Hillary Clinton: Classic or Dud?

Yemen and Haiti would like a word

― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), 15. september 2017 21:26 (twenty-eight minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

You can do that trick with literally every Secretary of State since WW2. You can almost do it by spinning a globe with your eyes closed.

― El Tomboto, 15. september 2017 21:28 (twenty-six minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

In this case I think Simon did. Yemen civil war began in 2015.

https://theintercept.com/2016/02/22/saudi-christmas-present/

i think unfortunately w/most elections since TV came about is the one who comes off as more of a stiff, no matter how qualified, is never going to come out on top against the more charismatic candidate. even if the candidate is a racist, really dumb, incurious, unstable, foggy-brained moron. in this case though i think the latter qualities were, as mentioned before, positives for lots of horrible people.

― nomar, Friday, September 15, 2017 3:33 PM (thirty-four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I'm still kicking myself for not remembering this back in November, it's practically iron-clad at this point.

x-post: Dear God, you actually think that way.

That states' actors should be held accountable for where they send arms and what they're used for?

selling weapons to allies is unacceptable

stellar analysis of the underlying issues there

The US spent 2011 getting the Saudi supported Ali Abdullah Saleh to resign following his violent response to the Arab Spring. It was, well, fairly competent. You think Saudi Arabia wouldn't have had weapons to kill Yemenites if it hadn't been for Clinton? They've been allies for decades.

going after Hillary Clinton about her Sec State tenure is pretty much 100% unadulterated sexism and/or personality-based bullshit. Even a cursory look at the other people who've held that position and how they've been assessed / "held accountable" makes that clear.

is that a better analysis of the "underlying issues" actually at work here, buddy?

the underlying issue is that it's largely irrelevant who the Sec of State was - the US sells arms to the Saudis, regardless of who holds the office

Simon, come on, we all know you don't have a clue what the underlying issues are.

going after Hillary Clinton about her Sec State tenure is pretty much 100% unadulterated sexism and/or personality-based bullshit. Even a cursory look at the other people who've held that position and how they've been assessed / "held accountable" makes that clear.

― El Tomboto, Friday, September 15, 2017 4:24 PM (one minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

is that a better analysis of the "underlying issues" actually at work here, buddy?

― El Tomboto, Friday, September 15, 2017 4:25 PM (thirty-nine seconds ago)

this is utter nonsense. go write for buzzfeed or something

the underlying issue is that it's largely irrelevant who the Sec of State was - the US sells arms to the Saudis, regardless of who holds the office

yes. I'm not singling out Clinton for special denigration here, she's just the one who ran.

but it's cool that you went straight for sexism

i'm glad no one's gone after Kissinger about his tenure

no, please, dudes, tell me who your favorite secretary of state was and why

thanks Morbs for helping make my point

lol imagine having a favorite US secretary of state

and imagine fighting to preserve this horrific state of affairs (or a slightly less horrific version of it)

probably Cordell Hull tbh

xp

Simon you specifically reacted to Clinton being called 'competent' so how the fuck can your attack be that she did what clearly is part of the job? And why did you mention Yemen if the attack was that she was bad on Saudi Arabia in general? You just don't know shit about the world outside of the US, it seems to me, unless the Intercept uncovers a bad email about it.

And now I remember why I stopped reading this thread.

Sorry everyone.

Silly me, thinking making moves that get a fuckton of people killed a couple of fairly predictable moves down the line should be a dent in one's claims to "competence." We shouldn't settle for just following the usual marching orders and not publicly shitting yourself while doing it.

international relations, a thing that exists, much to the chagrin of progressives who are vehemently against it in all forms

there's like a whole field of study on this stuff it's amazing - people even go to school for it

international relations, a thing that can only be expressed in massive arms deals

good answer shakey

i would argue that the resume of a former secretary of state matters a hell of a lot when that person is running for president. criticism of her record is necessarily going to be amplified, as are the refutations of the criticism. than to suggest that (and i know you were exaggerating for effect) any perceived focus on her signifies sexism is to take a fundamentally unserious position. we can have a discussion about the role sexism plays in our assessment of HRC compared to her predecessors (because it certainly is present), but to reflexively dismiss any criticism as gendered without any evidence is some lazy bullshit and you're better than that

Tombot, sell me an MX missile.

Cordell Hull was sidelined and mocked and was an anti-Semite.

