by Nicholas Beaudrot of Electoral Math
Team Clinton sends out Madeline Albright to repeat the 'vote for diplomacy' meme, though now something that Chuck Hagel thinks will "escalate the danger of a military confrontation" has been renamed "robust diplomacy", which is somehow supposed to be better than the namby-pamby diplomacy favored some unnamed strawman. Let's turn the mic over to publius of Obsidian Wings:
Second, Clinton's Iran vote is a big deal. As a matter of common sense,there's no reason to vote for any foreign policy resolution entitled“Kyl-Lieberman.” More substantively, she's not voting in a vacuum. Sheknows exactly what the effects of these actions are -- and how they make military action far more likely. It’s true of course that she -- wisely -- co-sponsored Webb’s Iran legislation. But I classify that under “hedging her panders.” Depending on what crowd she’s speaking to, she can pull out either the Kyl-Lieberman or the Webb card.
I honestly don't know what Hillary Clinton personally thinks about thisstuff. And, frankly, I don't care. The problem with Hillary is not whatshe thinks. The problem is her willingness to support more war-orientedforeign policy to avoid looking like a Woodstock hippy. She did it in2002 -- and she's just gone and done it again. And it's something to besincerely concerned about.
The relevant question is not what Clinton thinks Kyl-Lieberman means. Even if she thinks it's a vote for diplomacy, that only matters if the Bush adminstration agrees. And there have been no indications that this is the case, beyond David Brooks's reading of the President's body language and op-eds from Fred Hiatt's shop. As John Edwards said in a statement, "if you give this president an inch, he will take a mile—and launch a war", which is precisely the problem with voting for Kyl-Lieberman. If Clinton really wanted to show some leadership, she ought to do something to prevent that unlikely-but-not-impossible scenario; say, by seeing to it that the Webb Amendment becomes law as soon as humanly possible.
