Posted on 10/30/2003 6:38:37 AM PST by NYC Republican
Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) delivered her sharpest attack yet on President Bush's handling of foreign policy - reviving speculation she may challenge him for the presidency. Clinton's speech slammed Bush for excessive secrecy that she suggested shields the American people from the truth about Iraq and 9/11 intelligence failures.
She even suggested the administration was trying to hide casualty figures in the Iraq war.
"We must always be vigilant against letting our desire to keep information confidential be used as a pretext for classifying information that is more about political embarrassment," she said.
The hard-hitting tone of her comments come at a time when poll numbers indicate public confidence in Bush's foreign policy is slipping.
And it prompted some to speculate Clinton was keeping presidential options open.
Clinton fund-raiser John Catsimatidis, the chief executive officer of the Gristede's supermarket chain who is supporting John Kerry, said, "I know for a fact a lot of her supporters are urging her to do it."
One top Republican strategist said yesterday's speech puts her in the company of "the nine other Democrats running."
"You've got to wonder if she's keeping her foot wedged in the door," the GOP strategist said.
Clinton spokesman Philippe Reines reiterated her denial.
"Sen. Clinton has repeatedly said that she will serve out her full six-year term," Reines said.
At least one Clinton supporter was unconvinced.
"My opinion is that the door is still not closed. ... Part of her wants to do it," the supporter said.
Political observers also note she is a featured speaker at an Iowa Democratic event next month, where she is expected to overshadow several leading Democrats running for the party's nomination.
Clinton told the Center for American Progress - a moderate think tank - that Bush hasn't been straight with Americans about the costs of the country's Iraq policy.
"The Bush administration describes progress on many fronts in direct contravention to what we are seeing and hearing every day. ... There is too much at stake to treat war as a political spin zone," she said.
Clinton faulted Team Bush for sparing Americans "the sight of caskets coming home" and "refusing to release" timely casualty reports.
"We should be willing to admit the price that is being paid by these brave young men and women to pursue this policy," Clinton said.
Bush foreign policy, she said, has been marked by an "aggressive unilateralism."
"We now go to war as a first resort against perceived threats, not as a necessary final resort," she said.
And the federal 9/11 commission shouldn't have to threaten to subpoena White House intelligence documents.
"The administration unnecessarily raises the suspicion that it has something to hide," she said.
More evidence that she plans to run in 2004. The Daily News is in her pocket. They wouldn't print this little hint at the head of the article without her permission.
Is that like the mountain coming to Mohammed?
Here's an article by Andrea Peyser about the screwup:
Hill's History Lesson Has No Basis In Truth
Friday,October 13,2000
By ANDREA PEYSER
HILLARY Rodham Clinton, who is fond of lecturing about African-American history, may need a refresher course in the Truth.
Sojourner Truth, that is.
A black-oriented monthly newspaper is demanding an apology for a speech Clinton delivered last month in a Brooklyn church, in which she apparently confused the evangelist Truth with Harriet Tubman - the woman who led slaves to freedom on the Underground Railroad as "the Moses of her people."
The mangled facts are described as an insult on par with telling a veterans group about "our first president, John Quincy Adams," said an editorial in the October issue of Our Time Press.
As of yesterday, Clinton had not responded.
On Sept. 10, Clinton delivered a speech at the First Baptist Church of Crown Heights. Flanked by politicians and fans, she complained about the paucity of black-history education.
"I don't think our children get to hear enough about many of the important people in our history," the black press quoted her as saying.
"I really hope our children learn about Sojourner Truth ... because she did stand for truth and she did sojourn in difficult places time and time again."
Then, as puzzled observers listened politely, Clinton described Truth's "escape" from slavery - and her efforts to guide others to freedom.
"It was a terrible journey. She went through swamps, she was chased by dogs. She was shot at ... And she found her way to freedom, here in New York eventually."
Clinton said she "turned around and she went back. She would send out the word to the plantations that she was coming back. And if people could get there, break free or in the trees or on the side of their swamp, she would be there."
This came as a surprise to those who know that Truth, born a slave, did not escape from bondage.
"It just caught my attention immediately - and it pretty much set me off," said Our Time publisher David Greaves, whose angry editorial is headlined, "Candidate Clinton Trips Over American History."
As Greaves knew, Truth did not come from a Southern plantation, but from upstate Kingston - here in Hillary's adopted state - according to "Black Women in America: An Historical Encyclopedia" (Carlson Publishing, Inc., 1993).
After she was emancipated in accordance with state law in 1827, Truth became an itinerant preacher, feminist and abolitionist famous for challenging 19th-century prejudices about black humanity and femininity with the statement, "Ain't I a woman?"
Truth is revered for helping to lead the call for the end of slavery. But she has never been credited with guiding slaves' escape.
That credit goes to Harriet Ross Tubman.
In 1849, Tubman escaped from a Maryland plantation. She then made at least 15 daring and heroic trips down South, repeatedly risking her life to rescue slaves.
Hillary's gaffe surprised observers who say she often lectures about black heroines without mixing them up.
Democratic Assemblyman Clarence Norman Jr., who heard Clinton speak, was charitable about her factual foul-up.
"Her basic theme was, 'We have to look forward, while helping others,'" said Norman, son of the church's pastor, Clarence Norman Sr.
But one congregant told me the church was quietly buzzing over the mistake.
Greaves' editorial was less understanding. "Instead of the intended pandering, Hillary's writers put her foot in her mouth," he wrote.
"Had she spoken at a synagogue saying, 'One of my greatest heroines is Israel's first president, Golda Meir,' she would not have gotten far into David Ben-Gurion's biography without there being an indication from the assembled that the first lady did not have a clue as to what she was talking about."
Another black-oriented newspaper, The Daily Challenge, printed a lengthy excerpt from Hillary's speech, errors intact. Editor Dawad Philip said he found Hillary's booboo "less harmful than the people in this town who have it right, and still have policies that destroy us."
Philip said the paper was considering addressing Hillary's mistake.
Hillary enjoys tremendous support among African-Americans - the latest Zogby poll gauges it at around 95 percent - which may help explain her gentle treatment in Crown Heights.
At a time when candidates are taken to task for goofs big and small - getting the voting age wrong, misstating the cost of a dog's arthritis medicine - Clinton may feel compelled to explain.
Greaves, whose paper has supported Clinton, asks that she include "an apology and correction in the blizzard of public relations faxes coming daily from the Hillary 2000 press office."
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