Worth reading David Brooks today mocking the Democrats. In part, I just mean that if she can make anything he writes seem halfway plausible, she's not someone I'd admire. But more, as a portrait by him is necessarily really unfair, read it as a preview of the GOP spin and smear on whomever is nominated.

In that light, the lines on Edwards and Obama are predictable but, I think, ones we can handle. Yes, we know Edwards is a wealthy trial lawyer, but I think that limousine liberal line can be dealt with by someone this good at responding to it, even though I know the media and spin machine will keep pushing it. The Obama line that he's bland is going to stick, but it's it's also a fairly bland criticism to have to last out a campaign against a real person speaking.

But the Clinton criticism is, I think, going to be easier for them to keep using, including quotes in or out of context. I know she's popular in the polls and praised for responding effectively to criticism, but I just don't think she's half as safe a candidate as the Beltway thinks. 

John 

http://www.haberarts.com/

WH: I went back and read Todd again (the post on Dowd style knife jobs and her obsession with what she sees as the Clinton character issue). As far as your post is concerned, you do well making your points. So, where’s the part on which you half disagree with Gitlin? (Was it the Socks stuff?) And,

If only she was a different style Democrat!

Kevin Russell Cook

Thank you for one of the few articles I have read recently that isnt utterly crazy or needlessly personal and insulting. I too want Hillary tested hard by the primaries. I want to like Obama but he hasnt shown me toughness yet (meaning to toughness to take on what the Repubs will certainly throw at him). Someone said he demonstrated grace under pressure at the debate, which I thought was utterly nuts since he was under no pressure at all. And frankly, having listened now to her response on the immigration - license issue three times, I fail to see where she said different things. I thought her answer was crystal clear. She is not personally in favor of it from a national policy perspective but will let governors call their own shots on public safety. What is wrong with that? The fact that Edwards immediately accused her of saying two things, which she didnt, has left a bad taste in my mouth for Edwards. The media of course want nothing more than to tear down whomever the front runner is, but that seems to only apply to Hillary as I hear very little about how uniquely unqualified Giuliani is except from Biden (God Bless Biden). On the other hand Hillary had better be more adept at dealing with attacks since she will be attacked mercilessly if she is the nominee. Frankly, what appeals to me about her is she is tough, Machiavellian, shrewd, cunning and super smart: just the sort of person I want sitting across the table from Putin et al.

But eliminate all nuclear weapons? I dont see that happening ever. The fact is that they are here to stay, and the best control we have ever had over them is mutually assured destruction.

Finally, for those who think she is a corporatist sell out, I dont see it. What she and Bill do strongly believe in is that in our system sometimes you get 30% of the loaf, not 100%. Some people think that is selling out. I say that is representative democracy in action. I am frankly sick and damn tired of people drawing lines in the sand and refusing to find common ground and compromise. Thats exactly where we are on immigration and....so....we do nothing. Sometimes getting less than all you want seems like selling out, but it isnt. The sell out comes from those who refuse compromise and thereby lock us into complete inaction. The failure to tackle issues with bi-partisan compromise over the past 20 years is one of our most damning failures, in my opinion. Mind you I blame the Repubs far more than the Dems. But we had better find a way out of our perpetual gridlock or we are truly doomed.

Since the threshold for any female candidate is will she be tough enough it makes it encumbant on Clinton to show she is tough. The differences between Edwards, Obama and Clinton are so minimal and have to be worked on to be enlarged.

Edwards is presenting himself as a bit more of a populist, wil he stick to that emphasis in a general election, and is cut between not promising to remove troops from Iraq while saying he will, and not being sure if genocide should begin in Iraq. However, at hear the three leaders, indeed, the top six, Democrats are remarkably similar in their positions.

Hillary's approach to being attacked is to deflect the attack to a "we are in this together" against Bush and then to contrast Democrats with Bush. It lets her be tough, nonconfrontational with fellow Democrats while seeming to speak for all Democrats against Bush.

Daniel A. Greenbaum

Look at the lack of accomplishments during Bill Clinton's presidency.

As to compare to ...?

A HRC presidency will be, at very best, incrementalist,
Great!!!

Hillary's approach to being attacked is to deflect the attack to a "we are in this together" against Bush and then to contrast Democrats with Bush. It lets her be tough, nonconfrontational with fellow Democrats while seeming to speak for all Democrats against Bush.

