Comments on: HRC: “Waiting for orders, Sir”

By: Brad

Brad — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 15:49:55 +0000

Hillary will be superb. In fact, my money is on the fact that she will be the most accomplished SofS ever. We are very fortunate that she accepted. Thank you, Hillary!

By: Jon

Jon — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 14:37:49 +0000

Newsweek, in those “behind-the-scenes” stories it had after the election, mentioned something interesting Hillary supposedly said to an aide during the primaries. She said that she was happy in the Senate, and wasn’t sure why she was running for President. I don’t know how factual that is, but combining it with Newsweek’s accounts of Hillary’s haphazard management of her (seemingly) obnoxious staffers, it paints an interesting picture. Hillary might actually, in retrospect, prefer SecState over president, not necessarily because of the state of the economy and so forth and the challenges those things present to a would-be president, or because she thinks her self unqualified for the job, but because she felt too pressured by the political establishment and by her husband into running for president when she actually wasn’t that interested in the job.

This is, of course, just conjecture. :)

By: Ellen Kramer

Ellen Kramer — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 14:33:22 +0000

Hillary will do a great job for our country and Obama is very lucky that she accepted this position. The country will be in good hands once again, with our reputation and credibility throughout the world being restored. I trust Obama will not try to double cross her, but will appreciate her knowledge and hard work and credit her for that.

By: mike mcEachran

mike mcEachran — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 12:59:56 +0000

Answer – yes, he can fire her, because he’s earning so much cred as a team player. Any Clintonian antics, and the base won’t stand for it. Which is why she won’t “march off” – she’s well aware that her reputation as a team player is at stake. The boss will win any confrontations. The two Clinton’s are in just the right spot; they’ve been paid the proper respect, and they will return in kind. They’re egomaniacs; they’re not stupid.

By: TerenceC

TerenceC — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 11:14:15 +0000

I have to take issue with your assertion. To assume that HRC will march off on her own foreign policy agenda is ridiculous – she has a vested interest in working with the Obama administration – not against it. There’s an old expression – “peel the apple in your hand, not the one on the tree” – it’s fitting in this instance. Obama will have more than enough problems to deal with without allowing the manufacture of drama with the Clintons, which won’t happen. It’s no secret the Clinton’s are egomaniacal, but a world stage is exactly what they need – in any other role they would be a big problem – in this role they’re perfect. Besides, after Bush and Rice a trained Poodle would do a better job rebuilding our foreign policy – and the Clintons are far better than any trained animal – although Bill will need to be properly leashed and muzzled.

By: Jake

Jake — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 11:05:56 +0000

This is a fascinating view of the potential problems, yet it has a pessimism that I don’t share.

The Presidents you cite–Truman, Reagan, Clinton–were eventually mired in scandal or, in Truman’s case, mired in the ubiquitous lack of popularity of a post-war president (the Brits couldn’t wait to dump Churchill, for example, despite all he had done for the war effort). I don’t have tarot cards, so I can’t predict the level of scandal in Obama’s office, but certainly most of his own self-inflictions were from deep in the past rather than continually generated. From that, we can surmise that he will rise above his staff, rather than lose out to any of their political maladies.

When you explore “the best of circumstances,” I think what you’re exploring is a vacuum, which does not exist in Obama’s circumstances. He is ipso facto a war-time President who also inherits a vast array of domestic problems, and his staff will be forced to behave according to the urgency at hand. Bill Clinton had time for Monica Lewinsky; given our dire condition, even interns of the White House will be put to more use than simply lying on their back.

It’s intriguing that you as a former HRC supporter, and me, an Obama supporter, have switched positions on her loyalty to matters other than herself. The Clintons have proven hard to predict, but until she shows me otherwise, I believe she’ll be an excellent SOS, and that she knows her success is tied to Obama’s success, not to a separate legacy that she can burnish at her leisure. There simply isn’t time for that. Once the US is righted again, I imagine she will have already moved on, either back to the Senate or somewhere else outside the White House.

A healthy US could bring about those best of circumstances that you write about it, and then there would be time for individual acting.

Jake