Lady Gaga's Gay Pride Gig in Rome?

I had no idea? Much less the fact that the State Department sponsored. Rim-station diplomacy. Who knew?

At CNS News, "Hillary: State Dept. ‘Instrumental in Sealing Deal’ For Lady Gaga’s Gay Pride Gig in Rome":

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Monday that the State Department played an instrumental role in “sealing the deal” for pop-rock star Lady Gaga to perform at a gay pride rally in Rome, Italy.

Clinton specifically pointed to a letter that David Thorne, the U.S. ambassador to Italy, sent to Lady Gaga urging her to participate in the event.

“And then there is the work that our embassy team in Rome has been doing,” Clinton said. “Two weeks ago they played an instrumental role in bringing Lady Gaga to Italy for a Euro Pride concert.

“Now as many of you know Lady Gaga is Italian American and a strong supporter of LGBT rights,” said Clinton. “And the organizers of the Euro Pride event desperately wanted her to perform and a letter to her from Ambassador Thorne was instrumental in sealing the deal.”

Via Memeorandum and Weasel Zippers.

Huma Abedin's Ties to the Muslim Brotherhood

Jamie Glazov interviews Walid Shoebat at FrontPage Magazine, "The Dark Muslim Brotherhood World of Huma Abedin."

Glazov also interviewed Robert Spencer, "Abedin/Weiner: A Marriage Made by Hillary Clinton and the Muslim Brotherhood?"

And at World Net Daily, "Weiner's mother-in-law a member of Muslim Brotherhood."

Hillary Clinton's Intern

That's all I can mention. I'm loathe to indicate more lest Taliban Scott Eric Kaufman react with extreme malice in some way. Just check Robert Stacy McCain for the details and also Memeorandum and TMZ.

Huma Abedin Arrives Home

At London's Daily Mail, "Judgement day: Weiner's wife returns home to confront errant husband as new: images emerge showing congressman cross dressing and 'oiled up'."

And at Politico, "Decision time? Weiner's wife returns":

Rep. Anthony Weiner’s wife, Huma Abedin, returned to Washington early Wednesday from a trip abroad, setting off a new round of speculation that the New York Democrat’s resignation could come soon.

Friends of Weiner have said he would not make a decision on whether to quit until he had a chance to talk to Abedin, a top aide to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who returned to the United States from a trip to Africa with Clinton that began early last week.

Weiner and Abedin are expected to meet on Wednesday, and she was spotted driving into the garage alone at their northwest D.C. apartment building in the early morning hours. She has not yet been seen leaving the building.

See also, The Jawa Report, JammieWearingFool, and iOwnTheWorld.com (via Memeorandum).

Hillary Clinton Furious at Anthony Weiner's Betrayal of Wife Huma

Nice photo of Secretary Clinton and Ms. Abedin. At London's Daily Mail, "Hillary's fury over 'stupid' Weiner's cover-up and betrayal of Huma."

Hillary Clinton in Harper's Bazaar

The Public Relations Office at Hearst Magazines sent me its new piece from Harper's Bazaar, "Hillary Clinton: Myth and Reality." It's an interesting interview, for example:

She seems resigned to gender being an issue in politics. "Being a serious candidate for president as a woman brought out all the stuff that still exists about that," she says. "Some of it was personal, some of it was gender based, and you kind of accept it. I think that if you live long enough, you realize that so much of what happens in life is out of your control, but how you respond to it is in your control. That's what I try to remember."

And while I'm on this, Clinton's State Department has release an action memo today, "Internet Rights and Wrongs: Choices & Challenges in a Networked World."

John Bolton Hammers Obama Administration WikiLeaks Response — Barack Obama Especially — For Placing America's Interests at Risk

Well here's an appropriate follow-up to my previous post, "WikiLeaks Reveals Millions of Dollars Flowing to Extremists Worldwide: President Obama 'Less Critical' of Terror Financing Than Predecessor."

At The Guardian, Ambassador John Bolton takes issue with the Obama administration, "WikiLeaks cables: Barack Obama is a bigger danger — WikiLeaks harms the US. But the president's refusal to acknowledge the threats we face is a bigger danger" (via Memeorandum and Weasel Zippers):

This sustained, collective inaction exemplifies the Obama administration's all-too-common attitude towards threats to America's international interests. The president, unlike the long line of his predecessors since Franklin Roosevelt, simply does not put national security at the centre of his political priorities. Thus, Europeans who welcomed Obama to the Oval Office should reflect on his Warren Harding-like interest in foreign policy. Europeans who believe they will never again face real security threats to their comfortable lifestyle should realise that if by chance one occurs during this administration, the president will be otherwise occupied. He will be continuing his efforts to restructure the US economy, and does not wish to be distracted by foreign affairs.

