09/10/15 – Jack Mirkinson – The Scott Horton Show

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All right, y'all, welcome back to the show.
I'm Scott Horton.
It's my show, The Scott Horton Show.
Up next is Jack Merkinson.
He's got this piece at salon.com today about Hillary Clinton's big speech at the Brookings Institution.
Welcome to the show.
Jack, how are you?
I'm good.
How are you?
I'm very good.
Very appreciative of you joining us on the show today.
And you know, it's fun.
Part of what's fun about the election season is watching the politicians, on one hand, giving their pitch to the donors with all the money, and then on the other hand, trying to pretend they never said any of that to everybody else, that they're trying to get to vote for them, that they're trying to persuade with all that money to support them.
Oftentimes, those interests diverge.
And so it's just like this, right?
They give one big stump speech about one thing, then they go to the think tank and they say a bunch of stuff that, not that she would necessarily contradict herself out on the road, but she would never bring this stuff up and talk this way out on the road.
But here at Brookings, she lets them know, well, what?
Tell us.
Well, you know, she was giving a speech about the diplomatic deal that the Obama administration and a few other countries have struck with Iran, you know, and sort of the overall headline, I guess, was that she supports the deal, which, as I said, by this point, is hardly, you know, an act of extreme political courage, given that the deal's implementation is basically assured since there's no chance that it will be overturned by Congress because they have all the votes to override any presidential veto if they block the deal.
And in fact, if anything, it's cowardice because we all know she'd like to oppose it, but she can't because she was Obama's secretary of state.
She has to support this.
And so she's giving in and cowering instead of standing up for her horrible beliefs.
Right.
You know, I mean, I have no idea what is in Hillary Clinton's mind about what she truly feels about the Iran deal.
But I would imagine that if the political situation was different, she might view this as a good opportunity to break with Obama and set a different path.
But I think you're right that she feels like she has no choice but to stand behind, you know, this very major portion of Obama's diplomatic legacy.
But on the other hand, she did want to send different signals about what she would do.
And as is often the case with Hillary Clinton, and this was really the major thrust of the thing that I wrote, those signals were invariably very, very hawkish signals.
You know, Hillary Clinton throughout her political career has made a point of being very, very supportive of going to war or of military intervention.
And a lot of her speech really backed that up.
She talked about expanding the military presence of the United States in the region around Iran.
She explicitly said that she would not hesitate to attack Iran militarily if there were signs that they were developing a nuclear weapon, which is, you know, a pretty standard thing for politicians in the United States to say.
But when you step back and think about it, if Iran went around and said, well, if the United States does this thing we don't like, we will bomb them.
The United States would have a bit of a problem with that.
Well, of course, you could imagine her saying something along those lines, but in a much easier way, like, hey, look, you know, we can have confidence that this deal, it's a good deal and whatever.
Now, look, if on the off chance that things go wrong, then there are still other options.
And that's still horrible.
And I'm still against it.
But instead, she chooses to be as belligerent as possible as possible about it.
You know, don't forget, we had the H-bomb, you know, basically.
Right.
Yeah.
And, you know, and that is really in line with the stances that she has taken for decades, certainly at least since she became a senator in her own right.
Although, you know, she her husband, when he was in office, was certainly not averse to using the military.
And there was no sign that she ever opposed any of that.
But certainly once she got to the Senate, she infamously backed the war in Iraq.
She, you know, which was a big mistake of hers.
But, you know, she she comes down time and time again on the side of war.
And when she was secretary of state, if you look at her history, every single time there was any debate about whether or not the Obama administration was going to intervene someplace, she was always, always on the side of intervention.
She in terms of escalating the war in Afghanistan, in terms of intervening in Syria and especially in terms of attacking Libya, which she was really at the heart of and which has become just an unholy disaster in terms of how that turned out.
Yeah, well, for sure.
Now, before we get into those and I want to take them in order, actually, but there's also the matter of her letter.
I think it was her letter to Haim Saban about the BDS movement and how she was going to do everything she could to try to thwart that.
Are you familiar with that part of the story?
I'm not completely familiar with that letter, but it's absolutely no surprise to me that she would be taking that stance.
You know, I think that that most most politicians running for the presidency certainly, you know, would would try to send those signals.
But she has also, you know, been using Israel as another way to break with with the Obama administration, which a lot of hardliners on Israel think has been much too hard on Israel.
And so she has made a lot of different sort of intimations that she disagrees with the way the Obama administration has dealt with Israel and that she would have been more publicly diplomatic with Benjamin Netanyahu and that she would have, you know, and that she would basically have no daylight publicly between the between her public positions and Israel's public positions.
And so it's not surprising to me that she would want to send that kind of public signal to one of her biggest donors and biggest supporters.
