Diplomats back Hillary's Foreign Policy - and her role as First Lady

[SaveElmer]

I've highlighted some of the more prominent names...

Letter from Former Diplomats and Ambassadors on
Senator Clinton’s Role as First Lady

As diplomats and former Ambassadors who represented the United States to the rest of the world, we were personal witnesses to the important role Hillary Clinton played as First Lady in promoting American interests and values abroad. During those eight years, in travels to over 80 countries, Hillary Clinton was America’s human face to people around the globe who looked to America as a beacon of inspiration, hope, and opportunity.

As First Lady, Hillary was a highly effective and passionate advocate on behalf of human rights around the world. She met with the mothers and grandmothers of the disappeared in Argentina in 1997, survivors of the Rwandan genocide, and mothers of children kidnapped in Uganda. She advocated on behalf of women’s rights around the globe. Perhaps most famously, in her historic speech at the UN Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995, she declared that "women’s rights are human rights," inspiring actions in every corner of the globe to raise the status of women. Building on her overseas work, Hillary spearheaded U.S. efforts to combat human trafficking, and led the Vital Voices Democracy Initiative to support emerging women leaders who were advancing social, economic, and political progress in their respective countries.

Senator Clinton was also one of America’s most visible advocates for those struggling to gain the tools of opportunity. She put a spotlight on U.S. development programs that were bringing solutions to global challenges. She recognized the potential of microfinance in creating self-sufficiency for the world’s poor, and she led efforts in the United States to fund microcredit programs in developing countries.

As First Lady she worked for reconciliation in the aftermath of wars and she led humanitarian efforts for Bosnia and on behalf of Kosovar refugees. She developed programs to aid the victims of war, including mine awareness in the Balkans, where land mines left over from the fighting were claiming the lives of innocent children, and she enlisted all sectors of society to aid in assisting the victims of the conflict. She supported the role of women in Northern Ireland in building the peace and creating a better life for their families.

Senator Clinton helped pave the way for important diplomatic initiatives. Her 1995 trip to India, for example, helped foster good relations between the world’s two largest democracies. She also played a leading role in supporting people in the new democracies from the former USSR to South America. She championed the important role of civil society and supported nascent nongovernmental organizations.

As former ambassadors and diplomats we believe the United States faces unprecedented challenges. We need a President who will be ready to face them head on, beginning on Day 1. Senator Clinton’s diplomatic accomplishments as First Lady and her achievements in the Senate, including her service on the Senate Armed Services Committee, make her uniquely qualified to lead our nation at this time of great challenge. She is the candidate with the strength and experience to restore America’s standing in the world and to return the United States to a position of global leadership.

* Christopher Ashby - Ambassador to Uruguay (1997-2001)
* Harriet C. Babbitt - Ambassador to Organization of American States (1993-1997)
* Elizabeth Frawley Bagley - Ambassador to Portugal (1994-1997)
* James Blanchard - Ambassador to Canada (1993-1996)
* Amy L. Bondurant - Ambassador to OECD (1997-2001)
* Edward P. Brynn - Ambassador to Ghana (1995-1998)
* Robin Chandler Duke - Ambassador to Norway (2000-2001)
* Stuart E. Eizenstat - Ambassador to European Union (1993-1996)
* Thomas Foley - Ambassador to Japan (1997-2001)
* Edward E. Gabriel - Ambassador to Morocco (1997-2001)
* Marc C. Ginsberg - Ambassador to Morocco (1994-1998)
* Gabriel Guerra-Mondragon - Ambassador to Chile (1994-1998)
* Anthony S. Harrington - Ambassador to Brazil (1999-2001)
* Richard Holbrooke - Ambassador to Germany (1993-94), Ambassador to UN (1999-01)
* Swanee G. Hunt - Ambassador to Austria (1993-1997)
* Karl F. Inderfurth - Rep. for Special Political Affairs to the UN (1993-97)
* James R. Jones - Ambassador to Mexico (1993-1997)
* John Kornblum - Ambassador to Germany (1997-2001)
* Philip Lader - Ambassador to United Kingdom (1997-2001)
* Luis Lauredo - Ambassador to Organization of American States (2000-2001)
* Tom McDonald - Ambassador to Zimbabwe (1997-2001)
* Gerald McGowen - Ambassador to Portugal (1998-2001)
* Charles T. Manatt - Ambassador to Dominican Republic (1999-2001)
* Walter F. Mondale - Ambassador to Japan (1993-1997)
* Richard L. Morningstar - Ambassador to the European Union (1999-2001)
* Peter F. Romero - Ambassador to Ecuador (1993-1996)
* James C. Rosapepe - Ambassador to Romania (1998-2001)
* Cynthia P. Schneider - Ambassador to Netherlands (1998-2001)
* Derek Shearer - Ambassador to Finland (1994-1998)
* Wendy R. Sherman - Ambassador at Large (1997-01)
* Terry Shumaker - Ambassador to Trinidad (1997 to 2001)
* Daniel Spiegel - Ambassador UN in Geneva (1993-1997)
* Joseph Wilson - Ambassador to Gabon (1992-1995)

[Cameron27]

1. She wasn't just hosting tea parties at the WH,

that's a nice statement to pull out of her pocket whenever she's accused of that.