 Who is Senator Clinton to beleive that she gets to speak for all Democrats? Who died and made her Queen? Isn't this what Edwards call running in the general election mode and not the truth mode? Is it chutzpah, for Hillary to believe she does not have to contend in the primaries for the Democratic base before even one vote is cast? I find the toughness you describe to be primarily a means not to take a principled stand on any issues. After all, GWBush is not even running. So, we will not have to worry about what GWBush would do>

I'd like to know how the author gets to say this:
"Her suggestion that she voted for the Iraq War resolution on the assumption that it would strengthen the United States' hand in dealing with Saddam Hussein, then felt "lied to" when Bush used the resolution to pave the path to war, is simply not credible."

Sorry?
Don't we all agree that Bush DID lie before taking us to war? Yes.
He DID say he wouldn't pull the inspectors out, etc. etc. etc.
I think Bush probably truly believed the weapons were there and the inspectors would find the wmd's and Saddam would refuse to give them up and we would go to war. I don't deny that.
But I seriously don't think too many Congresspeople thought at that time that he would actually pull the inspeactors, when it was made clear (Or so we thought. We don't torture either, right?) that that was one of the stipulations.

My husband was in a position to know that there were no WMD's in Iraq because of some of his military service during Gulf War I. He called Cheney a liar out loud when Cheney said he knew where the wmd's were on Aug. 22, 2002.
However, even he believed Bush would be caught at his game when the inspectors didn't find any wmd's.

We know a lot more about Bush now than we knew when that resolution was passed. For instance, I'm still shocked that Bush surged after The 2006 Thumpin'. Did anyone expect that spit in our face, even already knowing he's an asshole? In Oct 2001, 90% of America wanted to have a beer with him.

Before he invaded Iraq, I thought he was a buffoon. Now I think he's psychotic. There's a big difference in what we know now, and we've all had to go through a pretty sickening learning curve.

I just personally think all 2002 votes are past history (except for sending Bush and the neocons to the Hague for war crimes) and a part of the Cheney Machine, which many of us didn't realize has been lurking at the dials since coming to the WH as a young up and comer with Richard Nixon.

Otherwise, I'm fine with the rest of the piece.

if one sees a just resolution to the I/P conflict as a key element in really fighting the "war on terror" and beginning to repair our relationships with the rest of the world. he is delusional.

http://blogs.tnr.com/tnr/blogs/the_spine/default.aspx

Ms. Hughes contrived that to mean she was a strategist. If only the Senate had known, it would never have confirmed her. So she had ideas: the first, predictably, was to solve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I, for one, can't grasp how that would ease hostility against America in Afghanistan or Pakistan -- unless one assumes that all those angry men on the streets carry Palestine in their hearts. And what about the rancor in South America against the U.S.? Are Senor Chavez's multitudes also angered that Jews are in their holy places

Comparing HRC to Edwards makes a lot of sense. They do differ on several important issues and I don't mean money from lobbyists (both take it).

As for comparing HRC to Obama it makes limited sense to me. A candidate, i.e. Obama, who believes that he can reach out to the fascists of the Republican party is not a serious candidate.

"Hillary's prescription for the Middle East is a set of demands on Palestinians, without mentioning anything Israel has to do. On this issue, she is to the right of the Bush administration"

I wonder if it even matters where Hillary is if the following report from Arutz Sheva proves to be accurate:

21 Cheshvan 5768, November 2, '07
"Olmert 'Beating around Bush'

(IsraelNN.com) Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has told aides and foreign officials he intends to help American President George W. Bush meet his deadline for a new Arab state within Israel's current borders by the fall of 2008. President Bush has set the deadline, which coincides with the Presidential elections, almost three months before he leaves office.

Prime Minister Olmert has reasoned that Israel is better off with an agreement with the PA while President Bush is in office rather than have to deal with a different administration that may not be committed to Israel's retaining large population centers in Judea and Samaria."
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/Flash.aspx/135750

This is a tall order for Olmert and the puppets in the PA. Can they work out some sort of deal within a year that will satisfy anyone? Given the reluctance of the Israeli government to commit to anything resembling "timetables", I can't see how Abbas or even Fayyad could sign on to an agreement timed to coincide with the presidential elections.

I am also somewhat puzzled at the alleged timing of this deadline. What difference could it make in the elections? It's not as if this issue is a big deal for most American voters and given that the GOP candidates aren't on board with Bush at this point, where's the benefit for the party?

