Bill Clinton is correct when he says that you can’t let opinion polls be your guide to foreign policy. But when he compares the situation in Syria to the situation he faced in Kosovo, he’s making one of the stupidest statements that I have ever heard from him.
“You just think how lame you’d be… suppose I had let a million people, two million people be refugees out of Kosovo, a couple hundred thousand people die, and they say, ‘You could have stopped this by dropping a few bombs. Why didn’t you do it?’ And I say, ‘because the House of Representatives voted 75% against it?’” Clinton said. “You look like a total wuss, and you would be.”
…
“If you refuse to act and you cause a calamity, the one thing you cannot say when all the eggs have been broken is, ‘Oh my god, two years ago there was a poll that said 80 percent of you were against it.’ You look like a total fool,” Clinton said.
First of all, the idea that the United States can “cause” a calamity in Syria is ridiculous. It is already a calamity, and it’s not because of our inaction. And the idea that all we need to do to fix the calamity and solve the refugee problem is to “drop a few bombs” is beyond idiotic.
For Clinton to appear with John McCain and make comments like this is a perfect vindication of my total opposition to his wife’s candidacy for president. We cannot afford more leadership from people who think about American power in this way. Obama has already overruled the advice of Hillary Clinton, the Joints Chiefs of Staff, then Director of the CIA David Petraeus, and then Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, and kept us out of the conflict in Syria. Now he has the former president intimating that he’s a wuss and a fool.
This is what we gained when we won the presidency for Obama. A cool head.
For Clinton to appear with John McCain and make comments like this is a perfect vindication of my total opposition to his wife’s candidacy for president.
So nice of Bill to make common cause with a shit-for-brains who voted for impeachment back in ’99. Also, too, it’s why Hillary isn’t a sure thing in ’16. It’s why I hope a Feingold or Schweitzer runs against her, if she runs. We need a real choice in ’16.
Very off-topic, but you’re a big fan of Schweitzer’s?
Yes, yes I am. Like any politician, he’s far from perfect. He openly advocates for single-payer and he enjoys rubbing the GOP’s(in Montana) nose in shit. There is more to it but those are two big reasons.
He doesn’t want the job (or at least not what it would take for him to have a chance of getting it).
If we want to draft someone that is actually an FDR type Democrat, Sherrod Brown has more of the right stuff including the ability to get a few million votes instead of a few hundred thousand. And got those votes in spite of the GOP and teabaggers throwing everything they had against him.
It seems to me that it would require more discipline to take the course that Obama has chosen, especially given the various recommendations to the contrary.
That is such a neat bipartisan-y idea you have there, Bill. We can yank out that “Made in the USA” rubber stamp and unite the warring factions in Syria by having them hate the US instead of fighting each other.
Assad and Bandar and al Zawahiri and Khamanei all marching hand in hand in unity and peace. Can’t you just see it?
That’s not what you had in mind, Bill?
WTF was Rwanda, Bill?
But don’t you remember how easy it was to fight the Iraq war when it was only being done in roundtable discussions on Sunday talk shows and on talk radio all around the country? Why it was just like playing a great, big, fun game of Risk, wasn’t it?
Apparently Clinton, along with his hawkish Republican buddies like McCain, is big fan of pursuing Parker Brothers diplomacy.
Umm … Kosovo wasn’t exactly a glorious achievement. The refugee stream started after the bombing. All but one of the counts of crimes against humanity were incidents that occurred after the bombing (the exception turned out to have been an incident staged by the Kosovaars for publicity).
Our choice of bombing targets wasn’t exactly in conformance with the Geneva Conventions.
Once in place the UN “peacekeepers” weren’t exactly shining examples of behavior.
Yes, the Kosovaars today are very grateful that Clinton bombed the Serbians out of Kosovo. I’m sure they love their independence and for them it was worth the pain of the bombing. Our military loves it too … Kosovo is now a the key base for all sorts of middle eastern military operations.