[cali]

2. in a just world this would put to rest the claim that NONE of her

experience as first lady was pertinant foreign policy experience. But it won't. And DU is definitely not a just "world". Note that I am NOT saying that this qualifies her to be president, or that her experience is as deep as someone who was actually an ambassador or long serving Senator, but I am saying that the claims that she has no relevant experience from her years in the White House, are bullshit.

[Capn Sunshine]

3. So who authored that letter? Mark Penn?

Hey, beltway insider, sign here, would you please? Thanks.

[Cameron27]

4. nevermind

too stupid to respond to.

[wyldwolf]

5. why would that matter?

[cali]

6. that's just ridiculous.

You have no evidence whatsoever, but beyond that, my argument is simply that her years in the White House did provide her with some relevant foreign policy experience. I'd also argue that Obama's childhood, though not foreign policy experience, did give him a valuable perspective.

[Tom Rinaldo]

18. If they weren't insiders to Bill Clinton's Administration...

...they wouldn't really be in a position to have an informed opinion of how involved Hillary Clinton was in it.

Honestly, I am tired of the standard DU operating procedure of assuming that anyone who actually is on friendly terms with a political figure can't be trusted to have anything of any value to say about that person. Should this letter be viewed with a few grains of salt? Yeah, I guess so. But don't pour on the Bonneville Salt Flats.

[Renew Deal]

7. Every single one of those worked in the Bill Clinton administration.

They worked for Bill. They're probably looking for more work. Is it any surprise?

[wyldwolf]

8. so?

[Renew Deal]

12. It's no surprise that they would be supporting her.

Many are just latching onto their meal ticket. I like Richard Holbrooke. He's a good man. But it's no secret he wants in on another Democratic administration.

[wyldwolf]

why? Other former Clinton staffers support Obama. Obamanation brags about it often

:shrug:

Your mentality is just a poor attempt to discredit the views of those listed.

[Renew Deal]

22. It depends on what you mean by discredit views.

I give them credit for trying to get another job.

[wyldwolf]

24. it's obvious you feel their views should be discounted because they worked for Bill Clinton

[Cameron27]

25. Well one of them is out of a job

because he had the guts to publicly announce that the Niger yellowcake intel was a fraud. Let's try to find some smears to use on all of them simply because they signed a statement favorable to Hillary Clinton.

[hughee99]

59. I though Wilson had retired before he even went to Niger? n/t

[Cameron27]

62. I don't know that for a fact,

but his wife sure didn't.

[Capn Sunshine]

9. It's the circle of life as applied to politics

once you're an insider you stick with the people that brought you in

[wyldwolf]

11. except when you don't - like the ecstasy Obamanation feels when a former Clinton staffer...

..backs Obama.

[cali]

15. ridiculous again.

several of them are elderly and retired. Some are surely pursuing other things. Assuming that they're all just doing it for a job or because they worked in the Clinton admin, is just silly. How about going with the obvious? They believe what they're saying. I find this constant impugning of people who disagree with you (not you personally) really distasteful and not wholly honest.

[SaveElmer]

17. So what you are saying then is...

The people on that list that got to work with Hillary the closest, and had the best opportunity to see the skill she brought to her efforts...are supporting her...

Yeah...always good to know that people you work with have a high enough opinion of you to lend their support to you..

[Renew Deal]

21. No, I'm saying that their following the meal ticket.

Politics as usual.

[SaveElmer]

23. In the panoply of stupid things you have said...that has got to be top 5...nt

[Renew Deal]

26. This coming from someone that posts volumes of stupidity.

I take is as a compliment.

[jefferson_dem]

30. Nepotism sucks.

Yuk.

[cali]

47. ignorance and stupidity

suck.

[jefferson_dem]

60. Agreed.

n/t

[russian33]

10. how dare they!

i mean what do they know??

[LeFleur1]

14. People

There are people...the neocons are a good example...who will stick to their beliefs no matter what facts are presented. They are called ideologues. Facts don't matter to them.

[BeyondGeography]

13. "Which world leader told her that we needed to invade Iraq?"

