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Hillary Clinton: World’s Second
Most
Powerful Woman?
By Ken Blackwell
8/31/2011
Forbes
Magazine is a most respected
resource for business leaders. The magazine recently came out with a
list of
the world’s Most Powerful Women. Not surprisingly, they chose German
Chancellor
Angela Merkel as No. 1. This is doubtless because the conservative
Merkel has
been trying to get the European Union to shape up. Putting out economic
fires
in Greece , Spain , Ireland , and Portugal , Germany ‘s financial
strength has
been put to the test. Just how much longer can the EU rely on Germany
‘s
productivity to subsidize European sloth? Merkel is like the old E.F.
Hutton
ads on TV: When Angela talks, Europeans listen.
Michelle
Obama ranks only eighth on
the list. This is somewhat surprising, since it’s hard to gauge just
how much
influence she has with the world’s Most Powerful Man. She recently
interrupted
a family vacation on Martha’s Vineyard , flying back with the president
aboard
Air Force One. She apparently had read some of the criticisms of her
separate
flights-and the extra expenses chalked up by the Secret Service in
accommodating the First Lady and her schedule. Still, Michelle Obama
has to be
considered a potential presidential candidate herself if her husband
holds onto
his office next year.
Mrs.
Obama would have precedent on her
side if she contends for the Democratic nomination in 2016. That’s
because of
the trailblazing efforts of none other than Forbes’ No. 2 Most Powerful
Woman:
Hillary Clinton.
This
may be the most left-handed
compliment ever for the left-leaning Secretary of State. Hillary
Clinton was
subjected early to criticisms-from left-wing blogs-that she had allowed
herself
to be placed in a “foreign policy burka” by President Obama, the man
who bested
her for the 2008 Democratic nomination. Some liberals even went so far
as to
claim the president had made Mrs. Clinton over as a “Saudi wife.” Those
were
stinging criticisms.
It’s
a bitter irony that Mrs. Clinton
left a safe U.S. Senate seat in New York to become Mr. Obama’s
compliant
assistant at the State Department. Can she really approve of this
administration’s anti-Israel policies?
Was
she even consulted when the
president delivered a highly controversial speech on Israel last May
while
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was en route to Washington? The
president
stated that the Israelis needed to consider returning to their pre-1967
borders. Those borders were indefensible and had led to Israel being
invaded
three times prior to the Six Day War in 1967.
Mrs.
Clinton was nowhere to be seen
when Netanyahu gave the president an on-camera rebuttal as they sat
together at
the White House. There was no fire in the elegant fireplace, but sparks
nonetheless flew between the two leaders. Where was the World’s Second
Most
Powerful Woman then?
In
just days, President Obama went
before a Washington gathering of AIPAC, the American-Israel Public
Affairs
Council. His purpose before this group was to climb down from the rash
statements he had made just two days earlier. He should have led with
the line
about “1967 borders with appropriate swaps of territory,” Mr. Obama
confessed,
trying to smooth ruffled feathers.
When
she was a candidate for U.S.
Senate and for president, Hillary Clinton never had to smooth any
ruffled
feathers of U.S. friends of Israel. How it must have galled the World’s
Second
Most Powerful Woman to watch as the World’s Most Powerful Man made a
real mess
of things.
She
had to smile a forced smile and pretend
there was nothing amiss. That’s not a role that comes naturally to a
miss like
Hillary. Correction: A Ms.
Even
with the president’s approval
rating going South, Hillary Clinton is trapped. She can’t go West-to
Iowa. Or
North-to New Hampshire. She’s already given notice that she’ll be out
as
Secretary of State in 2013, and she will not run for vice president or
president. Why would she do that? That’s a guaranteed way not to gain
power in
Washington.
It’s
hard to imagine the
ever-quotable, always notable Hillary Clinton winding up in such a
state. But
that’s the revolting state she’s in every day at State. Speaking of
revolting
states, it will be most interesting to see what role she’s assigned
when the UN
General Assembly moves to grant Statehood to the Palestinians. Will
Secretary
of State Clinton be sidelined for that momentous event, too?
Hillary’s
place in the Obama
administration is like that of Thomas Riley Marshall in the Wilson
administration. Vice President Marshall compared his role to a man in a
cataleptic state: He cannot speak; he cannot move; he suffers no pain;
and yet
he is perfectly conscious of everything going on about him.
It’s
certainly a most curious fate for
someone who’s supposed to be the World’s Second Most Powerful Woman.
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