I was walking home from the Italian Market today musing about Hillary Clinton. She seems to have stuck her finger in the wind and detected a strong gale coming down from Connecticut.
“I don’t take anything he says seriously anymore,” Clinton said when asked about Cheney at a later campaign stop. “I think that he has been a very counterproductive–even destructive–force in our country, and I am very disheartened by the failure of leadership from the President and Vice President.”
I appreciate the sentiment, but I take every thing Dick Cheney says very seriously. For example, I took him seriously back in March, when he spoke to AIPAC:
The regime in Tehran also continues to defy the world with its nuclear ambitions. Of course, this matter may soon go before the U.N. Security Council. The Iranian regime needs to know that if it stays on its present course, the international community is prepared to impose meaningful consequences. (Applause.) For our part, the United States is keeping all options on the table in addressing the irresponsible conduct of the regime. (Applause.) And we join other nations in sending that regime a clear message: We will not allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon. (Applause.)
The people of Iran can be absolutely certain that we respect them, their country, and their long history as a great civilization — and we stand with them. Iranians desire and deserve to be free from tyranny and oppression in their own homeland. Freedom in the Middle East requires freedom for the Iranian people — and America looks forward to the day when our Nation can be the closest of friends with a free and democratic Iran. (Applause.)
That was carefully framed and parsed language. It’s impossible to counter by saying that we will allow Iran to have a nuclear weapon. Of course, there is no evidence that Iran is pursuing a nuclear weapon. Cheney knows this. Olmert knows this. The conflict with Hizbollah, concocted at Beaver Creek (I believe), is designed to achieve several goals. It offers an opportunity to attack Iran by proxy, along with countless stories in the press that will prepare the American public for those “meaningful consequences” for Iran if they do not cave in to the UN resolution. It also has the potential to create a buffer between Hizbollah and Israel, by the introduction of an international force.
My belief is that the conditions will never be ripe enough to introduce the joint United Nations/Lebanese 30,000 strong force. The biggest obstacle is the Lebanese army, which is sympathetic to Hizbollah. They cannot be expected to carry out counterinsurgency in their own country. Once this UN process is found to be unwieldy, Israel will be stuck occupying southern Lebanon upto the Litani River. This is not something they want to do. If they cannot stop the resupply of weapons and rockets from Syria, the only option left is regime change in Damascus or another shameful retreat from Lebanon.
Does Hillary understand the stakes that are being played for in all of this? Does she agree with Cheney’s assessment? Does she take it seriously?
It’s interesting to see the center-left take note of Lamont’s victory. What is harder to see is any fundamental opposition to the neo-conservative foreign policy. Dick Cheney does not intend to leave office in 2009 with the same regimes in power in Syria and Iran. He doesn’t have the resources to occupy two more Islamic countries, but he does have the power to break them in the same way that Iraq and Lebanon are broken. What he needs are a couple casus belli to take to the American people.
Hillary is getting on the right side of the debate rhetorically. It remains to be seen whether she is on the right side of the debate substantively.
Oh Marvin, I could not agree with you more! I worry as to what you have described here. I worry seriously. We have a job, a very big job, ahead of us int he next 2 1/2 YEARS. What with all the weak minded others in congress, and then again looking at what will be left from the old regime to counter too. It will be a very big job for the new recruits to battle…I tell you! You are right on!
What no response that I called you Marvin. Martin, you have got to be taking a nap…:o) Anyhow Preach it again and again…till it takes hold on every point in the square and move to the center…then maybe it might work..Oh well..
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who is Marvin?
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."▼ ▼ ▼ MY DIARY
…Oh Oui, it is just something between booman and me. He knows I didn’t mean it..just felt a little frisky this afternoon is all…:o) I waited till I could not take it no longer …:o)
i thought I’d just let it go 😉
;o) ;o)…hugs anyhow..hope your heat has gone down some…It has here and boy am I grateful for that! Anyhow, I hope you know I was just funin with you….
He’s “counterproductive”? She’s “disheartened”? Remember when political rhetoric was supposed to be about motivating people to think or to act? Instead Hillary impersonates the stick-up-the-ass English teacher we hated in eighth grade.
Will Dems ever learn how to talk right? I wonder what she and her Dem colleagues will say if the Antichrist is positively identified and on a rampage? “This development has the potential to be very distressing” perhaps. Wouldn’t want to get Anti’s posse TOO pissed off.
Sometimes I’m just about ready to give up.
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Cheney quote –
“That is why we continue to fight Taliban remnants and al Qaeda forces in Afghanistan. That’s why we are working with President Musharraf to oppose and isolate the terrorist element in Pakistan.”
[Links added are mine – Oui]
AIPAC and U.S. Foreign Policy
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."▼ ▼ ▼ MY DIARY
wants the presidency, although most of us feel that she and Bill had a pact of some sort. Regardless she seems to be using the same playbook of center right movements, with nothing too jarring and nothing extreme, that Bill used in Arkansas and for the most part, as pres. But Bill has something going for him besides the playbook, something that Bushes have never had. That something is an intuitive feeling for the voters. He knows them, he knows how to wow them, and, even though he steered that ship of state rightward, he made people feel that it was okay and that he was more or less forced to do it because of the repub pressure. Hillary’s stance seems to be much more scripted, much more inflexible, much less made up of compassion, and considerably less intuitive. She, too, is holding course rightward. Never ever drifting leftward, even though we need the balance when we are falling into fascism. The question for Hillary is not “is she tough enough” as she has demonstrated through Bill’s troubles that the lady IS tough. The question for Hillary is “why”. Why would she go run for presnit when she is happy being a senator and seems to do very well there. So if she stays senator, whether through choice or because of circumstance, what kind of leader will she be in that body? What kind of leader would she follow? We have Harry Reid, but we may want a firebrand in the future. We may want a uniter, a passionate igniter (especially now that Lieberman is fading from influence). Who do we have in that body to give that kind of energy?
It’s about stopping their Domestic Energy Program as much as a nuke program. Imagine how much more powerful a fossil fuel-independent producer country would be..
Cheney (and his hand puppet Bush) are accomplishing what they want to accomplish. They are treasonous in that they are completely fucking up the security of our country to do so. The only way their actions make one bit of rational sense is to look at the consequences those actions have on the price of oil. It’s all about the oil. Osmama is all about the oil. So is the fascist program of Bush and Cheney. It’s about the oil. Well, it’s about the price of oil and how that affects some certain well placed wallets.
The only other way to interpret Cheney/Bush actions rationally is to accept that they are agents of Saudi Arabia and Iran. Either way. They should both be impeached. And then they should both be tried. And then they should both be thrown in federal prison where I’m sure they will meet up with a lot of old friends.