Hillary Clinton to Accept Secretary of State Job

[KrazyHorse]

More properly, his own would-be assassin.

And if you want that you should get a Canadian President.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andre_Dallaire

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shawinigan_Handshake

All your presidents since Jackson have been pussies...

[Boris Godunov]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse
All your presidents since Jackson have been pussies...

Teddy Roosevelt delivered a speech after he had just been shot.

[KrazyHorse]

I was actually thinking about writing in an exception for Grant and Teddy

[Darius871]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
And considering how long Cabinet official stay in their jobs (only one has made it through Bush's in one and that's the Secretary of Labor, Elaine Chao)

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly
And when was the last time a SecState appointed at the beginning of a president's first term was still in office at the end of his second?

Again, when was the last time we had a Secretary of State with such amply demonstrated presidential ambitions? Seward maybe? I don't see why the length of some bureaucrat's or academic's tenure has anything to do with what Clinton would choose to do. What's her alternative, "spend more time with her family?" And then run in 2016 as a "former" Senator?

The only way she's leaving is with a bootprint on her ass, no other way.

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
and how they are seen (more like acting on direct orders from the President, rather than working with the President as VP's like GHW Bush and Al Gore were seen), it wouldn't make much sense to decide a Cabinet post was a springboard to the Presidency.

And you think she'd be a more active and prominent figure as a junior Senator with no prospects for a committee chairmanship or leadership position? I should think not, especially when other Senators have taken the lead on major issues, including even healthcare, which they would never let her touch after what happened last time. She'd be an empty suit for the most part, instead of being at the forefront of whatever international crises are bound to come up at some point. Remember what Biden said about the likelihood of a manufactured crisis that will test Obama at the outset? Whose faces to you think are going to be permanently imprinted in the public memory of that event? Maybe 2 or 3, of which Clinton will certainly be one.

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
I mean look at Powell now. He's seen as basically falling in line with what the President told him to do. It is hard to distinguish yourself at State unless you navigate an international crisis well, but that usually doesn't lead to any plum elected office (ask James Baker or Madeline Albright).

As Ramo mentioned, none of those three were ever even on the verge of being a presidential contender. The apples and oranges in this thread are piled waist-deep.

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
And do you think that McCain would have been better served for the 2008 nomination as Secretary of Defense during that time? Because I think that would have been foolish. At least in the Senate he could be seen as his own person.

Oh noes, more apples and oranges...

Don't Clinton's degree of seniority, overall influence, and record of legislative accomplishments pale in comparison to McCain's? Wouldn't such a direct association with the Bush Administration be absolute political poison in a way that wouldn't necessarily apply to members of the Obama Administration in eight years?

If Obama ends up being another Bush, maybe your analogy might get somewhere. For now he looks to be mediocre at worst.

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly
Moreover, if you're going to run for president from a cabinet office, State is probably the worst one to do it from; you have no domestic constituency, no reason to run around the US giving speeches and meeting with people -- in short, no real opportunity to build or maintain a domestic political network from your position. All cabinet officials have this problem to some extent, but it's particularly bad for SecState.

It's not a coincidence that we haven't elected a cabinet officer since the 1920s (Hoover) -- the decline of the cabinet as a presidential springboard coincides pretty neatly with the decline of candidates being hand-picked by party bosses. If Hillary takes this job, it's the end of her political career, and she must know that; the interesting question is why she wants to end it.

Do you really think Hillary Clinton is deficient in the domestic constituency department? Were you living under a rock for the last 2 years? And why would they necessarily dissipate after a mere 8 years? And why would it be so hard to rejuvenate that constituency on the campaign trail even if it were to dissipate? And why wouldn't the party itself combined with The One's coattails create a decent-sized constituency all its own?

As Ramo said, her party nomination would be "a walk" from this position, or at least no worse than from a piddly little junior Senator. The real question is if she'd want it, and secondly what her chances would be in the general, both of which totally depend on how Obama does.

[Darius871]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse
More properly, his own would-be assassin.

And if you want that you should get a Canadian President.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andre_Dallaire

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shawinigan_Handshake

All your presidents since Jackson have been pussies...

Anybody with an accent aigue in his name is automatically a pu*sy

[KrazyHorse]

[Darius871]

I know, I've seen that pictures for years somewhere. Nonetheless, it's an irrevocable law of physics that é = \o/ .

[Dinner]

Notice how she refused to answer for 1-2 weeks all the while leaking to the press about how conflicted she felt? talk about a media whore. We all knew she'd take it because why demand a job you don't want?

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Originally posted by Darius871

Do you really think Hillary Clinton is deficient in the domestic constituency department? Were you living under a rock for the last 2 years? And why would they necessarily dissipate after a mere 8 years? And why would it be so hard to rejuvenate that constituency on the campaign trail even if it were to dissipate? And why wouldn't the party itself combined with The One's coattails create a decent-sized constituency all its own?

And did you sleep through 2008? If the election demonstrated anything, it's that the Clinton Brand is no match for a disciplined political ground game staffed by fired up, committed foot soldiers. She spent years running for president and couldn't pull that together; no way she pulls it together from Foggy Bottom, where she has no domestic constituency and her "troops" are in embassies and consulates around the world.

And, for what it's worth, we've had a number of cabinet secretaries with presidential ambitions since WWII; Tommy Thompson was the most recent. Not one of them got off the dime. I stand by what I said: given the nature of the modern primary and nominating process, parlaying a cabinet post into a viable run at the presidency is damned near impossible.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Darius871
I know, I've seen that pictures for years somewhere. Nonetheless, it's an irrevocable law of physics that é = \o/ .

Cheering?