Oh well, it's early yet and if the PA Pinochets can be induced to sign on to an agreement that creates a Palestinian "state" that remains under Israeli control, the GOP presidential candidate could be persuaded to endorse the grand bargain.The American media and voters won't care about the difficult details as long as they are presented with photo ops that make them feel good.

It is certainly very gracious of PM Olmert to devote his efforts to helping out his buddy Bush and the Republicans just in time for our elections next November.

Fair or not, she has to show she will stand up to those who threaten America.

So when is she going to start standing up against the neocons?  Seems to me they are the major global threat to Americans.

Particularly is she essentially wraps up the nomination on 1/3 in Iowa. Americans will have 10 full months to remember why had pretty much had their stomachs full of Clintons in 2000. I'm not at all convinced Americans really want to go there again.

I personnaly think the 2002 votes are past history EXCEPT as the vote informs us on our current crop of candidates. I am looking for judgment. I am looking for due diligence, particularly when it comes to war.

Hillary was quick to accuse a "vast right wing conspiracy" when Bill was accused of an affar. Yet, when she is considering whether or not Bush, the leader of this conspiracy, should have the authority to put this nation at war, she trusted him? There is simply something wrong with this--it makes no logical sense.

I am also appalled that such an important decision was not preceded by fact-finding--like reading the classified NIE. Anyone who has spent any time around bureaucracy KNOWS that a written document is full of CYAs and contrary opinions. The NIE was full of that. Hillary, along with others who need to be placed into retirement by voters, didn't bother to read it.

Neither of these actions represent the type of due diligence and judgment that I expect of the next Prez. Hillary failed.

She's so much better than anyone the Republicans will put up that it's not even worth discussing.

On what accomplishments in her life to date do you base such a statement?

I don't agree about scandals but I agree with rest of Don's comment:

She was involved, in one way or another, in many of the administration's major events, initiatives and scandals, and was by most accounts a shrewd operator and her husband's most important and influential advisor.

That's not how Brad DeLong saw it:

My two cents' worth--and I think it is the two cents' worth of everybody who worked for the Clinton Administration health care reform effort of 1993-1994--is that Hillary Rodham Clinton needs to be kept very far away from the White House for the rest of her life. Heading up health-care reform was the only major administrative job she has ever tried to do. And she was a complete flop at it. She had neither the grasp of policy substance, the managerial skills, nor the political smarts to do the job she was then given. And she wasn't smart enough to realize that she was in over her head and had to get out of the Health Care Czar role quickly.

So when senior members of the economic team said that key senators like Daniel Patrick Moynihan would have this-and-that objection, she told them they were disloyal. When junior members of the economic team told her that the Congressional Budget Office would say such-and-such, she told them (wrongly) that her conversations with CBO head Robert Reischauer had already fixed that. When long-time senior hill staffers told her that she was making a dreadful mistake by fighting with rather than reaching out to John Breaux and Jim Cooper, she told them that they did not understand the wave of popular political support the bill would generate. And when substantive objections were raised to the plan by analysts calculating the moral hazard and adverse selection pressures it would put on the nation's health-care system... [ellipses in original]

Hillary Rodham Clinton has already flopped as a senior administrative official in the executive branch--the equivalent of an Undersecretary. Perhaps she will make a good senator. But there is no reason to think that she would be anything but an abysmal president.

As my most recent blog entry says, I know I don't really know what the answer is-- Hillary, hypercompetent brains behind Bill, or Hillary, hyperentitled demonstration of the Peter Principle. None of us know. That's the issue.

"for those of us who tend to think the Palestinian issue is merely exploited by Arab leaders who actually could care less what happens to them, and given far too much attention by American foreign policymakers."

While it's true that most Arab leaders and Osama don't actually give a whit about what happens to Palestinians wherever they happen to be, their populations (most Lebanese excepted) and much of the civilized and not-so-civilized world does "care".

IMO, burying one's head ever more deeply in the sand in order to avoid that reality tends to deprive the brain of an element essential for the optimum cognition required to deal with I/P issues.

and much of the civilized and not-so civilized world does "care"
Yes, everything that has to do with Jews facinates much of the civilized and not-so civilized world for the better or for worse.
However, I doubt that "resolving", assuming it's posible, I/P conflict would make much difference
in the civilized and not-so civilized world.
But, please make no mistake, NOBODY really cares about Palestinians. It's not about them, it's about Jews.