Well, and we remember, I think, from the convention, there was that big I forgot exactly what the resolution was, but it was something about the occupation where, you know, the whole crowd, it was a voice vote and the whole crowd, basically two thirds, at least supermajority type thing, supported the resolution.
And then the I think it was the mayor of L.A. was administering the the the thing.
And he looked over for instructions and went ahead and and squashed the motion.
It was something to criticize.
So this is and of course, the Republicans are completely locked up for the Israel lobby.
So if there's any dissent and there is there's any dissent about American Israel policy, it, you know, in American politics, it's in the Democratic Party.
But again, major schism between what the people at the Brookings Institution want to hear in her speech and what the people on the road want to hear when it comes to that issue, for sure.
Yeah, I think I think that's absolutely true.
You know, I think the past few years you've seen actually a real growth in skepticism at the very least about the U.S. relationship with Israel.
But in terms of at the elite level, you know, I think that really hasn't happened in the same way.
Yeah.
And now I think it was in Glenn Greenwald's piece where he points out a quote of hers where she says, you know, if if I thought the Iran deal in any way compromise Israeli security at all, then I would absolutely, you know, oppose it, do anything to stop it.
But no mention of American interests even in the statement at all is all about Israel.
But, you know, in her judgment, this is good for Israel.
That's why she supports it only.
You know, she she definitely wants to hit that point as hard as she can.
You know, and I mean, you can you can see why there are there are a lot of very powerful people who are very big supporters of Israel, who are within the Democratic Party, you know.
And if and and if you are if you have attained the level that Hillary Clinton has reached in American politics, you are going to be very, very sympathetic to those of you.
So I don't even know she should be embarrassed.
He just says that.
All right.
Now, I'm sorry.
I got to put you on hold here.
We got to take this break, but we'll be right back.
Everybody with Jack Murchison, Murchison, sorry, from salon dot com.
Right after this.
Talking about Hillary's big Brookings speech.
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All right, you guys.
Welcome back.
I'm Scott Horton.
It's my show.
Scott Horton show.
What Hillary Clinton wants you to forget, but can't help but keep reminding you her disastrous record as a war hawk.
That's the article at Salon dot com.
It's by Jack Merkinson.
And you were very kind and left out her making up with Bill after Lewinsky over the bombing of Serbia.
She called Bill and urged him to bomb.
She told Gail Sheehy, her authorized biographer.
And that was how they made up again after the big scandal of 98.
Yeah, I didn't go that far back in history.
You're very gracious.
Yeah, no, you could have.
But anyway.
So, yeah, now you mentioned we talked about Palestine.
I think we pretty much covered that.
I guess we could talk about.
Do you know much about what she said or didn't say during what there were there one or two different Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip on her watch as secretary of state?
Do you remember?
I think there was one.
I think there I think there was the one just as the Obama administration came in to office, I think.
Right.
Yeah, we won't count that one because they actually wrapped it up like the day before the inauguration or whatever.
Right.
Yeah.
Yeah.
But there was one in 2012.
Yes.
And then again in 2014.
Right.
So and then I guess whatever role she played in 2012, I don't really remember specifically her doing anything, but I guess she sure as hell didn't make it better, did she?
No, I don't think she did.
You know, I mean, there has been a pretty standard policy in terms of how the United States, you know, deals with Israel, especially during Israeli attacks, you know, going back a ways.
And the Obama administration really hasn't deviated that much from that policy.
They've had rifts with the Israelis over different things.
But in terms of their essential support, you know, or their standing back, you know, when there is a flare up of violence in Israel and in Palestine, you know, they haven't really changed what has been the natural American stance.
And, you know, I don't think I think Hillary Clinton would not have been the one to push for that change during her time in office.
Yeah.
All right.
Now you mentioned her role in the Afghan surge.
And boy, there's something.
It's like the Korean War or some of the forgotten war that nobody remembers or talks about.
It was in nobody who was in love with Obama's interest to highlight.
And of course, all the war hawks who hate Obama, they still like surges.
So they didn't have a problem with it.
So it's just the libertarians really complained about it at the time.
And but it was really a big deal, right?
I mean, she she really helped Petraeus and McChrystal politically in their fight against the president to basically just leave him all the way out on a limb by himself where, you know, then he felt like he had no choice but to compromise and go ahead and do it.
Right.
And and, you know, she she was an enthusiastic proponent of escalating the war, you know, and of course, it didn't really work out too well, you know, and but that but that's really that was really the role that she played throughout her time at the State Department.
And that was at the very beginning of the Obama administration, you know, so it was really a key indicator of the kind of role that she would play for the next four years.
Yeah.
And boy, I mean, who didn't see that coming as soon as she was made secretary of state?
I mean, I could see why Obama didn't want to have her as a senator while he was a president, because that could be a problem.
But man, making her the secretary of state, that was just we're destined to, you know, get into some kind of mess or three.