The more appropriate response is to prosecute everyone associated with these leaks to the fullest extent of US law, which the justice department at least appears to be considering. Next, we must stop oscillating between excessive stove-piping of information, as before 9/11, and excessive access, as demonstrated by WikiLeaks. There is no one final answer, but the balance must be under constant analysis. Finally, the Pentagon's cyber-warriors need target practice in this new form of combat, and they could long ago have practised by obliterating WikiLeaks' electrons. Had we acted after the first release in July, there might not have been subsequent leaks, and lives and critical interests would have been protected.

RTWT.

WikiLeaks Reveals Millions of Dollars Flowing to Extremists Worldwide: President Obama 'Less Critical' of Terror Financing Than Predecessor — UPDATED

The hits keep coming, especially for progressives. And it's not the end game WikiLeaks' neo-communist champions were looking for. According to the New York Times, State Department cables reveal high-level concern over the flow of money to terrorist organizations worldwide, with funding going though some of our most important allies in the Persian Gulf and larger Middle East. And especially interesting is how the cables reveal that President Obama has been less concerned about cracking down on terror financing than was President George W. Bush. The news comes on the heels of the Ahmed Ghailani verdict last month. From civilian trials for enemy combatants to footsie financing for global jihad, the Obama administration continues to weaken U.S. national security and put more and more American lives at risk.

See, "Cables Suggest Mideast Resists U.S. on Cutting Terrorists’ Cash" (via Memeorandum):

WASHINGTON — Nine years after the United States vowed to shut down the money pipeline that finances terrorism, senior Obama administration officials say they believe that many millions of dollars are flowing largely unimpeded to extremist groups worldwide, and they have grown frustrated by frequent resistance from allies in the Middle East, according to secret diplomatic dispatches.

The government cables, sent by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and senior State Department officials, catalog a long list of methods that American officials suspect terrorist financiers are using, from a brazen armed bank robbery in Yemen last year to kidnappings for ransom, drug proceeds in Afghanistan and annual religious pilgrimages to Mecca, where millions of riyals or other forms of currency change hands.

While American officials in their public statements have been relatively upbeat about their progress in disrupting terrorist financing, the internal State Department cables, obtained by WikiLeaks and made available to several news organizations, offer a more pessimistic account, with blunt assessments of the threats to the United States from money flowing to militants affiliated with Al Qaeda, the Taliban, Hamas, Lashkar-e-Taiba and other groups.

A classified memo sent by Mrs. Clinton last December made it clear that residents of Saudi Arabia and its neighbors, all allies of the United States, are the chief financial supporters of many extremist activities. “It has been an ongoing challenge to persuade Saudi officials to treat terrorist financing emanating from Saudi Arabia as a strategic priority,” the cable said, concluding that “donors in Saudi Arabia constitute the most significant source of funding to Sunni terrorist groups worldwide.”

The dispatch and others offered similarly grim views about the United Arab Emirates (“a strategic gap” that terrorists can exploit), Qatar (“the worst in the region” on counterterrorism) and Kuwait (“a key transit point”). The cable stressed the need to “generate the political will necessary” to block money to terrorist networks — groups that she said were “threatening stability in Pakistan and Afghanistan and targeting coalition soldiers.”

While President George W. Bush frequently vowed to cut off financing for militants and pledged to make financiers as culpable as terrorists who carried out plots, President Obama has been far less vocal on the issue publicly as he has sought to adopt a more conciliatory tone with Arab nations. But his administration has used many of the same covert diplomatic, intelligence and law enforcement tools as his predecessor and set up a special task force in the summer of 2009 to deal with the growing problem.

While federal officials can point to some successes — prosecutions, seizures of money and tightened money-laundering regulations in foreign countries — the results have often been frustrating, the cables show. As the United States has pushed for more aggressive crackdowns on suspected supporters of terrorism, foreign leaders have pushed back. In private meetings, they have accused American officials of heavy-handedness and of presenting thin evidence of wrongdoing by Arab charities or individuals, according to numerous State Department cables.