But let’s not pretend that this, like Iraq before and afterwards, had anything to do with humanitarian motives.
Not only that but we dragged our feet forever before intervening. So Clinton has blood on his hands in that sense too. I’ve never thought the guy had an ounce of integrity. Great politician for sure, brilliant, extremely charismatic, but at core quite hollow.
The three things that he really does deserve some credit on were:
I suppose we can also give him credit for the National Monument declarations in 1996 … except that they were a blatant pander to the base after his prior series of environmental missteps (see also: Obama, Barak, 2012).
The refugee stream started after the bombing. All but one of the counts of crimes against humanity were incidents that occurred after the bombing
The administration pre-empted the beginning of the ethnic cleansing campaign, instead of waiting until it was ongoing. It’s bizarre to count this as a strike against them.
obviously in a proxy war between iran and KSA, the establishment will back the latter, even if that means supporting al qaeda. that won’t bite us in the ass, no siree.
no more clinton’s. not ever.
HAAAAH hah hah hah hah hah hah hah hah hah hah!!!
Wanna bet?
AG
See below, Arthur.
Damn, I feel dirty!! We agree on something. 😉
If y’all are such fans of politics, how come you can’t see the woods for the ballot boxes?
This isn’t “warmongering,” it’s simply centrist political fixing at its most blatant. Throw the old preznit under the bus…figuratively of course, because he will be a rich and honored man for the rest of his life…and start preparing the fix for the new preznit.
Check it out. The 2016 Centrist Fix Begins To Take Shape”
Who’s next?
C’mon…
I’ll give you a hint.
Bet on it.
Barring unforeseen…errr, ahhh…accidents? Bet on it.
Watch.
AG
it’s also a blog with numerous people who remember you saying the same thing in ’08. The fix was in, Hillary was ineveitable.
I don’t disagree with you that the game is rigged. I do disagree that you know who the winner will be.
You’re right. I don’t know who will win. That’s why I wrote “barring unforeseen accidents.” But I damned well do know who’s in the fix mix, and I know who’s out to an early lead, too. My point here wasn’t that HRC will win, it was about treating this political sideshow featuring Hawk McCain and Billy Bob Clinton and anything but politics as usual.
“Warmongering?”
Hell, esquimaux, w/the exception of the Rand family, warmongering has been a given among national pols and has damned well been so since poor, innocent Howard Dean was “ARRRRRGHED” out of contention by the media.
That was my point, and I’m stickin’ to it.
AG
Problem is there has to be pragmatism in politics. It doesn’t work otherwise. So I’ll do my best to oppose Hillary in the primaries. But you know what? If she wins the nomination, no matter who’s behind it, I’ll work like hell to get her elected. Because she’ll be way better than whomever the Republicans nominate and political battles are won incrementally over years and years. Only revolutions happen all at once and they don’t tend to work out well.
Hell, even Booman Trib is jumping on the Hillary bandwagon…for ad dollars,, anyway.
Found at the top of a BT page a couple of minutes ago:
Money talks; nobody walks.
Bet on it.
AG
Machts nichts. I usually get a big ad for one of our Illinois Teabag nutters. It’s highly amusing that they are so clueless as to buy ads here.
BTW, do you get more revenue if I click on their ads, Boo. I’m willing to do that with a warm heart, laughing with you all the way to the bank.
I guess you don’t know how Google AdSense works. Look it up.
Reminds me of a great parody last November. Purported to be a screen shot of Tebow’s inbox. The Google-generated ad was for benches.
Yeah,
I know how it works.
You allow your enemies to advertise on your website and you lose credibility but gain money.
Lemme ask you, Booman…where would you draw the line?
Inquiring minds want to know.
Nazis?
KKK?
Satanists?
Hell’s Angels?
Where does the copout end?
I dare ya.