Can I just say JQ Adams was my favorite and fuck the rest

international relations, a thing that exists, much to the chagrin of progressives who are vehemently against it in all forms

― El Tomboto, Friday, September 15, 2017 4:35 PM (seven minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

What fucking website is this?

clinton's tenure as secretary of state probably wasn't much worse than many of her predecessors', certainly not bush's people. she still has blood on her hands and will burn in hell if such a place exists, along with the rest of the members of that club

there is a wealth of fantastic reporting in the mainstream press about clinton's sins, errors, and misjudgments as secretary. to call all of that bullshit based on the (tbf, true) fact that she has to put up with a lot of sexism is not a legitimate response

Alfred, that is an acceptable answer especially since you live in florida

the LGM-118 peacekeeper is no longer in stock however

I do think there's an interesting question in there - how morally culpable is an individual for participating in an inherently unjust system - but I think the answer is so tangled that it leaves any interpretation of personal blame looking fairly facile.

if we want to restrict it to specific actions, what would Simon have preferred Hillary do re: that particular arms sale? Block it? It's hard to conceive of how she would have been able to - Congress would have immediately forced the sale, or Obama might have overruled her and told her "do it or you're fired, we can't have an international incident/disruption in relations over this". There could have been significant economic and political blowback that would cause all sorts of problems for the US. And in the end even if the sale was blocked as noted the Saudis would have just gone ahead and murdered as many Yemenis as they could anyway - either with what they already have or could have bought from others. So... where is Clinton's moral agency in this situation?

xp

Cordell Hull was sidelined and mocked

well tbf this is largely a contest of "least bad" not most effective

and was an anti-Semite.

is the a reference to the LaGuardia thing? or is there more there? playing middleman between LaGuardia and Hitler seems like a thankless task, dunno how much I would ascribe his personal views to that. (full disclosure I haven't read a bio of Hull or anything)

"middleman" isn't right there - referee maybe?

The moral option would have been not taking the job in the first place and using your massive influence and privilege to speak out against US foreign policy orthodoxy.

i do agree with shakey tho that this particular example is pretty low on the list of HRC's sins. doesn't mean she doesn't bear responsibility or that she shouldnt have to answer for it

The moral option would have been not taking the job in the first place and using your massive influence and privilege to speak out against US foreign policy orthodoxy.

but she obviously saw Sec of State as a stepping stone to having even MORE massive influence and privelege to actually control US foreign policy - ie, being President.

which is just the kind of inconceivable moral calculus the power elite have to traffick in (ie "well if I let these 5,000 people die I can maybe prevent the deaths of 25,000" - I mean who can second-guess or even make these decisions, it's fucking nuts)

Hey, remember back in 2011 when the international community wasted it's time on a peaceful transfer of power in Yemen and new elections, even though everyone foresaw that the Houthi insurgency would turn into a civil war four years later?

The moral option would have been not taking the job in the first place and using your massive influence and privilege to speak out against US foreign policy orthodoxy.

― a serious and fascinating fartist (Simon H.), 15. september 2017 22:47 (four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I know there is another thread dedicated to this, but this is such a sad parody of a leftist foreign policy position.

going after Hillary Clinton about her Sec State tenure is pretty much 100% unadulterated sexism and/or personality-based bullshit. Even a cursory look at the other people who've held that position and how they've been assessed / "held accountable" makes that clear.

It is fairly disingenuous for anyone with a passing familiarity with leftist thought to think that Clinton is the only SoS they utterly despise. Lefties are still wishing eternal pain and misery on Madeleine Albright for her stance on Iraq sanctions and openly pining for Kissinger to get Mussolini'd.

I think the "wealth of fantastic reporting" is partly because of The Clinton Rules, which are driven by her personality and the media's reaction to it. Most Sec States are treated, appropriately, as subordinate to the POTUS they work for, but since Obama was so much more popular and made us feel gooder about ourselves, all kinds of foreign policy errors were laid at Hillary's feet that would not have been. The counterfactual is exemplified by Kerry, who was covered as carrying out Obama's FP, not as some sinister orchestrator of neoliberal schemes.

Any coverage or argument that presents Hillary as especially conniving, scheming, or secretly approving of evil deeds, comes from a particular place, and I don't think it's wrong or lazy to question how people find themselves there.

Fred do you really think there's a "moral" way to act as SoS without dismantling the MIC

The counterfactual is exemplified by Kerry, who was covered as carrying out Obama's FP,

Obama's face palms?

btw I know I've already stated this a few times in other threads but in case I didn't say it loud enough Bernie also sucks on foreign policy

many xp. yes Milo I know Teh Left hates all Sec States. shakey otm.

Most Sec States are treated, appropriately, as subordinate to the POTUS they work for, but since Obama was so much more popular and made us feel gooder about ourselves, all kinds of foreign policy errors were laid at Hillary's feet that would not have been.

How many Secretaries of State have run for President immediately following the President they served?

If you know the left hates all Sec States how can you call it "sexism and/or personality-based bullshit"?