Were it not for bureaucratic momentum, the Obama administration would be much less vigilant against the terror finance network than it is. And of course, the same president who campaigned on global conciliation and talkin' sweet to terrorists, who offered heartfelt apologies around the world through 2009, and whose administration refused to fight a "War on Terror" in favor of managing "Overseas Contingency Operations," is again overwhelmed in the battle against global jihad. Recall that Obama told the Washington Post's Bob Woodward that the U.S. would be able to absorb another 3,000 dead in new terror attack on the scale of the 9/11 catastrophe. Hey, perhaps all our enemies need is a little more money. This is the administration's "new approach to terrorism."

Meanwhile, the conciliatory soft-on-terror parade continues with folks like Professor Daniel Drezner suggesting perhaps "Al Qaeda is no longer in the first tier of national security threats?" Drezner draws on Peter Bergen, "Bin Laden’s Lonely Crusade." Of course, it's not really about Bin Laden any more, but the global network of follow-on organizations who clearly have support in capitals across the Persian Gulf. But hey, let's defer to the experts. We need to talk to our enemies, and give them cash.

*****

UPDATE: A reader suggests by e-mail that the Times article, especially the last paragraph of the passage quoted above, contradicts my thesis at the post. So to reiterate: I'm stressing the president's disposition toward appeasement and public conciliation. Certainly State Department operatives, as is clear at the Times, have pressed Persian Gulf nations for greater cooperation, but the executive sets the tone, and I've thoroughly documented here the administration's shift to a softer, law enforcement fight against jihad. And further, others have seen administration failures in the WikiLeaks dump. Perhaps it's realpolitik, but the administration has failed to more effectively push against terror financing regimes, and this is to a notable extent apparent during the last two years. See, "WikiLeaks - Saudi Arabia: Their Oil is Thicker Than Our Blood":

In January 2010, the Saudi government refused to assist the U.S. request for information in a terror financing case involving a major Saudi bank. The Riyadh based Al Rajhi Bank, the largest Islamic bank in the Gulf Cooperation Council, and the third largest commercial bank in Saudi Arabia, refused to comply with a subpoena issued in the terror financing trial of Dr. Peter Seda, a U.S. operative of the Saudi based, U.S. designated, and allegedly defunct charity al Haramain Foundation. The evidence provided by the prosecution showed the Saudi al Rajhi Bank transferred $151,000 to the Chechen mujahedeen. Still, The Saudis who in 2007 ratified the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism, refused to cooperate.

The May 31, 2010 edition of The Sunday Times revealed that the Afghan financial intelligence unit, FinTraca, reported that since 2006, at least $1.5 billion from Saudi Arabia were smuggled into Afghanistan, headed most probably to the Taliban. The money entered Afghanistan through Pakistani tribal area, especially through North Waziristan, known as “al-Qaeda’s heartland.” One wonders how much of this money was used to buy weapons that killed 1,268 American soldiers and maimed thousands more in Afghanistan.

Also in May 2010, leaked Saudi intelligence document showing continued Saudi governmental support for al Qaeda in the form of cash and weapons, were published by Buratha News Service, an independent news source in Iraq.

On November 15, 2010, the GAO released its 2009 report on Saudi efforts to stop terror financing. It concluded that the “U.S. and Saudi officials report progress on countering terrorism and its financing within Saudi Arabia, but noted challenges, particularly in preventing alleged funding for terrorism and violent extremism outside of Saudi Arabia. (Emphasis added). Moreover, there are no restrictions on foreign branches of Saudi-based charities from funding terrorist groups. In addition, cash in large quantities to fund terrorism, is being smuggled out of the country via couriers.

Despite all the evidence of the danger posed by the Wahhabist message, the U.S. has continued its preferential treatment of the Kingdom, while Saudi funds continue flowing to Sunni radical groups, foreign charities, mosques, Islamic centers, and academic institutions.

It is time the U.S. took serious measures to protect Americans at home and abroad from the ill effects of Saudi funding to spread global Wahhabi radicalizations.

Hillary Rodham Clinton: Leading Through Civilian Power

I've been meaning to do this — and since I just posted "Hillary Clinton Says No White House Run - And No TSA Pat-Downs!" — what the heck?

