
- Kerry has a major diplomatic accomplishment, she doesn't.
- Kerry was influential in what arguments should be used to defend Obama, Hillary has to use his arguments.
- Kerry outlined potential policy on Afghanistan, HRC weighed in on the various options
- Kerry and Lugar with those two bills and the Kerry/Lugar Pakistan bill are instrumental in revamping foreign policy - while HRC is just starting to work on issues re-vamping foreign policy.

(This does not mean that HRC is not incredibly powerful and in a very good position.)

[MH1]

19. What you said, AND

I think Kerry cares more about having actually accomplished something, than getting the credit. That's one reason we all like him.

[Luftmensch067]

20. Word

:-):dem:

[karynnj]

21. I agreed completely on that

[MBS]

22. " " " " " " "" " n/t