==Good Comeback

After Clinton ridiculed Obama's comment about gaining his foreign policy experience living abroad as a youth by pointing to the dozens of world leaders she knows personally, Obama retorted, ``I wonder which world leader told her that we needed to invade Iraq.''==


http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&refer=columnist_carlson&sid=arvZFMfhE.t4

You want to know why the experience puffery isn't winning the day? There it is in one line.

[Cameron27]

16. That's a ridiculous statement for Obama to make.

Clinton didn't vote for an invasion of Iraq, and her speech was clear about that. She trusted Bush, the same as Kerry and others did, that was her (and their) mistake.

[Progress And Change]

19. and Obama may have voted for the Iraq War Res. too if he were in the senate

Can someone kick up the thread on his MPT statement in 2004 on not knowing how he would have voted?

[BeyondGeography]

27. So all that experience led her to trust Bush?

Thanks for reinforcing the point.

[Cameron27]

28. Clinton and most of the senate.

The thing is, her speech was pointedly anti-Iraq War, anti-invasion and she explained why. She also signed onto the Byrd sunset provision and Durbin's amendment that would have frozen funds until the intel bush used to justify the war was investigated.

If Obama wanted to attack her, he should have gone with her judgment in trusting bush, not an over the top accusation of voting for the invasion itself.

[BeyondGeography]

31. So you're saying at no point did she support the invasion?

[Cameron27]

33. Did she?

I can't find any statements that indicated she did.

[BeyondGeography]

42. Here she is on Feb. 27, 2003

Does this sound like someone who was opposed to the invasion?:

==WOODRUFF: Two of Washington's most polarizing political figures have come together to promote a shared concern. Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton and House Majority Leader Tom DeLay hosted a movie screening last night to publicize the needs of America's foster children.

Our conversation on that subject is coming up just a little later this hour. First, though, their thoughts on a potential war with Iraq. I started by asking Senator Clinton if she agrees with President Bush that Iraq has been given every chance to disarm, and that we're just weeks away from war.

CLINTON: Well, I think that's the unfortunate conclusion that one has to draw from any objective reading of the evidence, not just in the last months, but going back more than a dozen years now. So I think that the president's made the right decision to go back to the United Nations. I always believe if you can have a larger group of people behind you, not only for the military action, where we don't really need their help, but for what comes after, that's preferable.

But I also believe that at some point, this has been in Saddam Hussein's hands from the very beginning. He signed agreements that he has failed to keep, and even now has refused to cooperate with the inspectors.==

http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0302/27/ip.00.html

Perhaps it's anecdotes like that that lead her own supporters to say they've never heard her say she has opposed the war (as opposed to its prosecution).

http://unionleader.com/article.aspx?headline=Retired+general+backs+Clinton+on+Iraq&articleId=496162bb-d0bb-4aeb-8796-5e034699c0c3

[Cameron27]

48. I don't see that as a clear statement in favor of invasion:

CLINTON: I do have serious questions about the cost, the length of the commitment that we will have to make in Iraq and to the Iraqi people. I believe that we have to have more information in the Congress and among the American public to make a good judgments about what we need to be doing. I am worried that it seems inconsistent and unsustainable for the president to be asking for large tax cuts before we know what our continuing obligations are. I would like to see us just take a deep breath, deal with Iraq if we have to, understand exactly what we've gotten ourselves into, because in the briefings I've received, there's a lot of unknowables. You hear that from the people at the Pentagon and the State Department. And I don't believe that we really fully appreciate the cost that we may be embarking upon.

[BeyondGeography]

50. The issue there is the cost of the war

which is why I didn't even bother adding it. It bears the typical marks of the hedging politician, but the prior statement is much more clear.

I'm sure you are open-minded enough to understand how an unqualified agreement with Bush's whole rationale for invading (Saddam has been given every chance to disarm and he hasn't) two weeks prior to the invasion would lead many reasonable people to believe she approved of the invasion. Let me add that had she taken the tough and proper stance, like 23 other Democratic Senators did, and voted against IWR, this wouldn't even be a race (and Obama would almost certainly not been a candidate...if he had proceeded he would have been nuts to do so).

[Cameron27]

51. Maybe you're right,

but I see enough caution in that statement about invading Iraq in general, that I'm not willing to assume that she was convinced invasion was inevitable.

[Progress And Change]

38. "at this point there is no difference between me and George Bush on Iraq."

Who said this in 2004? It wasn't Clinton...

[BeyondGeography]

44. "Actual invasion" is the topic

but thanks for playing.

[DURHAM D]

49. Obama is a bitch.

Oh wait.. He can't be cause he doesn't have a vagina.

