It’s sobering, isn’t it?
When Hillary Clinton and her supporters talk about her being the most qualified person to run for the nomination since the 19th century, they’re not talking about her being most qualified because of her 8 years in the Senate. Bernie Sanders has served in the Senate for over 9 years now. He served in the House of Representatives for 16 years. Clearly he is far more qualified than her on domestic policy.
No, what they are talking about is her four years as Secretary of State.
So when Clinton says she is the most prepared to “get things done” and “lead our nation from day 1” www.indystar.com/... we know that’s impossible for her to do domestically, with a Republican Congress, and she isn’t nearly as qualified as Sanders to even attempt it. What she means is that she’s ready to overhaul our foreign policy from Day One. To strike out aggressively on a new track in using our military overseas.
This new track will not involve getting less involved in the Middle East, as the majority of the country would like to see. www.gallup.com/... No. Every report we have seen contrasting Hillary Clinton’s foreign policy ideas with President Obama’s have indicated that she is to his right: more interventionist, more militaristic. The Washington Post described her as having a “more muscular” foreign policy. www.huffingtonpost.com/... New York Times Magazine just a few days ago published a piece: “How Hillary Clinton Became a Hawk: Throughout her career she has displayed instincts on foreign policy that are more aggressive than those of President Obama – and most Democrats.” www.nytimes.com/...
We know, now, that in every instance during her time as Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton pushed for greater intervention, more troops on the ground, more sanctions, more war-like behavior in meetings with the President. It is only after she was succeeded by Kerry, in fact, that we have seen peaceful initiatives move forward, in the Middle East and elsewhere. Just nine months in for Kerry, The Atlantic wrote that “In the last two months, he has reopened talks between the Israelis and Palestinians, negotiated a chemical weapons ban in Syria, found common ground with Russia, and met in a historic sit-down with Iran's foreign minister.” www.theatlantic.com/...
Bernie Sanders has questioned her judgment, not just on her Iraq War vote, but on her militarism as Secretary of State, as well as her taking such pride in Kissinger’s compliments to her, that she bragged about them in a Democratic Town Hall event. Kissinger, who once said “The illegal we do immediately; the unconstitutional takes a little longer.” www.alternet.org/... In a 2014 article, David Corn writing in Mother Jones wonders at Secretary Clinton’s calling Kissinger a friend who she checked in with regularly to counsel her, when he “is a symbol of the worst of US foreign policy” who engaged “in underhanded and covert diplomacy that led to massacres around the globe.” www.motherjones.com/...
The refugees flooding Europe and the problem of ISIS began with the Iraq war which the Bush administration perpetrated based on a lie. www.vanityfair.com/... We know that the founder of al-Qaeda, responsible for the attacks of 9/11, was Osama bin Laden, from a wealthy Saudi family (his father was a billionaire with close ties to the royal family). We know that 15 of the 19 terrorists of 9/11 were Saudis, like bin Laden. A memo by Hillary Clinton while Secretary of State in 2009 stated that donors in Saudi Arabia were the most significant source of aid to al-Qaeda, the Taliban and other terrorists groups. www.theguardian.com/...
So why did she push so hard for $29 billion in weapons sales to Saudi Arabia in 2011? theintercept.com/... Was it because, as Bryan Schatz in Mother Jones wrote in May of 2015, she wanted the millions of dollars in donations these countries (and Boeing) gave to the Clinton Foundation? www.motherjones.com/... Or was it because she genuinely believes further militarizing the Middle East will not lead to these same weapons being used against the American ground troops that she seems very likely to deploy if she becomes president?
Ready from Day One?
I think, all things considered, I’d rather it turn out that she was just after the money.