"But, please make no mistake, NOBODY really cares about Palestinians. It's not about them, it's about Jews."

Really, Mr Secret Weapon Man?

Does that include the government of Brazil that has rescued some of the Palestinians stuck on Iraq's border and is offering to sponsor them, educate them, teach them Portuguese and proudly promises them their full rights as equal citizens of Brazil? The Brazilian government shames the world and provides an example by telling these lucky Palestinian refugees they are most welcome to make Brazil their home if they choose to do so.

Is that proof that the Brazilians are also a bunch of sneaky anti-semites who are so wily that they have concocted this elaborate and well-designed plan in order to make Jews look bad or something?

Damn. You just never know, do you?

Davai,

Your reasoning seems askew.

 Someone having lots of years to make mistakes  to learn from is not the type of experience needed.  The preference is for an individual with good judgment whose experience is based on being right. That person goes forward is far greater assurance and leadership capability than an individual who is learning from mistakes constantly.

I grant you that Hillary is intellectual smart, but as that paragraphed detailed she lacks the judgment to know when she is over her head and she compensates for that weakness by blustering and using power to force her way forward, carrying all in her tow reluctantly as they lack the power to stop her. Notice in the paragraph it says she lacked not just managerial and administrative skills but she was out of her depth on the subject matter and she had no political skills.

This is the same Hillary we see today. Nothing has changed. Her being smart means that she can run rings around the opposing views but her position is nevertheless ineffectual. We know this by looking at how she cast her votes for war and how she has become the largest recipient of health care contributions in the Senate. This is not a person who has learned from their mistakes at all.

Again, there are people who do not need years of 'experience' as they have the judgment to get it right the first time.  After all, experience is what you get when you don't get what you want.

there hasn't been a president in more than fifty years who has performed as expected. why should Hillary be any different?
she will probably do far better than her rabid detractors declare with their screams and shouts. anybody who says that they will vote for Rudy or Mitt if Hillary's the nominee are Republicans, clumsily muddying the waters, and nothing more.
i'm not a Hillary fan. i actually think that John Edwards is presently the best candidate from either party. he's not Our Savior, no, and neither are any of the rest of them. it's amazing how many people have to declare somebody as being more worthy than the other candidates actually are or even could be. it's ridiculous. America is not a nation of religious idealists. We are ruthless, we lie, we're selfish, we pick on the weak, we are pompous hypocrites, our record of altruism is spotty at best, and at the moment we, as a nation, have sunk to historical depths, morally. the closest we've come to having a good person as president in the last fifty years is Jimmy Carter and he was run out of town after one term.
i'm a Democrat, warts and all, and i'll vote for Hillary a year from now. i'm not going to stay at home that day, and i certainly won't vote for Rudy the lying fascist, or Mitt the clueless chameleon. one can only hope, with some degree of possibility, that Hillary as president will be an improvement over the current regime. it's a shamefully low standard to be using, but these are the times in which we live.

it's not like she's a neo-con, after all.

She just plays one on TV.

I continue to watch with fascination how presidential candidates respond to challenges and criticisms. They can all, especially apparent frontrunner Clinton, expect criticism that is unfair, exaggerated, and even insulting.

For example, the current charge that Clinton is whining and playing the gender card. It’s not true (she’s merely stated that her past has prepared her for all kinds of attacks and assaults), but how she responds will be revealing.

Another example. William Hartung writes, “Her suggestion that she voted for the Iraq War resolution on the assumption that it would strengthen the United States' hand in dealing with Saddam Hussein, then felt "lied to" when Bush used the resolution to pave the path to war, is simply not credible.” Plenty of people agree with that and she damn well needs to respond effectively.

For my part, I think Hartung’s statement is over simplification. Clinton, along with some of her contemporaries like John Kerry, wrote and delivered a contemporaneous speech when she voted for the AUMF. They succeeded in what they, and the Democratic leadership, claimed was their primary purpose. Language was included that forced Bush to go to the UN and get inspectors back on the ground in Iraq among other things. I love the fact that happened, the inspectors found nothing, took directions from the Bush people on where to look, found nothing. I wonder what would have happened otherwise. Would Bush have been better able to hide his lies about Iraq’s WMD threat? Don’t know.