If a female candidate had made that remark she would have been ridiculed through at least two news cycles for being snarky and nasty.

Male candidates can act like a bitchy queen - females can not.

[BeyondGeography]

54. I agree with your point

but if you were to design a prototypically culturally acceptable presidential candidate, you probably wouldn't come up with a biracial guy named Barack Hussein Obama either.

[Beacool]

20. So much for the B.S. of "she was JUST a First Lady".

The saddest part is that this Republican mantra is repeated quite frequently in this board.

Hillary was never a traditional first lady, neither in Arkansas and least of all in the White House. To continue pushing that drivel is just disingenuous. I'm glad that these career diplomats spoke up and stated the truth.

Go Hillary!

P.S. Her speech in Beijing is considered one of the best 100 American speeches, it ranks at #35.

[DrFunkenstein]

45. You Twist Our Arguments to Look Unfounded

She has definitely had some experience, after all she was the real champion of Dick Morris's ideas about triangulation, but her claims about experience are so absurdly exagerrated that she needs to dose of reality.

Nothing in Hillary Clinton's past makes her uniquely prepared to assume the role of President, and much of her past discredits such a claim while her veil of secrecy about the very experience she touts comes after one of the most secretive Presidents in history. Given her record of personal ambition and secrecy, I seriously doubt she would roll back the Bush-Cheney power grab for the executive branch.

[Beacool]

57. They are unfounded!

It seems to me that a lot of you who like Obama are taken in by a smooth speaker with grandiose ideas, but with very little solid experience in the national and international arena to qualify to run for president (at least not in 08). Some of you like to disparage Hillary by belittling her calling her "just" a spouse. Granted that she wasn't elected to office until 2000, but she was Bill's most trusted adviser and was involved in a lot of policy making issues. To ignore that fact is disingenuous.

Regardless, you vote for your candidate, I'll vote for mine and let the chips fall where they may.

[jefferson_dem]

29. The aged establishment-types endorse the establishment candidate.

Color me not surprised.

One would think most of these folks once worked for the candidate's spouse or something...

[Cameron27]

32. The aged-establishment types?

There isn't a generational war going on, and Obama is as "establishment" as anyone else in this race.

[jefferson_dem]

36. Yeah. Right.

HILLARY: "You bring change by working within the system," Clinton finally declared on Labor Day weekend. "You can't pretend the system doesn't exist."

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m4PRN/is_2007_Sept_9/ai_n19505276/print


OBAMA: I know it's not enough to just change parties or even presidents. I know that to truly change the way Washington works, we need to build a movement of everyday Americans who are committed to that change long after the last ballot is counted.

http://www.barackobama.com/2007/07/26/remarks_of_senator_barack_obam_20.php

[Cameron27]

41. But he never defines what he means by change,

and Obama is part of the Washington establishment. His mentor was Joe Lieberman, no? He was advised by Colin Powell, and he counts some RW senators as friends.

[SaveElmer]

35. Well I know none of them were part-time legislators or lawyers for slum lords...

But I think their credentials are pretty good...

[jefferson_dem]

37. Ewww...

Getting nasty.

Are any of them *bundling* SHillraisers for Hillary?

[Progress And Change]

40. Yeah, you usually have to work somewhere to assess the role someone played at that workplace...

[oasis]

55. Okay then. Name one Obama endorser who tops Richard Holbrooke in international stature.

[jefferson_dem]

58. Your "Stature" =

My Stale Conventional Washingtonian Establishment.

[oasis]

61. Just as I thought. Obama has a very thin line-up of foriegn policy experts. If any.

:rofl:

[HeraldSquare212]

34. Diplomatic accomplishments?

She traveled, she advocated, she supported, which is all well and good, but how that gets turned into 'diplomatic accomplishments' in the last paragraph is unclear; it seems to be a species of grade inflation.

[RaleighNCDUer]

39. Some day, and that day may never come, I may ask of you to

repay this debt...

[Armstead]

43. Very subtle

Ihad to think about that one for a minute before I got it.

[SaveOurDemocracy]

46. Subtle bullshit.

Let's just make stuff up ... kay?

[MethuenProgressive]

52. Now it's back to the RW notion of her asThe GodMother putting a hit on Foster?

Who the hell writes your shit? Bob Novak?

[RaleighNCDUer]

56. Did I say that?

All I said was, well, what I said. Politics is all about trading favors. You support me now, and down the road I'll support you. I give you a job in my administration, and down the road you support my wife's candidacy. That's just the way politics is played.

That is resembles the trading of favors in a mafia story is just...coincidental.

[Alamom]

53. k&r