And now, yeah, the Libya war.
I mean, this is supposedly Obama's only doctrine is don't do stupid stuff.
Right.
And then talk about a war of choice.
Let's get rid of Muammar Gaddafi that George W.
Bush finally had brought in from the cold and had made a deal with and had normalized relations with.
Yeah.
Well, you know, you talk about Afghanistan being the forgotten war.
I think Libya even more so, you know, it's like beyond Benghazi, which has become such a sort of, you know, cartoonish politicized kind of controversy.
Nobody ever talks about what actually went on in Libya, which is that, you know, the West invaded and completely destroyed the country.
I mean, you know, it's basically it's hardly even a recognizable place anymore.
It's been completely, completely upended, you know, and it's directly contributing to a lot of the other problems that we're seeing around the world, certainly in terms of the refugee crisis in Europe.
A lot of these refugees have been coming from Libya, which has become so destabilized from from the Western intervention.
And Hillary Clinton was really one of the key players in shaping the decision and the strategy in terms of in terms of that invasion.
And it's been a huge catastrophe.
Yeah.
In fact, there's a recent email where one of her aides, I don't know if it's Sidney Blumenthal or someone who actually works directly for her, is saying, yes, you know, we should coin this the Clinton doctrine.
This is how we do business now.
This is her big thing.
And in fact, when The Washington Times came out with their four part series, which I know The Washington Times, you could lump them in with the childish Benghazi coverage a lot of the time.
But they did this great four part series about how Dennis Kucinich, the CIA and the D.O.D. tried to stop the war and negotiate with Gaddafi's son for a subregime change and a peace deal and whatever.
Carter Ham from AFRICOM was in on it and no one could stop Hillary Clinton.
She crushed all their efforts.
And I mean, I haven't I haven't read that.
Oh, yeah.
No, you got to look at it.
It's by Kelly Riddell.
Riddell is her last name.
Four part series.
Great journalism.
I know it's The Mooney Times, but really great journalism there.
No, you know, and after that happened, wind up anywhere.
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I went back.
Yeah.
No.
Yeah, I did in this case.
But I went back and checked in there.
Michael Hastings and Josh Rogan and a few other people had all told the same story about how they had, you know, on the two couches in the Oval Office.
They had the secretary, the national security adviser and his deputy, the secretary of defense and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff all opposed.
And the secretary of defense was the Republican Robert Gates at the time even.
So Obama's right flank completely covered.
They were all against it.
And then on the other side was Hillary Clinton, Samantha Power and Susan Rice and their deputies.
And they said, no, we got to do it to save the poor people.
When the Benghazi slaughter was make believe anyway, it wasn't even going to happen.
We're talking the original Benghazi scam, not the second one.
And and Obama sided with them above all reason.
And when he had his his right flank covered politically to say, hey, all my military men are telling me not to do it.
Right.
And he did it anyway.
I mean, I think overall, certainly what the decisions around Libya highlight is that going to war is always a political choice, certainly for the United States, you know, despite despite the rhetoric that's thrown around about how under threat the United States is, the United States is overwhelmingly the most powerful military force in the history of the planet, you know.
And so far more often than not, when the United States decides to go to war, it is making a very political decision.
And so I think whatever diplomatic initiatives might have been crushed or stalled, you know, I think when there is a decision made that for whatever reason, war has to be waged.
If you know, certainly if you look at Iraq, there was, you know, and I remember when they were saying, oh, well, you know, we'll give we'll give Saddam 48 hours to get out and then maybe we won't bomb, you know.
But of course they were going to bomb because they had already decided that that's what they had to do for a variety of different reasons that we all know about.
And so I think in Libya, you know, is a deeply political decision.
And, you know, unfortunately, the world has reaped the consequences of that decision ever since.
And then, as you mentioned, and tying right in a segue right in literally from the Mujahideen in Libya, taking all of Gaddafi's captured guns, moving on to Mali and forging a revolution there.
And then, but more famously on to Syria, where they hijacked the Arab Spring uprising there and turned it into a war of bin Laden nights versus the the secular coalition government there.
Something that she pushed hard.
And after she resigned, she complained publicly in The New York Times, threw Obama under the bus for not doing enough to help the mythical moderates over there.
Right.
I mean, it's you know, it's very striking that, you know, she hasn't she hasn't publicly broken with Obama about that many things.
But but but most of them have been about foreign policy.
And most of that has been about how she would have been, quote unquote, tougher, you know, held a harder line than Obama did and how disappointed she was that that he didn't, you know, and and and Syria is a classic example of that.
All right.
That's Jack Merkinson.
He's at Salon.com.
What Hillary wants you to forget her disastrous record as a war hawk.
Thanks, Jack.
Thank you.
Hey, I'll Scott Horton here.
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