I didn’t like it when the Democrats cut the deal with Bush and approved the AUMF. But I would never say that they weren’t credible. I’ve read the AUMF and the contemporaneous speeches several times. Their arguments were credible and defensible. Bush was going to invade anyway. I opposed, but I could have been wrong.

I continue to lay 99.99 percent of the blame on George Bush. The Democrats were trying to slow him down. The Democrats claimed Bush needed to get an additional and specific UN resolution to allow invasion. That resolution would not have happened.

So, Clinton, Edwards and the rest do have credibility with me. Like everybody else, I will judge how well they react and explain themselves. But I do not blame them for the invasion and occupation of Iraq. That’s ridiculous. That’s rewriting history and, in my opinion, rewriting the AUMF itself.

BTW, I favor outlawing AUMF’s. Such resolutions can too easily be abused by the party in power, in this case the Republicans. And they give the President too much power. There should be a specific declaration of war vote by Congress.

For example, the current charge that Clinton is whining and playing the gender card.
Of course, she is playing the gender card.
Obama is playing race card, Edwards is playing cancer card, Rudy is playing 911 card, McCain is plaing hero card.

Biden and Dodd have no cards to play, so they have no chances.

To me, the war issue trumps all others because I figure war is going to make all other priorities impossible. I won't vote for war with Iran. I won't vote for staying in Iraq. Therefore, I can't vote for Hillary. The fact that I have no other choice only demonstrates to me how dire our problem is but I don't see how that changes until enough people stop voting to enable two war parties. As it is, no other alternatives can even be voiced you are either for war with Iran in 5 minutes or war with Iran in 10 minutes. You might as well be living under martial law for all the non-martial choices there are on your ballot.

She's so much better than anyone the Republicans will put up that it's not even worth discussing.

On what accomplishments in her life to date do you base such a statement

Lady Hawk's motto: Me and Bill are stronger than dirt.

Best, Terry

Do you mean, for example, a principled Democrat? A progressive Democrat? A Democratic Democrat?

Yeah, if only.

I'm a woman Hillary's age and I think it is absurd to think any woman, no matter how smart and applauded by teachers, peers and parents, who entered adulthood in the mid-60s was cold-bloodly calculating a path to power and riches through politics and public service. Such a path, most especially for a woman, simply did not exist.

As a generation we, even the brightest, most advantaged and most ambitious of us, were raised to be good, not successful. To do good and serve -- our families, our communities -- not to lead. If, as a woman, you really were cold and calculating, you set your sights on an already powerful and established husband -- not a law degree and work involving the rights and welfare of children. If you wanted wealth, your best, and for the most part only, bet was to marry wealth. You certainly didn't risk your future on a poor boy with talent -- even if you believed, no matter how improbably, that some day he would be president. (It hadn't been that many years since Truman, remember, left the presidency almost destitute.)

I know its difficult for those, even other women, born as little as 10 or 15 years later to fully understand this. To understand the magnitude of difference between the lives women of our generation were prepared for and the lives we, in the face of rapidly and drastically changing realities, had to eventually learn, with very little guidance from the past, to prepare ourselves for. Between the traditional privileges our parents generation -- including an earlier generation of feminists -- presumed would be ours automatically, and the new responsibilities, that necessitated we demand new opportunities, that they and we never imagined.

When I look at Hillary's rise, I don't see a straight and calculated shot -- I see the zigs and zags, the conflict of priorities, the awakening to new possibilities, the assumption of greater and greater responsibility, the growing willingness to ask, more and more directly, not for the relatively easy to obtain, traditional benefits of male approval, but for much harder to earn actual respect and authority, that is in fact typical of the most successful women of my generation.

This doesn't mean that she is my choice for President. But it does mean that I believe most of the speculative blather about her character is pure BS.

Also, as to the silliness about Hillary or other successful woman as "man-haters" etc., I'd add this -- no woman working in mostly male arenas who doesn't genuinely like and respect men has any hope of getting very far. Any woman in my generation who has achieved any success in business, law or public life, has had to do it with the support and encouragement of male collegues, mentors and partners. And she had to earn that support by earning their respect -- with demonstrated honesty, competence and ability.

People who suggest otherwise not only make sexist assumptions about women, they also make sexist assumptions about men -- denigrating their sense of fair play and justice, as well as their committment to and respect for real competence and achievement.

She or he would lose General election in 48 states.

Sadly, this is likely true.

It will be much more satisfying to simply lose it in, say, Ohio, huh?