From Foreign Affairs, "Leading Through Civilian Power: Redefining American Diplomacy and Development." The word "staid" comes to mind, but interesting nevertheless:

Diplomacy has long been the backbone of U.S. foreign policy. It remains so today. The vast majority of my work at the State Department consists of engaging in diplomacy to address major global and regional challenges, such as confronting Iran's nuclear ambitions, facilitating negotiations between the Israelis and the Palestinians, enhancing stability on the Korean Peninsula, and working with other governments to bring emergency relief to Haiti. And President Barack Obama and I certainly relied on old-fashioned diplomatic elbow grease to hammer out a last-minute accord at the Copenhagen conference on climate change last December.

In annual strategic dialogues with a range of key partners -- including China, India, Indonesia, Nigeria, Pakistan, Russia, and South Africa -- the United States aims to deepen and broaden its relationships and to establish a stronger foundation for addressing shared problems, advancing shared interests, and managing differences. The United States is investing in strengthening global structures such as the G-20 and regional institutions such as the Organization of American States and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. This is part of a commitment to building a new global architecture of cooperation that includes not only the East and the West but also the North and the South.

Although traditional diplomacy will always be critical to advancing the United States' agenda, it is not enough. The State Department must expand its engagement to reach and influence wider and more diverse groups using new skills, strategies, and tools. To that end, the department is broadening the way it conceives of diplomacy as well as the roles and responsibilities of its practitioners.

The original Foreign Service, as its name implies, consisted of people trained to manage U.S. relations with foreign states, principally through consultations with their counterparts in government. This has been the main function of U.S. ambassadors and embassies, as well as the staff at the State Department. But increasing global interconnectedness now necessitates reaching beyond governments to citizens directly and broadening the U.S. foreign policy portfolio to include issues once confined to the domestic sphere, such as economic and environmental regulation, drugs and disease, organized crime, and world hunger. As those issues spill across borders, the domestic agencies addressing them must now do more of their work overseas, operating out of embassies and consulates. A U.S. ambassador in 2010 is thus responsible not only for managing civilians from the State Department and USAID but also for operating as the CEO of a multiagency mission. And he or she must also be adept at connecting with audiences outside of government, such as the private sector and civil society.

More at the link.

Hillary Clinton Says No White House Run — And No TSA Pat-Downs!

Two entries from Gateway Pundit, here and here, with video:

More at Memeorandum.

Hillary Clinton for President

It's a novelty, and that's it. I don't for a minute expect a primary challenge to Obama in 2012, although if anyone could possibly bump Hussein off the ticket it's Hillary.

White House AFPAK Strategy

From the White House Flickr page:

President Barack Obama speaks, during a meeting on Afghanistan and Pakistan, in the Situation Room of the White House, April 16, 2010. Listening at the table, from left, are National Security Advisor Gen. James Jones, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, Deputy National Security Advisor Tom Donilon, USAID Administrator Rajiv Shah, and Vice President Joe Biden.

And to keep up with the conflict, bookmark Foreign Policy's, "AFPAK CHANNEL." For example, from Friday, "Daily Brief: Quetta Hospital Blast Kills 12."

Added: From Bernard Finel, at Foreign Affairs, "A Substitute for Victory: Adopting a New Counterinsurgency Strategy in Afghanistan."

Hillary Clinton in 2016?

I've been suggesting this very scenario to students during lectures. There's an especially compelling case in the event of a one-term Obama presidency. From the Telegraph UK, "Smart Money is on Hillary Clinton for 2016":

Driving past the White House the other day, my eye was caught by the bumper sticker on the shiny black Toyota Prius in front of me. It read: "We love you Hillary - Clinton for President, 2016".

A year ago, I'd have snorted at the slogan and kept my distance from the vehicle - judging the driver to be a delusional Clintonite diehard still desperately fighting the reality that the former First Lady's presidential aspirations were history.

Now, the person behind that wheel seems to be on the money. Having elected Barack Obama amid near national euphoria, America is experiencing something akin to buyer's remorse.

Obama's popularity is the lowest of any American president at the end of his first year in office since polling began. Yet as his approval ratings have nose-dived, those of his Secretary of State have curved elegantly upwards.

A recent poll by the Clarus Research Group found that Hillary Clinton had a 75 per cent approval rating compared to 51 per cent for the man who defeated her in their epic battle for the Democratic nomination.

These are very early days to handicap 2016 but it's already clear that she has gone from being the supposedly inevitable 2008 nominee who had blown her one big chance as odds-on favourite to be the next Democratic president.

When Mrs Clinton accepted the job of Secretary of State many of her supporters feared she was falling into a trap. Fearing that she could be a rival source of power from Capitol Hill, Obama calculated she would be less of a threat if he brought her inside his tent.

