Frankenstein's back, with a resounding endorsement of Barack Obama. I refer, of course, to the reemergence in public of former Clinton Secretary of State Madeleine Albright.
Albright chastized Bush and defended Obama's statement that he would be happy to talk to Iran and other enemies of the United States. Albright blasted the current approach to the Middle East and made the anodyne point that it is just as important to converse with one's adversaries as it is to converse with one's friends.
The problem, of course, is not with talking with folks like Mahmoud Ahmedinejad. The problem is: who is going to do the talking? Certainly a President McCain has the experience and resolve to sit across the table with the bad guys and not fall for their deceptions or give in to their pressures. With an unseasoned guy like Obama, whose global experience may be confined to an occasional visit to the International House of Pancakes, who knows?
With Albright too it is credibility that becomes an issue. On May 11, 1996 this woman was asked by a television interviewer for "60 Minutes" whether she was troubled by the fact that Clinton-supported sanctions had resulted in the death of 500,000 Iraqi children. "It's a hard choice," she replied, "but we think it's worth it."
Leftists should keep Albright's response in mind when they wail about civilian casualties as a consequence of Bush's war in Iraq. Iraq Body Count keeps track of these casualties, and they are less than one-fifth the number of innocent civilians (mostly children) killed in the aftermath of sanctions. Sanctions had no effect on Saddam or his henchmen, who didn't miss a meal. Rather, they hurt the most vulnerable members of Iraqi society.
These facts remind us not only of the shortcomings of sanctions, which are not likely to work better with Iran than they did with Iraq. They also remind us that bad things in the world must be measured not against utopia but against what came before. Bush's Iraq war has resulted in a steep reduction of Iraqi deaths compared to the 300,000 people Saddam deposited in the mass graves and compared to the even greater number of deaths that Clinton's policies seem to have produced.
Still, I come back to Albright's original dismissal of half a million deaths with the calm affirmation: it's worth it. Can you recall another secretary of state making a remark more shockingly callous than Albright's? How this Frankenstein became the first female secretary of state remains a mystery.
And it is this same person who would presume to lecture us on what we should now be doing with Iran. I don't think we need more advice from Albright. Rather, what we need from her is an apology, followed by an overdue withdrawal from public life.
Reader Comments ( Page 2 of 14)
16. Dinesh, we can always dig up history of people making callous remarks ... George Bush making fun of Karla Faye Rucker for instance:
In the weeks before the execution, Bush says, a number of protesters came to Austin to demand clemency for Karla Faye Tucker. "Did you meet with any of them?" I ask. Bush whips around and stares at me. "No, I didn't meet with any of them", he snaps, as though I've just asked the dumbest, most offensive question ever posed. "I didn't meet with Larry King either when he came down for it. I watched his interview with Tucker, though. He asked her real difficult questions like, 'What would you say to Governor Bush?'" "What was her answer?" I wonder. "'Please,'" Bush whimpers, his lips pursed in mock desperation, "'don't kill me.'" I must look shocked — ridiculing the pleas of a condemned prisoner who has since been executed seems odd and cruel — because he immediately stops smirking.
JimCO at 9:15AM on Jun 29th 2008
17. Let's see, Dinesh D'Souza was Assistant Second Gopher to the Assistant to the Adviser of the Under Secretary in the Reagan white house, and Madeline Albright was the first female Secretary of State.
Just level setting.
Ryan Anderson at 9:43AM on Jun 29th 2008
18. The CORONATION of "Barry" Obama from Chicago...
Sounds like something out of Mad Magazine. Come to think of it..."Barry" is a slightly darker version of the pale, freckle-faced, skinny kid that once graced the cover of this classic magazine. Yeah...the kid with the big ears and that silly grin on his face. The one that coined the phrase: "What, me worry?" His name was "Alfred E. Neuman."
Substitute the cover photo on that same magazine today (which only collectors will have now) with a grinning, toothy, big-eared "Barry" from Chicago and write "CHANGE" under it.
Actually, take all of the controversial proclamations this guy has made, along with those of his 20 year pastor (now "under a bus" somewhere in Chicago) quotes from his 2 books, quotes from his debates, interviews and cozy speeches in private meetings (ie: the "guns and religion" thing in San Francisco) etc. and that would fill up an entire Special Edition of a modern-day Mad Magazine, wouldn't it?
Get the picture? Why hasn't someone out there thought of this already?
Dee at 10:17AM on Jun 29th 2008
19. Re: HILLARY and "BARRY" kiss and make up...
Well, aren't they cute? Hillary...in blue and "Barry" in a matching (blue) tie. Looks like a wedding rehearsal...the two of them...up on that stage...hugging...looking into each other's eyes...with such respect and compassion.
Like a scene out of "Rosemary's Baby" when the crowd of devilish onlookers...tell her (Rosemary) "you'll get used to him and learn to love him dear."
Life...imitating art.
Dee at 10:23AM on Jun 29th 2008
20. "John mccain has the resolve...." DD, you really haven't been paying attention. mccain has flip-flopped even more than Obama. First mccain was against torture, but then voted for it. First mccain was against bush's tax cuts, but then voted for them and now wants to make them permanent. First mccain spoke of "agents of intolerance" on the religious right, but has gone out of his way to cultivate their support. How resolute!!! (sic).