[Ramo]

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly


And did you sleep through 2008? If the election demonstrated anything, it's that the Clinton Brand is no match for a disciplined political ground game staffed by fired up, committed foot soldiers. She spent years running for president and couldn't pull that together; no way she pulls it together from Foggy Bottom, where she has no domestic constituency and her "troops" are in embassies and consulates around the world.

And, for what it's worth, we've had a number of cabinet secretaries with presidential ambitions since WWII; Tommy Thompson was the most recent. Not one of them got off the dime. I stand by what I said: given the nature of the modern primary and nominating process, parlaying a cabinet post into a viable run at the presidency is damned near impossible.

I don't think that advertising your connection to G Dub is something that gets you too far in politics these days. Thompson had to run on a decade old record as Governor of Wisconsin.

In the Clinton Admin, the only real politicos were:
1. Bentsen and Babbitt, who are too old.
2. Cisneros, who had a scandal.
3. Cohen, who's a Republican.
Not a real surprise that any of these guys parlayed that experience into a Pres bid.

Out of curiosity, who were you pulling for at Foggy Bottom?

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Darius871
Again, when was the last time we had a Secretary of State with such amply demonstrated presidential ambitions?

As pointed out by Rufus, there have been a number in the past. They tend to find out that it isn't all it is cracked up to be to further a Presidential run.

I don't see why the length of some bureaucrat's or academic's tenure has anything to do with what Clinton would choose to do.

Mostly because it indicates how demanding these jobs are. These people don't leave because they really want to spend "more time with their family". They leave because they are burnt out.

And you think she'd be a more active and prominent figure as a junior Senator with no prospects for a committee chairmanship or leadership position?

Reid was working on a leadership position for her. Even making a new one just specifically for her.

If Obama ends up being another Bush, maybe your analogy might get somewhere. For now he looks to be mediocre at worst.

And if he ends up being mediocre, or not able to not able to really fix everything, would you really want to be tied down with "Obama fatigue"? I mean Clinton was one of the most popular Presidents in history when he left office, but still Gore was in a dogfight and ended up losing because of the ties to the Administration.

After all, this only really works if Obama becomes super duper popular and Reaganesque. And being Hillary Clinton, that's quite an assumption for her.

[q=Rufus T. Firefly] I stand by what I said: given the nature of the modern primary and nominating process, parlaying a cabinet post into a viable run at the presidency is damned near impossible.[/q]

I agree. As a Senator or Governor, you don't have to really be there all the time. Come back for a handful of bills to vote on or sign into law (you probably don't even have to go back your home state to sign bills into law) and run most of the time.

There is NO WAY that a President Obama lets his Secretary of State (if she is willing to stick around that long) basically go on a campaign trail for 2 years.

[Bosh]

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly


That all depends on who the Deputy Secretary ends up being. If, as predicted, it's an Obama loyalist rather than a Clintonite, it's Hillary who ends up being the "victim" -- she'll be serving a president she disagrees with, her advice will have to compete with that of a Veep who is an agressive political player and much better-informed than she is, and her own stewardship of State wil be filtered through a White House crony. Again, I can see why Obama would do this -- I just can't see why Hillary would.

Yes I think we'll see an Obama loyalist as deputy is state. Probably the deal is to have Clinton jet around the world as sort of a mega diplomat (gets her face on TV a huge amount) and foreign leaders don't feel stiffed meeting with such a big name SecState instead of the President. Everyone's happy.

Meanwhile the deputy runs most of the bureaucracy and (hopefully) keeps Hillary's managerial incompetence away from the day to day running to the State bureaucracy.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Originally posted by Ramo
Out of curiosity, who were you pulling for at Foggy Bottom?

Well, the ideal appointment is someone with intelligence/gravitas, foreign policy experience, managerial experience, and a reputation for being a decent boss. All those qualities in one person are hard to come by; Powell had them, which is why he's still regarded with Jesus-like reverence at State.

My hope -- and that of lots of people at State I know -- was that Obama would reach across the aisle and choose Richard Lugar, who lacks the managerial experience but has the other qualities in spades.

Barring that, my preference was for Richard Holbrooke, who's reputed to be a complete son-of-a-b!tch to work for but uber-qualified in all other ways.

Of the big 3 who were being mentioned -- Clinton, Kerry, Richardson -- I was leaning very, very slightly toward Richardson. Kerry's just out; he's an intellectual lightweight, has never managed anything, and in spite of the fact that he's about to chair Senate Foreign Relations isn't really known as a foreign policy guy. Clinton is smart as hell, but doesn't have a lot of foreign policy experience, apparently sucks as a manager (see her campaign), and is reputed to be a pain to work for. Richardson, by contrast, has some foreign policy experience, significant managerial skills, and is a pretty good guy; unfortunately, as the campaign showed, it would be charitable to describe him as a complete goofball.

Some choices, huh? My marginal preference for Richardson is that I don't believe he'd put his own ambition ahead of administration goals, whereas I do believe that of Hillary. And while I respect the whole team-of-rivals thing, State has been genuinely damaged by the Bushies (who wanted to -- an tried to -- run foreign affairs from the Pentagon), and it's going to be harder to repair that damage if the president doesn't quite trust his SecState.

[RGBVideo]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
Yeah, but the 1976 was basically Reagan's coming out party

reagan ran for president in the primaries way back in '68

the real reason he had such a hard time against ford was that ford was an incumbent president

And if Obama is successful, that means she's 69 when she has a chance to run. Maybe she believes that being so far down in the seniority in Senate just isn't worth it and she'd rather be in a more high profile position to end her career.

Or maybe H. Clinton is power-hungry but in denial about her chances in 2016.