The downsides for the former First Lady were obvious. She would give up her cherished seat as Senator for New York, which gave her an independent power base. Her voice on domestic policy would be silenced.

And her fortunes would inevitably be linked to the man whom she fervently believed was not up to the top job.

It is a sign of Mrs Clinton's astuteness that she said yes and now finds herself ideally placed to succeed Mr Obama or, in the increasingly plausible scenario that he becomes a one-term president, the Republican who ousts him in 2012.

More at the link.

2016 is a long way off. I'm more interested in "ousting Obama in 2012, and totally confident's the Dems will be beaten, and badly. It's going to start in 2010, in fact. 1994 redux. We'll worry about HRC later.

Car Bomb Kills Dozens in Pakistan: Hillary Clinton to Islamabad, 'No Biggie, Our Relationship Goes Beyond Medieval Slaughter of Innocents'

From London's Guardian, "Bomb Kills Dozens in Pakistan as Hillary Clinton Arrives":

The deadliest Taliban bombing in two years ripped through a women's market in the Pakistani city of Peshawar today, killing almost 90 people.

The attack happened as the US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, began a three-day visit to Pakistan.

The blast ripped through cosmetics stalls and clothes shops in Peshawar's old city, filling the narrow streets with burning debris and trapping dozens of victims under wreckage and charred roof beams. A two-storey building collapsed as firefighters doused it with water.

Television footage showed wounded people sitting amid debris as others attempted to rescue survivors and get them to hospital.

A spokesman for the Lady Reading hospital said it had received the bodies of 87 victims, many of them women and children. Provincial officials said over 200 people were injured ....

Clinton said the US was turning a "new page" in the decades-old relationship to include more than just security-related issues.

"Our relationship goes far beyond security... the terrorists can destroy but they cannot build. That is where we have an advantage," she said, pledging funds to rebuild the dilapidated electricity infrastructure that has led to large-scale power rationing in recent years.

The US has for years pressed Pakistan to hunt al-Qaida militants hiding in its tribal belt.

Earlier, Clinton admitted relations between the two countries had developed a lot of "scar tissue" and said: "We also recognise that it's imperative that we broaden our engagement with Pakistan."

Great. Blame the U.S. for a "deterioration" in relations. That'll send a message to the barbarians!

See also, the Los Angeles Times, "Car Bomb Kills More Than 80, Wounds 200 in Pakistan":

Video Hat Tip: Gateway Pundit, "Massive Car Bomb Kills 80 In Peshawar, Pakistan."

'Bros Before Hoes' - America's Left-Wing Cult of Obama Worship

From El Marco, "Oh Wow! OBA MAO in Washington":

Hillary Clinton on Iran: 'Transparency or Sanctions'

Here's Hillary Clinton's interview this morning on Face the Nation, "Clinton on Iran: Transparency or Sanctions":

Clinton spoke of transparency and diplomacy, but not on the question of military force. Even Robert Gates said all options should remain on the table. Clinton sounded like a model of equanimity here. She was tougher during the campaign. See, for example, Johanna Neuman,"Was Hillary Clinton Right on Iran?"

Is Hillary Obama's Colin Powell?

The likely nomination of Hillary Clinton as Barack Obama's secretary of state is baffling to many.

How could two supremely ambitious rivals bury competing agendas and political differences for the common good of a new era of Democratic power? Or, more frankly, why would Hillary want to subordinate herself to a President Obama, who she clearly bested during the primaries on questions of readiness to lead in foreign policy?

I still haven't figured it out myself, but I have the feeling that a Secretary Clinton may end up being the Obama administration's Colin Powell. At times, Powell was more popular the President Bush, and as a foreign policy realist outside of the neocononservative cocoon driving the administration's war on terror and Iraq policy, his stature protected a foreign policy independence that might have gotten a lesser contemporary fired.

We may see a similar dynamic under the new administration.

For some perspective, check out today's Los Angeles Times, "Clinton's Potential Pitfalls Seen in FDR's Secretary of State." The article examines Franklin Roosevelt's relationship to Cordell Hull, who was a marginalized as something as an administration outsider who fell out influence in the president's inner circle:

Cordell Hull was a veteran lawmaker with a worldwide reputation when Franklin D. Roosevelt appointed him secretary of State in 1933, in part to win needed support from Hull's army of Democratic admirers.

But the dignified Tennessean was never close to FDR. As time passed, he was "muscled out by others in the administration," said Michael Hunt, a diplomatic historian at the University of North Carolina.

