March 5, 2009
While most American media outlets focus their attention on Rush Limbaugh’s vainglorious publicity extravaganza, Hillary Clinton is traveling around the world, letting everyone know that the foreign policy of the United States is being drastically changed by the new administration.
The new Secretary of State took quite a bit of heat for her failure to stage a fit of righteous indignation over China’s record of human rights abuses, during her visit there. Nevertheless, America has been a critic of these transgressions for decades. Given the current economic situation, our need to maintain a healthy business relationship with China and our country’s embarrassing human rights track record for the past eight years, her decision to leave that issue on the back burner for her initial visit, wasn’t such a bad idea.
Her trip to the Middle East was the first step toward rehabilitating the role of the United States as an effective peace broker for the Israeli – Palestinian conflict. As Barak Ravid reported for Haaretz, prior to Clinton’s arrival in Israel, a list of demands or “red lines” was created and “approved by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Defense Minister Ehud Barak at a meeting with senior defense officials last week”. These individuals are apparently so accustomed to browbeating Condoleezza Rice, they feel comfortable about dictating their own “marching orders” to be followed by Clinton as she approaches engaging Iran in formal, diplomatic relations. The Haaretz article itemized these four mandates as follows:
1. Any dialogue must be both preceded by and accompanied by harsher sanctions against Iran, both within the framework of the UN Security Council and outside it. Otherwise, the talks are liable to be perceived by both Iran and the international community as acceptance of Iran’s nuclear program.
2. Before the dialogue begins, the U.S. should formulate an action plan with Russia, China, France, Germany and Britain regarding what to do if the talks fail. Specifically, there must be an agreement that the talks’ failure will prompt extremely harsh international sanctions on Iran.
3. A time limit must be set for the talks, to prevent Iran from merely buying time to complete its nuclear development. The talks should also be defined as a “one-time opportunity” for Tehran.
4. Timing is critical, and the U.S. should consider whether it makes sense to begin the talks before Iran’s presidential election in June.
Steve Clemons of The Washington Note emphasized that “Israel is crossing the line” by attempting to dictate this agenda to our new Secretary of State and President:
Iran’s pretensions in the region are a problem in my view — but Iran, which fears regime change efforts by the US and other of its neighbors, is responding to an “ecosystem” that many around the world have complicity in building.
Israel should be rebuffed by Hillary Clinton. She should listen to Israel’s views on the region of course — and consider proposals. But this kind of instruction manual on what red lines can be tolerated or not is pretty outrageous — and borders on the type of irresponsibility and consequences of what a Taiwanese declaration of independence from China would mean.
In another Haaretz article by Barak Ravid, we see Clinton giving Israel some “pushback” that may or may not have been anticipated:
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Wednesday blasted Israel’s plans to demolish Palestinian homes in East Jerusalem as a violation of its international obligations and “unhelpful” to Middle East peace efforts.
“Clearly this kind of activity is unhelpful and not in keeping with the obligations entered into under the ‘road map’,” Clinton said, referring to the long-stalled peace plan.
On March 4, a day before meeting with Israeli leaders in Jerusalem, Clinton met with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas and Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad in the West Bank city of Ramallah. According to a CNN report, Clinton advised the Palestinian leaders that the United States is committed to the “two-state solution” (establishing a separate Palestinian state) despite the objections to that plan, voiced by Israel’s Prime Minister-designate, Benjamin Netanyahu.
“The United States through President Obama is committed to a comprehensive peace including a two-state solution,” Clinton said. “I have said that publicly, I have said that privately. There is no difference in any message.”
Meanwhile, Secretary Clinton made it a point to single out Iran’s “supreme leader”, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, for interfering in Palestinian affairs by funding terrorism “whether it’s Hezbollah, Hamas or other proxies”. As the Voice of America News pointed out:
Khamenei also called the Jewish state a “cancerous tumor” and accused U.S. President Barack Obama of following what he called the same mistaken path as George W. Bush in supporting Israel. He made the comments during a conference in Tehran earlier Wednesday.
