Politico: Big Dawg concedes last week's flap to Obama

[Perky]

Bill Clinton said Monday that he had no interest in wading into “that little spat” that broke out last week between Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama over whether the next president should commit to meeting with the leader of several U.S. adversaries.

Then, in the next sentence, the former president waded right in -- in a way that sounded like the Clintons are seeking a truce with Obama in the debate over the proper role of presidential diplomacy when dealing with assorted bad guys on the world stage.

While Hillary Clinton and her team pounced on Obama’s pledge to meet with leaders of such countries as Iran, Syria and Cuba as “naïve,” her husband took pains in a speech to centrist Democrats to emphasize that all the candidates basically agree on the big picture.

“We have to get back to more diplomacy,” Clinton said, adding: “I’ve heard no fewer than four of our candidates say in the last month, remind us that in the middle of the cold war, in the darkest hours, we never stopped talking to the Soviets at some level. So no one disputes that.”

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0707/5154.html

[Mythsaje]

1. Effective diplomacy often involves talking with your enemies...n/t

[Wetzelbill]

5. it's downright stupid not to

that doesn't mean you have to give up any of your principles or whatever. But figuring out a way to quell hostilities is often as simple as working together towards something. I just don't get the idea that international relations involves acting like a spoiled child who refuses to play well with others, and lashes out when others have a problem with that.

[Mythsaje]

7. If nothing else, it keeps them busy and unwilling

to risk losing concessions by doing something overtly aggressive or stupid.

This administration is diplomatically ignorant.

[Wetzelbill]

12. definitely

and often a country just wants to be recognized. Like Iran. Relations would greatly improve if, well, somebody actually thought to have viable diplomatic relations in the first place. Not to mention they have a robust younger generation which embraces Western culture. 20 years from now if Iran is still an enemy of the United States, it will be a diplomatic failure of biblical portions, and you can point right at the Bush Administration as the idiots who dropped the biggest ball on that one.

I think this administration has created a new foreign policy term. There are Realists. Social Constructivists. Liberals. Liberal Interventionists. Even good old regular Neo-Conservatives. These guys are just plain old Idiots.

[Mythsaje]

21. Well, I've been pointing at BushCo's stupidity

where Iran is concerned ever since that ignorant "axis of evil" speech that gave the hard-liners there the leg up they needed. If not for that, Iran may have been heading in the way of true Democracy WITHOUT military intervention.

[Captain Hilts]

17. Who's advocating that, other than the Bush Admin? nt

[Wetzelbill]

19. nobody

I was responding to what Sage said.

[Captain Hilts]

Neither Obama or Hillary said that.

Hillary said it, "you don't make peace with your friends."

[BeyondGeography]

2. His goal: Make her look reasonable again

More proof that she married well.

[Bucky]

26. And why shouldn't he? Certainly she's been making everyone else look reasonable

Actually, this little flap was her first serious misstep in what has been a flawless, if unspontaneous, campaign. She thought she had Obama in a 'gotcha' and made a play for it. It was fun watching her go off script for once. It'll be a long time before we see her wing it again.

[Perky]

3. Kind of scary when you have to trot an ex-president out there to do damage control...

Come on Hillary... Can't you say you were wrong about anything? Ever? This is not Bush-lite...this is Bush League.

[Chadius Maximus]

23. Obama is "naive"

I guess Obama lacks the "savvy" and
"experience"
it takes to get an ex-president to come out and 
make excuses for Him. This guy's so "naive" he'll
probably take responsibility for everything he
says and does.
How pathetic is that ?

[MADem]

4. Where does that Right Wing piece of shit politico get "concedes" from those statements?

Oh, wait--they didn't--the actual title of the piece is

Bill Clinton seeks truce with Obama

The National Enquirer does a better job of reporting, with about the same number of 'if's' and other "just supposing" types of phrases.

And they just have to shop the primary contests like a catfight, pulling John Edwards into the mix, too, and suggesting that he's getting on Bill Clinton's nerves.

