Warning! Handle with Gloves!
Posted on 01/25/2003 1:12:20 AM PST by kattracks
New York Sen. Hillary Clinton racheted up her attacks on the Bush administration on Friday, accusing the White House of ignoring Clinton administration warnings about Osama bin Laden and shortchanging national security since the 9/11 attacks.
"I know that during the transition between the Clinton and Bush administrations that the outgoing administration told the incoming one that they would spend more time on terrorism and bin Laden than anything else," Sen. Clinton told WLUX-NY radio host Mike Siegel. "And that wasn't their priorities," she charged. "Their priorities were different."
The former first lady said that national security was weaker under the Bush administration than it should be because of the president's "absolute ideological commitment" to tax cuts, contending that Bush wasn't willing to spend enough money to keep Americans safe.
"I don't understand the administration's absolute ideological commitment to tax cuts until we pay for what we need," Clinton told WLUX. "How can we be talking about cutting taxes when the survey that I did around our state has many cities and counties laying off police officers and closing fire stations when we should be beefing up, not cutting back?"
Sen. Clinton expanded on her argument against tax cuts, claiming that they will likely render Americans vulnerable to further terrorist attacks.
"What good is it going to do if you take the tax off a dividend if we don't know what's on 98 percent of the (shipping) containers that are coming into our ports," she told Siegel. "Why don't we use some of the money to harden doors in our airplanes. ... You know, you go down the list of unmet needs.... part of the problem is that nobody wants to pay for it. And if you don't have a national commitment of resources you cannot possibly be as well prepared as we need to be."
The New York Senator, who was named in an NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll released Friday as her party's top choice to challenge Bush in 2004, accused the White House of using the Homeland Security Department to distract from FBI whistleblower Colleen Rowley's testimony last year about the bureau's 9/11 bungling.
"If you remember when Colleen Rowley was going to testify, that was the very day that the administration announced all of a sudden that they were in favor of a Homeland Security Department after having opposed it for months," Clinton said. "And many of us believe that it was an intentional effort to divert attention from her testimony because she raised a lot of unanswered questions."
The Democratic presidential frontrunner also complained that the Bush White House had been silent on Iran's nuclear weapons program.
"I pick up the paper a week or so ago and the Russians have made a deal with the Iranians," she said. "And, you know, they're working to put their nuclear reactors online and I didn't hear a word out of the Bush administration."
And Mrs. Clinton was particularly tough on the administration's handling of the North Korean nuclear crisis.
"The way they've mishandled North Korea, I mean - we don't think that Iraq yet has nuclear weapons, or Iran. We know darn well that North Korea is trying to commit nuclear blackmail on us and we have to be more vigilant there."
The rising Democratric Party star then suggested that Bush's overall handling of foreign policy had not been "smart."
"We have many issues around the world and we've got to be much smarter about how we handle other countries and our allies. And I don't think it's smart to engage in a lot of bellicose rhetoric which, you know, gives people the chance to say, 'Well, you know, I'm not going to be on that wavelength.'"
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Stunning eloquence.
I say BWAHAHAHAHA, keep it up Hitlery, your the best asset the RNC has for the next election cycle.
Vince Foster got killed exploring it.
Go home and thank your husband for that. And while you're home.....STAY THERE!!!!
This speech of hers is the newest example of her political bad timing and bad sense. Who on earth would buy into her premise except for the choir?
And fortunately, they're in the minority.
When the right went after President Clinton over some real transgressions, the American public by not demanding his removal, allowed him to stay in office. Some claim that is was a backlash against all of the critism against him. I will leave it up to Historians to determine what really happen.
My point is, Clinton never had the approval ratings President Bush now enjoys. Does Hillary really think her ill-timed pot shots will have an effect? Why is she doing it?
Since the only ones that enjoy hearing what she has to say is her base, but that is already secure, so who is she speaking to? I don't know.
What I do know is that by putting herself on the side she has, the only way she comes out ahead is if we, the United States suffers a major military defeat. So her only hope to gain is by hoping more Americans die.
The same goes for her economic statements. If the economy improves, she loses, if it goes into the toilet, she (may) win.
So, knowing this, do you really think she has the best interest of this country in mind, does she really want to help improve the economy?
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