Barack Obama's election as president has drawn other comparisons with Roosevelt's, especially for the economic crisis he inherits. But the example of Hull, a marginal figure despite the fact that he served into the 1940s and later won the Nobel Peace Prize, may point to potential pitfalls for Hillary Rodham Clinton if she takes the top diplomatic post, as seems increasingly likely.

Clinton would come to the role with global star power, a first-name relationship with world leaders, and a long familiarity with foreign policy.

But her relationship with the president and the new administration -- so key to success in the job -- is coarsely mixed. And her future ambitions could affect her pursuit of the administration's goals.

"I can imagine lots of room for friction," Hunt said, adding that strains between presidents and their top diplomats have been "a leitmotif of U.S. history."

The presence of her husband, former President Clinton, raises a range of additional questions.

From all outward appearances, Sen. Clinton and Obama have made peace. Yet they were rivals in the most protracted presidential primary in history, and that battle is certain to tint her arrival in the administration and on the world scene.

Throughout a long career, Clinton has been known for her diligence and grasp of details. Like the president-elect, she is thorough and methodical.

She met world leaders on a ceremonial level as first lady, but also knows many from her last five years as a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee who dealt with Iraq and Afghanistan. International leaders are aware that she is one of the most influential politicians in the United States.

"She'll bring stature and seriousness to a job that needs a real heavyweight," said former Ambassador Nancy Soderberg, who held a series of top-ranking foreign policy positions in the Clinton administration.

Top foreign policy experts of both parties, including former Secretary of State Henry A. Kissinger, have praised her skills. In her campaign, Clinton was supported by a large team of experienced foreign policy experts, many of whom she could bring to the State Department.

But world leaders who are impressed by her high profile also may wonder whether she speaks for Obama, said one former Clinton foreign policy official who spoke on condition of anonymity when assessing her aptitude for the diplomatic post.

The article notes that successful secretaries have been close to their bosses, like James A. Baker III was to the first President Bush, and how Condoleeza Rice is to Bush 43.

Colin Powell stepped down after one term in office, largely from the deep strain he endured in the diplomatic run-up to the war. Michael Hirsch, in "Hillary Rodham Powell?", says a future Obama-Clinton relationsip may indeed end up like that of Bush-Powell:

Foggy Bottom is simply too far away from the White House to be an independent power base. As secretary of state, Hillary would take over a huge, prestigious organization. But it would, for the most part, be a gilded cage. And to the extent that she might fail to do Obama's bidding, she would be ignored, neutralized and ultimately rendered irrelevant. Perhaps she ought to give Powell a call before she accepts the job.

For some additional perspective, from the policy side, see Ross Douthat, "Getting Out of Iraq."

Remembering the Real Hillary Clinton

Often earlier this year, during the Democratic primaries, I would pinch myself and say, "what is it about Hillary Clinton that I now like so much?"

Indeed, I got so excited by her indelible fighting spirit, I got to calling her "Hillary Clinton Maximus Decimus Meridius," for just like Russell Crowe's Roman general, she simply wouldn't die.

Hillary's in the news again, of course, with all the speculation on her potential appointment as secretary of state (which would be a disaster, in my opinion, not for U.S. foreign policy, but for Hillary's moral legacy).

Noemie Emery, in any case, zooms in on why we love her, why we love Hillary Clinton, even though her history indeed represents all that conservatives claim to loathe. The grudging respect emerged after Barack Obama had become the Democratic frontrunner, and Hillary's inevitability was long forgotten. That's when Americans saw Hillary as a gladiator refusing to go down:

After March 4, she suddenly seemed to look and sound different: She began to seem real. The shrillness was gone, and so was The Cackle, and so were the forced southern accents that once caused so many so much merriment. Hillary!--whoever that was--never really cohered as a character; her previous poses--the Perfect Wife, the Aggrieved Wife, the Empress-in-Waiting--were all unconvincing, but in her new role--the scrapper, forced to the wall, and hanging in there with ferocious and grim resolution--she is suddenly all of a piece. Along with her inner JFK, she has channeled her inner Robert F. Kennedy (going back to the days when he was still "ruthless"), along with her inner Margaret Thatcher--"No time to go wobbly"--along with echoes of the John McCain who clawed his way out of the grave only last winter, and the George W. Bush who just as tenaciously saved his Iraq policy--and maybe Iraq itself--from the Democrats in Congress last year.

