Hillary Watch

Human Events, Jul 30, 2007

SHE TAKES ON OBAMA. In the Democratic CNN/YouTube debate, Hillary answered questions about whether she is a liberal (she considers herself a "modern progressive") and if she thinks it's acceptable to have either a Bush or Clinton in the White House again (she said that "the problem was George W. Bush's getting elected in the first place in 2000"). Most pundits believe that she did well enough to maintain her grip on the Democratic nomination. Even Republicans were pleased with her response to Illinois Democratic Sen. Barack Obama's claim that he would be willing to meet in the first year of his hypothetical presidency with the leaders of countries antagonistic to the United States, such as Hugo Chavez., Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Kirn Jong Il and Fidel Castro. Hillary responded: "I will not promise to meet with the leaders of these countries during my first year.... I don't want to be used for propaganda purposes and don't want to make a situation even worse, but I certainly agree that we need to get back to diplomacy, which has been turned into a bad word by this administration." A day later, Hillary went even further, calling Obama's views "irresponsible and frankly naive," and her campaign issued a statement saying it was a "mistake" to commit to presidential-level meetings without precondition "with some of the world's worst dictators." Obama's campaign responded by reminding reporters that in April 2007 the Associated Press quoted Hillary's saying it would be a "terrible mistake for our President to say he will not talk with bad people."

THE PENTAGON TAKES ON HILLARY A couple of months ago, Hillary sent a letter to the Pentagon, urging the military to begin planning for the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq. On July 16, Undersecretary of Defense Eric Edelman responded with a letter that didn't make Hillary too happy. Edelman's response said that "premature and public discussion of the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq reinforces enemy propaganda that the United States will abandon its allies in Iraq, much as we are perceived to have done in Vietnam, Lebanon and Somalia" and that "such talk understandably unnerves the very same Iraqi allies we are asking to assume enormous personal risks." Hillary spokesman Phillip Reines was the first to respond to the Pentagon's letter, labeling it "at once outrageous and dangerous." Reines also said, "Redeploying out of Iraq with the same combination of arrogance and incompetence with which the Bush Administration deployed our young men and women into Iraq is completely unacceptable, and our troops deserve far better." When Hillary got around to responding herself, she said, "Edelman has his priorities backward. Open and honest debate and congressional oversight strengthens our nation and supports our military. His suggestion to the contrary is outrageous and dangerous."

NO TO NUCLEAR. Although Hillary claims to support our country's energy independence and alternative forms of energy, recent statements indicate that she does not support nuclear power, one of the cheapest and cleanest forms of energy. At the Democratic presidential debate, she called herself an "agnostic" on nuclear power, but she has been catering to elements of her party that are anti-nuclear power. She recently told some New Hampshire voters that "it is unlikely ... that we will see any new plants built because it is so hard to site them and so hard to fund them." This is despite the fact that, as she has admitted in the past, nuclear power "doesn't put greenhouse emissions into the air." Compare Hillary's opposition to nuclear power to her strong support of ethanol, which plays very well in Iowa.

WHO'S MORE OF A WOMAN? Elizabeth Edwards, wife of Hillary's rival, former Sen. John Edwards (D.-N.C.). said in a recent interview with Salon.com that Sen. Edwards is more of a woman than Hillary. Mrs. Edwards elaborated by claiming that Hillary doesn't care as much about "women's issues" as much as Mr. Edwards. She even impugned Hillary's efforts to nationalize Healthcare, by claiming that it wouldn't go far enough. And, said Mrs. Edwards, Hillary's "not really talking about poverty, when the face of poverty is a woman's face, often a single mother." Mrs. Edwards even implied that Hillary was not pro-choice enough, accusing the senator of "muddling" the language surrounding the abortion debate: "Hillary may be expressing exactly what she believes-I hope she is-but the wiggle room in what she says makes me feel uncomfortable."