That's not reporting. That's just...fetid. Shit. Right wing garbage.

And they'll do the same thing to Edwards or Obama, when the time is right. It's how they play it. And it's UGLY.

[JNelson6563]

9. Yep, you're right on the money!

Just more shit flinging to see if anything sticks. Corporate media is so pathetic.

Julie

[Supersedeas]

18. politirot - more spin from the GOP/Media Establishment

[quinnox]

6. Turns out this little fracas had no impact on the poll numbers

The race remains stable, with Hillary leading comfortably.

and the headline is misleading, as the previous poster pointed out.

[Perky]

8. The only place it has any real play is in the blogosphere

which is an important consituency for everyone.

[sandnsea]

14. The people who vote in primaries

Are watching. A few more of these attacks by Hillary, and her numbers will tank overnight. People can forgive one or two missteps, but not a whole series. That's actually what happened to Howard Dean.

[Perky]

15. It willbe interesting to see how she handles "stars and bars"

not that she is going to gett a lot of bubba support to begin with. But in South Carolina she is going to have to eat into Obama's support in the African American community to win.

[Larkspur]

25. Howard Dean was attacked by the Mainstream Media

after he said that he would break up the media monopolies and by the scumbags, like disgraced ex-senator Torriceli, in Kerry's and Gephardt's campaigns. The Dem Establishment knows how to squash insurgent campaigns. Just proves that they don't want to defeat Repukes.

[Wetzelbill]

16. yeah, nobody cares

Not really. You ask somebody on the street and 99 out of 100 probably wouldn't even know what the hell you were talking about. Most people can't even tell you who the Speaker of the House, Secretary of State or Secretary of Defense is, let alone some obscure BS that occured in a primary election race over a year out from when the actual election is going to be held. Even most voters or politically aware people don't get swayed by little ticky-tack things like this. The Beltway pundits and hyperventilating bloggers are about the only ones who actually get overly excited about this stuff. The rest of us who do pay attention take it for what it is, and that is basic daily and weekly political information. Some people act like these things are the end of the world, or something. :)

[sandnsea]

10. Can Hillary say "mistake"

Still no, she sends Bill to do it for her.

Stubborn hawkishness because she's afraid of the "weak woman" label. Thats the problem with Hillary.

[Perky]

11. My thought exactly.

see my other post.

[Wetzelbill]

13. And sending Bill out muddies the waters enough

where she has enough leeway to take any and all positions when it is convenient for her to do so.

[BlooInBloo]

27. My biggest qualm about Clinton - her inability to say she was wrong.

[Perky]

20. The debate point was substantive

And so was the dust-up last week.... Hillary Called Obama Naive....Obama fired back with the IWR vote was naive, and Hillary's view on talking to our enemies is a lot like Bush's view.


Her Jab was reposnded to with a puch and a cross.... at one level the debate point was minr but Hillary response to Obama;s combination blow....is to to trot Bill out there to essentially agree with Obama.......


Very telling.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

22. Now he's "triangulating" for Hillary at the DLC.

The Clintons' one great ability is straddling any fence they come to.

[yellowcanine]

24. Personally I think Hillary overplayed the Obama statement. Obama was just saying what nearly

everyone thinks. The Bush administration has blown potential diplomatic openings time after time with their diplomatic ineptness and the fact that their foreign policy is hostage to the worst wishful thinking of the neocons.

[Captain Hilts]

28. And Hillary would agree.

Biden's the one really making that point.

But there's no reason for a Prez. of the US to sit down with Kim Jong Il.

[sandnsea]

29. Of course there is

That's the entire point. To change the kind of blustering foreign policy ushered in by Reagan. The people we face now play for keeps, and they aren't always concerned about long term consequences. Talking to all of these people to show we are willing to go every step of the way in order to have peace is EXACTLY what we need to be doing right now. Leading by example, not bullying.