It is no accident that it was just at this juncture that she began to rouse outrage in parts of what once was her base. It is a truism that liberals think people are formed by exterior forces around them and are helpless before them, while conservatives think individuals make their own destiny. Liberals love victims and want them to stay helpless, so they can help them, with government programs; while conservatives love those who refuse to be victims, and get up off the canvas and fight. Hillary may still be a nanny-state type in some of her policies, but in her own life she seems more and more of a Social Darwinian, refusing to lose, and insisting on shaping her destiny. If the fittest survive, she intends to be one of them. This takes her part of the way towards a private conversion. She is acting like one of our own.

If this weren't enough to make right-wing hearts flutter, Hillary has another brand-new advantage: She is hated on all the right fronts. The snots and the snark-mongers now all despise her, along with the trendies, the glitzies; the food, drama, and lifestyle critics, the beautiful people (and those who would join them), the Style sections of all the big papers; the slick magazines; the above-it-all pundits, who have looked down for years on the Republicans and on the poor fools who elect them, and now sneer even harder at her. The New York Times is having hysterics about her. At the New Republic, Jonathan Chait (who inspired the word "Chaitred" for his pioneer work on Bush hatred) has transferred his loathing of the 43rd president intact and still shining to her. "She should now go gentle into the political night," he advised in January. "Go Already!" he repeated in March, when she had failed to act on his suggestion. "No Really, You Should Go," he said in April after she won Pennsylvania, which made her even less likely to take his advice. "Now that loathing seems a lot less irrational," he wrote of the right wing's prior distaste for both the Clintons. "We just really wish they'd go away."

And what caused this display of intense irritation? She's running a right-wing campaign. She's running the classic Republican race against her opponent, running on toughness and use-of-force issues, the campaign that the elder George Bush ran against Michael Dukakis, that the younger George Bush waged in 2000 and then again against John Kerry, and that Ronald Reagan--"The Bear in the Forest"--ran against Jimmy Carter and Walter F. Mondale. And she's doing it with much the same symbols.

"Clinton became the first Democratic candidate to wave the bloody shirt of 9/11," the New York Times has been whining. "A Clinton television ad, torn right from Karl Rove's playbook, evoked the 1929 stock market crash, Pearl Harbor, the Cuban missile crisis, the cold war, and 9/11 attacks, complete with video of Osama bin Laden . . . declaring in an interview with ABC News that if Iran attacked Israel while she were president," she would wipe the aggressor off the face of the earth. "Clinton is saying almost exactly the same things about Obama that McCain is," Chait lamented: "He's inexperienced, lacking in substance," unprepared to stand up to the world. She has said her opponent is ill-prepared to answer the phone, should it ring in the White House at three in the morning. Her ads are like the ones McCain would be running in her place, and they'll doubtless show up in McCain's ads should Obama defeat her. She has said that while she and McCain are both prepared to be president, Obama is not. They act, he makes speeches. They take heat, while he tends to wilt or to faint in the kitchen. He may even throw like a girl.

And better--or worse--she is becoming a social conservative, a feminist form of George Bush. Against an opponent who shops for arugula, hangs out with ex-Weathermen, and says rural residents cling to guns and to God in unenlightened despair at their circumstances, she has rushed to the defense of religion and firearms, while knocking back shots of Crown Royal and beer. Her harsh, football-playing Republican father (the villain of the piece, against whom she rebelled in earlier takes on her story) has become a role model, a working class hero, whose name she evokes with great reverence. Any day now, she'll start talking Texan, and cutting the brush out in Chappaqua or at her posh mansion on Embassy Row.

In the right-wing conspiracy, this adaptation has not gone unobserved. "Hillary has shown a Nixonian resilience and she's morphing into Scoop Jackson," runs one post on National Review's blog, The Corner:

She's entering the culture war as a general. All of this has made her a far more formidable general election candidate. She's fighting the left and she's capturing the center. She's denounced MoveOn.org. She's become the Lieberman of the Democratic Party. The left hates her and treats her like Lieberman. . . . Obama is distancing himself from Wright and Hillary is getting in touch with O'Reilly. The culture war has come to the Democratic Party.

She might run to the right of McCain, if she makes it to the general election, and get the votes of rebellious conservatives. Or she, Lieberman, and McCain could form a pro-war coalition, with all of them running to pick up the phone when it rings in the small hours. The New York Times and the rest of the left would go crazy. Respect can't get stranger than that.

