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Secretary of State-designate Hillary Rodham Clinton
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Clinton comes wrapped in familiar history. (Composite by PBG)
You think you know Hillary. You know about how she is "no Tammy Wynette" and her eight years as first lady, about "Travelgate" and "Hillary Care," about the Whitewater investigation and the "vast right-wing conspiracy."
As a presidential candidate in 2008, we heard a lot about 3:00 a.m. phone calls and being "ready to lead from day one."
"America cannot solve these crises without the world, and the world cannot solve them without America."
- Sen. Hillary Clinton, in accepting President-elect Obama's nomination for secretary of state
Between those two political - and public - demonstrations, the Obama State Department designate spent eight years in the U.S. Senate. The record she has accumulated as a legislator, plus some of her less rhetorical statements on the campaign trail, may give us an idea or two of where she stands on foreign policy. She has been on the Senate Armed Services Committee since 2003, as well as the more diplomatic - if lesser known - Commission on Security & Cooperation in Europe (aka Helsinki Commission) since 2001. The law creating that group of commissioners from both Houses of Congress and the executive branch, empowers the commission "to expand East-West economic cooperation and a greater interchange of people and ideas between East and West."
On her Senate website, Sen. Clinton discusses her stand on all the issues, including national security and foreign policy.
During the campaign, Mr. Obama voiced disagreement with the decision Sen. Clinton (and others) made to empower the Bush Administration to prosecute the war in Iraq, without holding President Bush accountable to pursue all diplomatic avenues prior to any invasion. Sen. Clinton questioned Barack Obama's foreign policy because of his willingness to meet with world leaders, "without preconditions," who have voiced vehement dissatisfaction with what America has become to the world. But does any of that matter when the commander-in-chief is her boss?
Mr. Obama said that it is precisely because of Mrs. Clinton's notoriety, and the seriousness with which he and the world regard her, that he chose her to be the nation's chief diplomat. Cynics may say that he chose his former rival for the Democratic presidential nomination because it was a good way to make sure she was working with him in the White House, rather than against him in the Senate.
“Hillary’s appointment is a sign to friend and foe of the seriousness of my commitment to renew American diplomacy and restore our alliances,” the president-elect told a team of reporters in Chicago on Monday morning.
For her part, Mrs. Clinton said she considers this appointment an "honor," and, she continued, "if confirmed, I will give this assignment, your administration and our country my all."
- There is a thumbnail bio of Hillary Clinton on Project Vote Smart.
- There have been some who have called the constitutionality of her appointment into question.
- Hillary thanks New York for the opportunity to represent the state in DC.
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