Hillary Clinton on Iraq and Afghanistan

Hillary Clinton gave a press conference after her trip to Iraq and Afghanistan. Margaret Talev of McClatchy Newspapers has the story in the Kansas City Star:

Just back from Iraq and facing doubters in her own party, Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., on Wednesday opposed President Bush's plan to send more troops and offered an alternative that stops short of an immediate withdrawal or cutting funds.

Instead, Clinton called for capping U.S. troop deployments in Iraq at Jan. 1 levels, beginning soon to move them out of Baghdad and eventually redeploying forces to Afghanistan. She also stressed that Iraq's government must meet benchmarks for political progress before it gets more U.S. aid.

Despite Clinton's stiffened posture on Iraq, the war remains a political burden for her as she weighs a 2008 run for the presidency. The Democratic Party base is staunchly anti-war and displeased that she has never rejected her October 2002 vote to authorize the war. While she's voicing greater opposition to Bush's war leadership, she's not as fervently anti-war as some of her rivals for the 2008 Democratic nomination.

(snip)

Much like the recommendations of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group last month, Clinton's plan would pressure Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's government to meet benchmarks for political progress before it can receive additional U.S. funds. The Iraqi government should decide how to allocate oil revenues among all factions, disarm sectarian militias and let former Baath Party members resume civilian work as teachers, nurses and the like, she said.

I saw the press conference and appreciated what Senator Clinton was saying but I was puzzled by the woodenness of her prepared text. When she finished the text, she returned to the more natural style she is known for though she made a minor gaffe by calling Senator Bayh: Secretary Bayh. Clinton has a natural style that seems to be disappearing as she prepares to make a decision about running for president. In my opinion, she needs to get back to who she is. We need her to be a strong candidate.

For the past year, Hillary Clinton's position on the war has been moving away from lukewarm support of Bush's position (with caveats) towards a nuanced opposition to a failing war (except, of course, that disengagement has to be done carefully so that we don't unleash a regional war). There seems to be two possible stories on Hillary. One story is that she's a tough, principled Democrat whose positions are somewhere in the middle and who has increasingly become disillusioned with the extraordinary incompetence of the Bush administration. The first story gives her a winning chance (there is room in the party for a somewhat liberal, moderate-liberal or moderate candidate to win). But the other story is that she is too cautious, careful and calculating as she threads her way towards a position that can give her a win in a presidential race. The second story makes people uneasy.

The story Hillary needs is the one where she simply makes her case; she is a ways from that storyline and it would be a loss for the Democrats if she can't find it. Her trip to Asia and what she says about what needs to be done in Iraq and Afghanistan were steps in the right direction; so it's not just that she has to make her case, she has to make it real.