Clinton and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas dismissed the ayatollah’s remarks. Mr. Abbas said Iran should look after its own affairs and stop trying to widen the divide among Palestinians.
Although many critics of the new administration complain that Obama has failed to deliver on his promise of “Change”, one important agent of Change on the Obama team is turning out to be none other than Hillary Clinton. Who could have foreseen that development at this point, last year?
The Betrayal
March 23, 2009
We the people, who voted for Barack Obama, are about to get ripped off by our favorite Hope dealer. Throughout the recent controversy arising from the huge bonuses paid to AIG executives, President Obama has done quite a bit of hand wringing over the fact that the government is rewarding “the very same people who got us into this mess”. Treasury Secretary, “Turbo” Tim Geithner is now rolling out the administration’s so-called Financial Stability Plan, wherein once again, “the very same people who got us into this mess” will be rewarded with our tax dollars. Over a trillion dollars of taxpayer money will be used to either buy back or insure an arbitrarily-assigned value for the infamous mortgage-backed securities. The purpose of this exercise will be to prevent the bankers themselves from losing money. The country’s top economists, including two Nobel Prize winners (Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz) have advocated a different solution: placing those banks that are about to fail into “temporary receivership”. However, this process would result in a significant reduction of the stock prices for those banks, in addition to replacement of the management of those institutions. The big-shot bankers won’t put up with this.
In Sunday’s New York Times, Frank Rich referenced a reader’s observation that this is President Obama’s “Katrina Moment”. How the new President responds to this crisis will likely shape “the trajectory of his term”. I prefer to call it Obama’s “Yellow Cake Moment”, since he and his administration are bent on selling a lie (the likelihood that the Financial Stability Plan can succeed) to the public in order to further assist the bad bankers. It is similar to when George W. Bush convinced many in Congress and the public, that Saddam Hussein was attempting to purchase yellow cake uranium to make atomic bombs (with Bush’s ultimate goal being widespread support for the invasion of Iraq).
It should be no coincidence that the Financial Stability Plan is rewarding the bad bankers, since it was prepared by some of “the very same people who got us into this mess”. I am specifically referring to Larry Summers and Turbo Tim himself. Frank Rich covered this point quite well in Sunday’s article. As a result, Obama’s attempt to chastise “the very same people who got us into this mess” is quite specious, in light of the fact that some of those people have shaped his latest bank bailout.
Back during the campaign, Candidate Obama caught quite a bit of flack for talking about “putting lipstick on a pig”. Nevertheless, his continued promotion of the various incarnations of what is essentially the same ill-conceived plan floated by former Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, demonstrates that Obama himself is now putting lipstick on a pig. As Paul Krugman pointed out:
Nevertheless, “public outcry” is exactly what is warranted in response to this soon-to-be fiasco. Most economists favor the “temporary receivership” approach, rather than the continued bailouts of insolvent banks. The Administration’s Financial Stability Plan is just another way to reward “the very same people who got us into this mess”. This plan is expected to cost at least one trillion dollars. As a result, the government is about to bilk the taxpayers out of an amount in excess of 20 Bernie Madoff Ponzi schemes.
MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow has recently vilified Senator Evan Bayh’s caucus of moderate Democrats, whom she calls “Conservadems” because they have been offering some resistance to a few of Obama’s proposals. These Senators are actually smart people who can detect the distinctive odor of snake oil. They know better than to tie their political futures to a bank bailout plan that can destroy their own credibility with the voting public. They know that public support of Obama’s broader agenda is hinged on how he deals with the banking problem. As Ben Smith and Manu Raju reported for Politico:
Meanwhile, there’s an ill wind a-blowin’ and it’s coming from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. The efforts by many pundits to blame the flawed financial policy on Geithner are misplaced. If President Obama weren’t on board with this plan, it would have never made it outside of the Oval Office. The problem is with Obama himself, rather than Geithner. Unfortunately, the decision our President has made will likely turn a two-year recession into a ten-year recession. To him, the corresponding benefit of helping out the bankers must apparently be worth it.