David Broder doesn’t like the idea of Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State. There is the Bill problem, but this is the heart of his complaint:
What Obama wants and needs in the person running the State Department is a diplomat who will carry out his foreign policy. He does not need someone who will tell him how to approach the world or be his mentor in international relations. One of the principal reasons he was elected was that, relying on his own instincts, he came to the correct conclusion that war with Iraq was not in America’s interest.
No, no, say conservatives. That’s exactly why America needs Hillary. She is there to prevent Obama from following his instincts, to curb his dangerous and naive tendencies, and to explain that the world is filled with scheming and dangerous characters. We don’t want a lackey (John Kerry comes to mind) to say, “Sure Mr. President, the faster you pull out of Iraq the better!” We need someone to explain the dangers of that approach — and assure him that the Left wing of the Democratic base doesn’t have any real sway at this point. He doesn’t need someone to schedule tea with Ahmadinejad. He needs someone to explain that conservatives can call it “preconditions” and he can call it “preparations,” but there is no reason on Earth for the President to give the Holocaust-denying and terrorist-sponsoring Ahmadinejad the greatest propaganda coup (i.e. a face-to-face meeting with the leader of the Free World) he could ever hope to obtain.
In short, President Obama’s underlying instincts are peppered with dangerous misconceptions which, if followed, will set back the security of the U.S. and its allies. It is up to Hillary (or, if Obama’s not smart enough to figure out a Bill solution, someone equally savvy, tough and cunning) to defend U.S. interests and guide him back to a centrist course on foreign policy.
Oh, but this is so undemocratic! The President is supposed to run the show! Well, the State Department has a tried and true tradition of manipulating and pressuring the White House. Usually it works to “curb” Republican Presidents, but there is no reason that a Secretary Clinton couldn’t employ that same bag of tricks (e.g. leaking, back-channel negotiations, unauthorized statements, inter-agency politics) to give the future occupant some spine and our foreign policy some needed toughness.
The fact that the President-elect is considering Hillary might even suggest that he is aware that’s what he needs. If so, that’s one instinct he should follow.
