Barack Hussein Obama has announced his foreign policy/national security 'working group'...and if anyone doubted that the Chosen One is running for Jimmy Carter's second term, wonder no more:
Ex-Secretary of State Madeleine Albright - Kim Il Jong's favorite US diplomat, her experience in appeasing tyrants bent on becoming nuclear powers will be invaluable in appeasing.. I mean.. in negotiating with Iran.
Ex-Senator David Boren, former Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence - Lessee...voted against the 1990 Persian Gulf War, one of the Clinton's top choices to replace Les Aspin as a U.S. Secretary of Defense in 1994, really sorry he voted to confirm Clarence Thomas...yep,fits the pattern.
Ex-Secretary of State Warren Christopher-Jimmy Carter's ex- Deputy Secretary of State and Bill Clinton's Secretary of State...need I say any more?
Greg Craig, former director of the State Department Office of Policy Planning- Teddy Kennedy's Senior Advisor on Defense, Foreign Policy and National Security issues for five years, Kennedy's lawyer during the 1991 William Kennedy Smith rape trial,and a key part of the Clinton defense team during his impeachment and the lawyer instrumental in sending Elian Gonzalez back to Cuba.
Secretary of the Navy Richard Danzig AKA Winnie The Pooh.
Ex-Representative Lee Hamilton, former Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee - James Baker's partner in putting together the infamous Iraq Study group report in 2006,which included a special section on how the problems in the Middle East were All Israel's Fault.
Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder - Obama's senior legal advisor, he served as Deputy Attorney General under Janet Reno during the Clinton Administration and was a major part of granting a number of questionable pardons in the last days of the Clinton era,including the one granted to Mark Rich,who was wanted on tax evasion charges and for illegal trading with Iran and Iraq.
Dr. Tony Lake, former National Security Advisor - Lake was a foreign policy advisor to Jimmy Carter's 1976 campaign and later worked in the Carter Administration as head of the State Department's in-house think tank.He was Bill Clinton's NSA during his first term,and was part of the team that dealt with Bosnia, Somalia and Oslo.
Senator Sam Nunn, former Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee -A relatively conservative democrat, difficult to know what he's doing here in this group.
Secretary of Defense William Perry -Perry served as undersecretary of defense
during the Carter Administration, and as secretary of defense during Clinton's first term..sohe has a great deal of experience in slashing defense budgets.
Dr. Susan Rice, former Assistant Secretary of State - A long time DC State Department apparatchnik and an assistant secretary of state for African Affairs under President Clinton who was in office while Somalia and the Rwandan genocide occurred while very little was done to stop it. She was a foreign policy aide in the Michael Dukakis campaign and served as a foreign policy adviser to John Kerry during the 2004 presidential campaign. One of the major steps Kerry suggested for dealing with the Middle East was to appoint James Baker and Jimmy Carter as negotiators. When furor erupted at the prospect of two of the most ardent foes of Israel being suggested to basically ride “roughshod” over Israel, Kerry backtracked and blamed his staff for the idea. His "staff" was Susan Rice.
Like Condi Rice, she's female,black and relatively young, which leads to her being referred to by the Obama campaign as "our Dr. Rice." She's a noted foe of the Iraq war and is known for favoring an immediate pull out.
Representative Tim Roemer, 9/11 Commissioner -Roemer was a member of the 9/11 Commission. He was a candidate for chair of the Democratic National Committee but lost out to Howard Dean, largely because he was considered too centerist for the job.
He actually was fairly moderate (a congressman from Indiana), unless things have changed and is one of the few people on this list without major ties to the Carter or Clinton Administration.
Jim Steinberg, former Deputy National Security Advisor - Another Clinonista, the former Deputy National Security Advisor.
This leaves off people like Samantha Power, Robert Malley, Zbignew Brezhinski, Daniel Kurzer and Dennis Ross who are still hanging around and will definitely be part of an Obama Administration.
What we basically have here is a whole slew of people associated with the Carter and Clinton foreign policies, which were not exactly noted for defending the country. To paraphrase an old joke, you goes into the votin' booth and you takes your choice.
5 comments:
Very good post, JP. Linked. http://wolfhowling.blogspot.com/2008/06/interesting-posts-from-around-web-19.html
Thanks GW!
Wasn't Warren Christopher Cyrus Vance's #2 in the Carter administration but the Sec. of State for Clinton's first term?
Susan Rice was also responsible for ignoring the metastasizing threat of Bin Laden during the 90's.
And I do think it says something that one of the saner members of Clinton's foreign policy team, James Woolsey - whom Clinton ignored - is advising McCain.
Mea culpa, SD on Christopher. I've edited the piece ot reflect the error!
Susan Rice is indeed one scary Lewftist intellectual...google and read some of her papers sometime.
Shabbat Shalom to you and the team!
rm
My knowledge of Susan Rice comes from books like "Losing bin Laden" by Richard Miniter. (At that time Richard Clarke seemed like a good guy; about the only one taking the terror threat seriously in the Clinton administration.)
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