AG
Arthur – get real. These ads are provided by a third party which chooses the ads based on the content of the web page that is being loaded AND – importantly – on your own web browsing history. That’s why I get a lot of ads for the Nissan LEAF and for Nissans in general – I spend a lot of time at LEAF-centric sites. Recently I’ve been doing web searches on stuff that doesn’t interest me in the least because I’ve been selling stuff from my father’s estate on Craigslist and needed a price range. Now I’m getting advertisements for things like Nordic Track and bedroom furniture.
In other words, if you’re seeing an ad its because you’ve been browsing that topic. All of us political news junkies get the standard NewsMax “Impeach Obama?” ads because NoiseMax has a large budget from their rich reichwing supporter and thus are willing to carpet-bomb with their advertisements rather than use targeted marketing – if you have any association with politics in your browsing (which, by definition you get on a politics blog) you’ll get those ads.
Universally offensive ads, such as Nazis and KKK, would be blocked by the third party.
For Boo to opt out of those kind of ads would mean opting out of the majority of ads. This isn’t a big profit operation – I for one am happy to have the reichwing web sites waste their marketing dollars on Boo’s site.
Wow the blue contacts are out again.
Yes. Thus far, Syria is very much in the plus column for Obama. And it’s an example of what I hoped for when I supported him over Hillary in 2008.
.
BREAKING NEWS: Syria Crossed Obama’s Red Line
I have long suspected that the Clintons have been connected to the permanent government long before either of them got elected to anything. Bill’s profile in the sixties would nicely fit the kind of guy recruited by the CIA to report on the anti-war movement over in Europe. Goldwater Girl Hillary got liberal religion just in time to work a summer for the lawyers representing the Black Panthers in Oakland, another good spot to observe and report back to her superiors. When H. Clinton was part of the Democratic legal team for Watergate she was in a good spot to report back to the CIA as to how their coup was going on the Demo side. Then Bill was governor in Arkansas when CIA cocaine rained down on his state. You earn your bones, you get rewarded, you get to be the drum major at the front of the parade.
Sounds like a conspiracy theory. ‘Course, as Krugman said in the Bush years yesterdays’ conspiracy theory is todays’ common wisdom.
We really don’t know what Bill did to make the powers that be comfortable with him as President, but he must have done something. Otherwise his political career would have been conveniently derailed (see: Dean, Howard, the Scream that wasn’t).
Ditto Obama btw. And yes, I’ve read detailed conspiracy theories about him being recruited as a CIA agent in those years before Harvard Law School.
So good to see the Clintons sticking with their 2002 gameplan to recapture the WH. Will it be “bomb, bomb, bomb Iran” by 2016?
Sure wish women and liberal Americans would recognize how loathsome and destructive these two power mad people are.
White House says Syria regime used Chem weapons on oppo. So wonder what the game plan could be?
“The president has made a decision on providing more support to Syrian opposition. That includes military support.”
.
See my diary – BREAKING NEWS: Syria Crossed Obama’s Red Line .
Assad using chemical weapons is an international issue and one for the Hague.
The Clintons are sabotaging Obama. They also hate john Kerry.
At the Clinton Foundation conference coming up, it’s about job training. Clinton is schmoozing CEOs to train people.
Before Clinton signed NAFTA, he promised to propose job training programs. He didn’t do it.
This is It’s The Economy, Stupid all over again, except for Hillary in 2016.
I’m tired of Clinton telling us he’s better than Obama and what Obama should do in serious situations.
Hillary Clinton, when she was SoS, talked to the head of CIA and DoD about arming the rebels in Syria. Then she brought this agreement between them to Obama.
She had no business messing around with military matters when she was at the State Department.
You guys are funny. Clinton wasn’t war-mongering or putting pressure on Obama – or trying to make him look bad, as has been suggested.
He was running interference for a policy he’d already been briefed in on by the White House.
It’s the same political operation now, so get used to it.
(And let’s leave out the “wife” stuff, please – it’s pretty sexist. HRC has a mind of her own, you know).
Sure appears that way now.