The Anchoress
I don’t care how much the press heralds her. I don’t care how well she does when she is “on script.”
She has a political tin ear. She has a lesser gift for diplomacy than even I. And that is saying something.
Last year, among friends, she declared, “we’re going to have to take some things away from you, for the common good.”
Whoops, she didn’t mean for that to get out!
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton has touched off a diplomatic flap with Iraq’s incoming government by questioning whether the leading candidate to become the next prime minister is too close to Iran’s ayatollahs.
The likely new prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, shot back at Clinton, who just completed a visit to Iraq, by questioning her credibility as a spokeswoman for U.S. foreign policy.
“Hillary Clinton, as far as I know, does not represent any political decision or the American administration and I don’t know why she said this,” al-Jaafari told The Times of London.
“She knows nothing about the Iraq situation,” he added.
Clinton had infuriated al-Jaafari — selected this week by the dominant Shiite political conglomerate to become prime minister — by saying his past connections to Iran are cause for “concern.”
The former first lady, considering running for president in 2008, ignited the diplomatic tempest after she appeared on NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday and noted al-Jaafari’s leadership of the Dawa Party, a conservative Shiite group with longstanding ties to Iran.
“There are grounds for concern and for vigilance about this,” said Clinton, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
“I am willing to look at the situation and not yet jump to conclusions,” she added.
“But I don’t believe there is by any means a large body of opinion that wants to cede independence and control over Iraq’s future to Iran.”
Clinton’s office did not respond to requests for comments on al-Jaafari’s remarks about her.
This is why when she goes on tour, it’s always a “listening” tour. She’s just awful off script.
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