Get Cliff Schecter's book THE REAL MCCAIN and read how carefully the author has documented mccain's numerous flip-flops, instances of pandering, and volatile temper including calling his wife a
"c--t" in public.
Marty Adams at 10:24AM on Jun 29th 2008
21. DD - "With an unseasoned guy like Obama, whose global experience may be confined to an occasional visit to the International House of Pancakes, who knows?"
Seriously? This may be the least accurate, most deceptive thing DD has said in weeks.
Ryan Anderson at 10:52AM on Jun 29th 2008
22. Get the picture? Why hasn't someone out there thought of this already?
Dee at 10:17AM on Jun 29th 2008
-----------------------------------------
Because it took a person that both hated obama and loved mad magazine to say it, and most people that loved mad magazine are smarter than that.
So, how's it feel, being a racist idiot, I mean? I guess you'll be voting for the angry old white dude with alzheimer's, then. Great.... Hey, his campaign staff is practically all lobbyists, he changed all his former "maverick" views to match the neocon standard, he has changed his position on other things more times than a fidgety five year old with poison ivy on his nuts, his lovely wife is a former drug addict (look it up) and he thinks merely talking tough and weilding a big stick is a valid foreign policy, just like his newfound buttbuddy bush did. Yeah, that's a great CHANGE, huh?
But hey, "What? Me Worry?" huh? Don't vote for the funny looking smart skinny black guy that has most of the right positions on things. No, never do THAT... Why, it's best to get another RETARD in there, huh? As long as he's white. say, that John McCain graduated right at the very BOTTOM of his class.... OOH! LET'S PICK HIM!
Godless Heathen Brian at 11:13AM on Jun 29th 2008
23. Get over it DD. You Reepukes are history in November.
Larry at 11:16AM on Jun 29th 2008
24. GHB - "Because it took a person that both hated obama and loved mad magazine to say it, and most people that loved mad magazine are smarter than that"
Nice one.
Ryan Anderson at 11:22AM on Jun 29th 2008
25. DD - "With an unseasoned guy like Obama, whose global experience may be confined to an occasional visit to the International House of Pancakes, who knows?"
--------------------
Yeah Ryan, DD's a little bitch. He thinks he's funny. But oabma's lived abroad, experienced other cultures and worldviews... What's Bush ever done? And while McCain's travelled and stayed abroad, (granted not of his own volition for five years there) and had many other experiences that might have given him a broader perspective, I see no evidence of such a thing in his character. He's just not very bright. In order to benefit from travel and experiences abroad, you have to be smart enough to actually learn new things. McCain's a war hero, no doubt, but that's where it ends for me. He's not the man to lead us anywhere we want to go. He's a dunce. An angry dunce. The very worst kind. (See G. W. Bush for reference)
Godless Heathen Brian at 11:23AM on Jun 29th 2008
26. McCain's wife was true to him while he was a POW, for all those years, and Our Man John dumped her like a piece of refuse practically as soon as he saw her and how her looks had changed due to illness. He then promptly married his much younger current meal ticket, with whom he was already having an affair. Nice. Sterling character.
Godless Heathen Brian at 11:31AM on Jun 29th 2008
27. It's interesting how McCain had gradually morphed from a maverick to a gelding eating his oats out of Bush's hand. He should never have surrendered his nuts like that.
Godless Heathen Brian at 11:35AM on Jun 29th 2008
28. It is a perfect page to go to if you have limited intelligence, you can probably hang out there with DoubleD.
JefFlyingV at 2:54AM on Jun 29th 2008
Another example of an elitist inferring about unlimited intelligence by leftists.
Greg at 11:40AM on Jun 29th 2008
29. How Cindy McCain was outed for drug addiction
When an attempt to get tough with a whistleblower backfired in 1994, the McCain spin machine went into overdrive, and the candidate's wife confessed to problems the media was already poised to reveal.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
By Amy Silverman
Oct. 18, 1999 | PHOENIX -- GOP presidential candidate John McCain's wife Cindy took to the airwaves last week, recounting for Jane Pauley (on "Dateline") and Diane Sawyer (on "Good Morning America") the tale of her onetime addiction to Percocet and Vicodin, and the fact that she stole the drugs from her own nonprofit medical relief organization.
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/1999/10/18/drugs/
--------------------------------------------------
Oh, and she actually STOLE drugs from her workplace!
I can't believe the republicans trys to slur Michelle Obama, with Cindy McCain's sordid past.
Godless Heathen Brian at 11:41AM on Jun 29th 2008
30. How Cindy McCain was outed for drug addiction
When an attempt to get tough with a whistleblower backfired in 1994, the McCain spin machine went into overdrive, and the candidate's wife confessed to problems the media was already poised to reveal.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
By Amy Silverman
Oct. 18, 1999 | PHOENIX -- GOP presidential candidate John McCain's wife Cindy took to the airwaves last week, recounting for Jane Pauley (on "Dateline") and Diane Sawyer (on "Good Morning America") the tale of her onetime addiction to Percocet and Vicodin, and the fact that she stole the drugs from her own nonprofit medical relief organization.
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/1999/10/18/drugs/
--------------------------------------------------
Oh, and she actually STOLE drugs from her workplace!
I can't believe the republicans trys to slur Michelle Obama, with Cindy McCain's sordid past.
Godless Heathen Brian at 11:43AM on Jun 29th 2008