Mr. Hartung,

Before the war started, in November of 2002, Bill Clinton gave a speech to a convention of Britain's Labour Party that was intended to, and I believe did, bolster support for Tony Blair and his support for Bush and US policy toward Iraq. It was broadcast on C-Span. It was an extremely eloquent speech, and, if you can research and read it, I think it goes a long way to demonstrating the context in which Hillary cast her vote. I think both Clintons viewed Iraq in the context of his efforts in Bosnia, that they presumed too much good faith and competence on the part of the Bush administration, and I think they did, as the Republicans remind us over and over again, believe Saddam most probably had or was seeking weapons of mass destruction.

As I said, the speech is extremely eloquent. He almost had me convinced.

I'm going to quote some of the most pertinent parts, but I think it is worth reading in its entirety. You can find it at http://www.clintonfoundation.org/index.htm

"I want to talk about the larger context, the challenges that you and I share, the obligation to have everything we do contribute to building an integrated global community out of the interdependent world in which we find ourselves. You clapped when I made that comment about the United Nations and I am glad you did, but one of the challenges we face today is that all the international institutions in which we place such hope are still becoming, they are still forming.

We have only really had a chance to make them work for a little over a decade. The European Union is not what most people think and at least I hope it will be in five, 10 or 20 years; it is becoming. The United Nations is not what I hope it will be in five, 10 or 20 years. There are still people who vote in the United Nations based on the sort of old fashioned national self-interest views they held in the cold war or even long before, so that not every vote reflects the clear and present interests of the world and the direction we are going.

I take it almost everybody in this room supports what Prime Minister Blair and I did in Kosovo. (Applause) It was a clear and present emergency, you had a million people being driven from their homes, but in the end, even though we had all the Muslim world for it and most of the developing nations for it, all of Nato for it, we could not get a UN resolution because of the historic ties of the Serbs to the Russians. So we went in anyway and as soon as the conflict was over the Russians came in and did a very responsible job participating with the United States in an international UN sanction peacekeeping environment. Why? Why did that happen? Because the UN is still becoming.

You also see the same thing when we, the United States, do not contribute in my view as much as we should to international institutions. (Applause) You know I have a difference in opinion with the Republicans about whether we should be involved in the Kyoto protocol, the comprehensive test ban treaty, the international criminal court, and all these things, but these things stand for something larger which is our larger obligation to create an integrated world. You cannot have an integrated world and have your say all the time. And America can lead the world towards that but we cannot dominate and run the world in that direction. There is a big difference. (Applause)

So, having said that, do we want to strengthen these institutions? Yes. Why? Because they contribute to an integrated global community. But if we cannot solve all the problems what else do we do and how do we go about strengthening these institutions? One thing we know is that whenever possible the outcome is likely to be better if Great Britain and the United States, if the United States and Europe are working together. We have half a century of evidence to support that.

I am profoundly grateful for the partnership that we enjoyed in the years when I served as President; in Bosnia; in Kosovo; in the Middle East; in our work in Africa; in East Timor; in bringing China into the World Trade Organization and the community of nations; in trying to build alliances with Russia between the United States and Europe; all of the things we did together for global debt relief, and a hundred other issues; whenever we were working together the outcome was likely to be better.

I am profoundly grateful for Britain's involvement with the United States and with others in diplomatic efforts and where necessary in military ones. You were there when we turned back Slobodan Milosevic and the tide of ethnic cleansing which threatened every dream people had of a Europe united, democratic and at peace for the first time in history.

You were there in 1991 when the United States and the global alliance turned back Saddam Hussein's invasion of Kuwait. When we attacked Iraq Saddam Hussein threw the weapons inspectors out in 1998 you were there. And then when you were working towards peace in Northern Ireland we were there. (Applause)

Because of the recent headlines coming out of Northern Ireland I would like to say just a word about that. The Good Friday Accord gave hope to beleaguered peoples all across the globe, from the Middle East to the Indian sub-continent, to Cyprus, to Africa. George Mitchell told us at the time it was signed that signing the Good Friday Accord was the easy part, following through on it would require courage and constant commitment, and he turned out as usual to be right. So I would like to say today to the people of the land I have loved so well: keep your eyes on the prize and don't turn back. (Applause)