I can't add much to that, except to say, once again, Noemie Emery's shown herself to be among the very best of those writing on politics and culture today.

Don't Waste Hillary at the State Department

I haven't posted on all of the rumors that Hillary Clinton will become secretary of state in the Barack Obama administration.

I don't like the idea, frankly. David Broder explains my reservations perfectly:

It may be moot and it certainly is presumptuous, but I would be less than honest with readers if I did not say what I believe: Making Hillary Rodham Clinton the secretary of state in Barack Obama's administration would be a mistake.

I do not doubt that she could do the job -- and do it well. I have been a fan of the former first lady's since I covered her efforts for health-care reform 15 years ago. What I saw in the recent campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination was convincing evidence of her physical stamina and moral courage, and of her capacity to improve her own performance at every step of the process. I admired her readiness to endorse and campaign hard for Obama after her own candidacy fell short.

Equally, I admire Obama's readiness to reach out to former rivals and enlist their help in the governing enterprise he is launching. His serious discussions with Clinton, John McCain and Bill Richardson, among others, are testaments to his sincerity in wanting to move beyond the partisanship and personal differences that too often poison the atmosphere in Washington.

What, then, is the problem? Clinton is the wrong person for that job in this administration. It's not the best use of her talents, and it's certainly not the best fit for this new president.

Unfortunately, Broder marred his piece with a slam on the Iraq war ... which is no surprise since the Beltway establishment attaced the war as a "disaster" from the get go.

But Hillary Clinton was right in authorizing the deployment in 2002, and perhaps by staying away from the Obama cabinet, she can return to a more realistic view of American foreign policy, not driven by electoral pressures from the Democratic party's defeatist base.

Hillary Makes Good Start on 2012 Campaign

I admire Michael Barone, so I'm pleased that my analysis of Hillary Clinton's speech last night dovetails with Barone's analysis today, "Hillary Clinton's Speech Was a Good Start on Her 2012 Run":

Clinton's speech was carefully tailored, like the very attractive orange pants suit she wore. It was tailored to her need to speak directly to those who supported her, especially those unreconciled to Obama's nomination. It was laden with references to feminist advances—the Seneca Falls conference of 1848 got hearty applause, the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment was duly noted, Harriet Tubman was cited as advice to all (keep going). She saluted thereby her own persistence through the primaries and noted that America does not like a quitter. So much for those Obamaites who kept urging her to get out of the race.

My sense is that many of the women—at the convention and out in America—who are heartsick over Clinton's defeat and see it as somehow illegitimate are women of a certain age, like Hillary, women who made choices over and over again to do things they were told growing up they shouldn't do (live with a man before marriage, work outside the home after having children), women who are disappointed that the young women of today don't share their fervor and sense of outrage (because those women were never told not to do those things). An increasing percentage of mothers with children under 5 are choosing not to work outside the home. Michelle Obama, as Danielle Crittenden notes, spoke on Monday night more as a wife and mother than as a career woman (and indeed quit her $321,000 job to campaign for her husband). The Hillary feminists sense that time has passed them by. Time and the Democratic Party. Hillary Clinton addressed their grievances and gave them visibility and legitimacy.

In contrast, the argument for supporting Barack Obama was far more abstract. Clinton voters supported her because she could help those unfortunate souls out there (the requisite lugubrious stories follow). Barack Obama would help those unfortunate souls, and John McCain wouldn't, not at all. He'd just be four more years of George W. Bush. Ergo, logic requires you to support Barack Obama. But Clinton's affect was chilly, or at least seemed so to me; I could see the back of her head as she spoke from my press seats and could watch the Fox News feed on Chris Wallace's TV on the podium two rows in front of me. Yes, she smiled, but not a lot, and at moments when it was she (or her husband) she was spotlighting.

What was missing was much in the way of description of Barack Obama. What kind of man is he? One who supports the same positions she does. Has she looked deep into his heart and found something worthy? No evidence here that she had. Would he be a good commander-in-chief? Not a word on that, as the McCain campaign quickly and gleefully noted. Clinton can tell Obamaites that she made the case for Obama and brought the convention cheering to its feet. She can say that she told her supporters in the most explicit language possible to work hard for his election. She can make this claim whether he wins or (the more tantalizing case) he loses. In the latter case, she's made a good start on her own 2012 campaign. She'll be only 64 that year, the same age as George H. W. Bush when he was elected in 1988.

See also, Victor Davis Hanson, "Hil's Grand Strategy."