Hillary's Empty Foreign Portfolio

By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY Posted Monday, March 10, 2008 4:20 PM PT

One by one, the medals that Commander Hillary has pinned to her chest are falling away like so many leaves and flowers withering into the truth.

During the Cleveland debate, Clinton bragged that her "extensive" foreign policy experience makes her best prepared to meet national security challenges on Day One.

Pray tell, what international experience could a former first lady bring to the table?

"You know," she said, "helping to support the peace process in Northern Ireland, negotiating to open borders so that (Kosovar) refugees fleeing ethnic cleansing would be safe, going to Beijing and standing up for women's rights as human rights and so much else."

Hillary claims her "lifetime of experience" matches that of GOP hopeful John McCain, a war hero who's been involved in every major national security event over the past 25 years. By comparison, all Barack Obama can bring is "speeches," she sniffed.

But it turns out Hillary exaggerated her list of foreign policy accomplishments, which is really quite pathetic given how scrawny they already appeared.

First, she never played a key role in brokering peace in Northern Ireland, according to former first minister David Trimble, who said she had no direct role in the talks. Her husband, the president, was engaged in the talks, yes, said Trimble. But Hillary essentially was just along for the ride.

"I don't want to rain on the thing for her," Trimble said, "but being a cheerleader for something is slightly different from being a principal player."

Ouch. Yet Hillary made the boast even more directly on another occasion: "I helped to bring peace to Northern Ireland." Clearly, this statement is no longer operative.

What about her claim that she negotiated with the government of Macedonia to open its border to help fleeing Kosovar refugees during the war? Hillary did travel to Macedonia in May 1999, and she did visit refugee camps near the Kosovo border.

However, it's not clear how she helped the Kosovar refugees when Macedonia reopened its border to them before her visit.

Hillary also says she was instrumental in pressing Beijing on human rights. But she carried no official portfolio while speaking on women's rights there.

In fact, Hillary did not attend any National Security Council meetings. She never sat in the Situation Room during Desert Fox or the Kosovo war, or read in on presidential security briefings. Nor was she part of the Cabinet.

She did, however, take campaign checks from Chinese bagmen for the People's Liberation Army.

Hillary couldn't even answer MSNBC host Tim Russert's question about Russian President Putin's hand-picked successor during the same Cleveland debate.

Russert: Who will it be? Do you know his name?
Hillary: Medved —
Russert: Medvedev.
Hillary: Medvedeva — whatever —
Russert: Yes.
Hillary: Yes. (Giggle.)

Whatever? She sounded more like a sorority girl than someone who claims to be prepared to take on the world's toughest leaders.

Meantime, Obama wants to give propaganda victories to our enemies by sitting down and talking nice with them. Fresh from the Neville Chamberlain School of Diplomacy, he thinks talking to Ahmadinejad and Castro, without preconditions, will defang them. Next, Obama will propose tea with Osama.

His solution to the war on Islamic terror includes building schools in the Middle East to teach math and science instead of hatred.

What planet is he living on? Does he think the Saudi religious police, who confiscate Bibles at the airport, will clang the bell at American schoolhouses in Mecca and Medina?

One of Obama's foreign policy advisers, Susan Rice, said it best when she confessed that neither he nor Hillary would be ready to pick up the White House red phone at 3 a.m.

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