Whatever America did for Britain and Northern Ireland in the Irish peace process, you repaid 100 fold in the aftermath of September 11. Prime Minister Blair's firm determined voice bolstered our own resolve, his calm and caring manner soothed our aching hearts; and the British people pierced our darkness with the light of your friendship. In the aftermath of September 11th we went to work against terror in a world rudely awakened to its universal threat, and much more willing to support the actions necessary to prevail. I still believe our most pressing security challenge is to finish the job against Al Qaeda and its leaders in Afghanistan and any other place that they might hide. I would support even committing war forces to that. We have only about half as many forces in Afghanistan today that we had in Bosnia after the conflict was over and we were keeping the peace. I applaud Britain's commitment to finish the job in not only the conflict but to winning the peace, to staying in Afghanistan with an international force and with the kind of support necessary to make sure that we do not have the disaster that occurred when the West walked away from them 20 years ago. (Applause)

A few words about Iraq. I support the efforts of the Prime Minister and President Bush to get tougher with Saddam Hussein. I strongly support the Prime Minister's determination if at all possible to act through the UN. We need a strong new resolution calling for unrestricted inspections. The restrictions imposed in 1998 are not acceptable and will not do the job. There should be a deadline and no lack of clarity about what Iraq must do. There is no doubt that Saddam Hussein's regime poses a threat to his people, his neighbors and the world at large because of his biological and chemical weapons and his nuclear program. They admitted to vast stores of biological and chemical stocks in 1995. In 1998, as the Prime Minister's speech a few days ago made clear, even more were documented. But I think it is also important to remember that Britain and the United States made real progress with our international allies through the UN with the inspection program in the 1990s. The inspectors discovered and destroyed far more weapons of mass destruction and constituent parts with the inspection program than were destroyed in the Gulf War, far more, including 40,000 chemical weapons, 100,000 gallons of chemicals used to make weapons, 48 missiles, 30 armed warheads and a massive biological weapons facility equipped to produce anthrax and other bio-weapons. In other words the inspections were working even when he was trying to thwart them.

In December of 1998 after the inspectors were kicked out along with the support of Prime Minister Blair and the British military we launched Operation Desert Fox for four days. An air assault on those weapons of mass destruction, the air defense and regime protection forces. This campaign had scores of targets and successfully degraded both the conventional and non-conventional arsenal. It diminished Iraq's threat to the region and it demonstrated the price to be paid for violating the Security Council's resolutions. It was the right thing to do, and it is one reason why I still believe we had to stay at this business until we get all those biological and chemical weapons out of there. (Applause)

What has happened in the last four years? No inspectors, a fresh opportunity to rebuild the biological and chemical weapons program and to try and develop some sort of nuclear capacity. Because of the sanctions Saddam Hussein is much weaker militarily than he was in 1990, while we are stronger, but that probably has given him even more incentive to try and amass weapons of mass destruction. I agree with many Republicans and Democrats in America and many here in Britain who want to go through the United Nations to bring the weight of world opinion together, to bring us all together, too offer one more chance to the inspections.

President Bush and Secretary Powell say they want a UN resolution too and are willing to give the inspectors another chance. Saddam Hussein, as usual, is bobbing and weaving. We should call his bluff. The United Nations should scrap the 1998 restrictions and call for a complete and unrestricted set of inspections with a new resolution. If the inspections go forward, and I hope they will, perhaps we can avoid a conflict. In any case the world ought to show up and say we meant it in 1991 when we said this man should not have a biological, chemical and nuclear weapons program. And we can do that through the UN. The prospect of a resolution actually offers us the chance to integrate the world, to make the United Nations a more meaningful, more powerful, more effective institution. And that's why I appreciate what the Prime Minister is trying to do, in trying to bring America and the rest of the world to a common position. If he was not there to do this I doubt if anyone else could, so I am very, very grateful. (Applause)

If the inspections go forward I believe we should still work for a regime change in Iraq in non-military ways, through support of the Iraqi opposition and in trying to strengthen it. Iraq has not always been a tyrannical dictatorship. Saddam Hussein was once a part of a government which came to power through more legitimate means."

I'm not saying that Clinton is a victim. I'm simply saying that the kind of cold, long-term calculation she is constantly accused of is unlikely for a woman born into a generation of women that has, for the most part, had to rise to the occasion and make it up as we went along.

No argument at all with your general thesis.

I have been witness to the struggle women have had to be accepted as professionals and being told to go home to care for their children. If they had no children the usual for a successful woman was word that she slept her way to the top.

Times are a'changing. That is very good.

Best, Terry