Hillary Clinton Schedules Show Drop in Policy Role After Healthcare Failure.

[tekisui]

March 19 (Bloomberg) -- Hillary Clinton's daily schedules show that her formal policy role in the presidency of her husband, Bill Clinton, shrunk once Congress shelved the health- care plan she helped craft in the administration's first two years.

The 11,046 pages of daily schedules released by the Clinton Presidential Library show that her days became filled with the more traditional, ceremonial events attended by first ladies instead of policy meetings after Congress in 1994 killed her plan to guarantee every American access to health insurance.

In campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination, Clinton says the experience she gained in her husband's administration prepared her to be president on ``day one.'' Clinton, a New York senator, argues that her travel and meetings with foreign leaders give her a deeper foreign-policy resume than Democratic rival Barack Obama. She has questioned the Illinois senator's fitness to be commander in chief.

(snip)

During the first two years of her husband's presidency, Clinton mixed her traditional first lady duties with her work on health-care reform.

The records also show she attended two White House meetings in October and November of 1993 about the North American Free Trade Agreement as the administration was seeking congressional approval of the accord. On the campaign trail this year, Clinton has denounced the agreement as costing U.S. jobs and has questioned Obama's willingness to seek new labor protections.

On Jan. 21, 1994, she met privately with Queen Noor of Jordan, went to the Healthcare Leadership Council at the Madison Hotel, and then returned to the White House to join a meeting that staff aides were conducting with health-care executives including Roy Vagelos, chief executive officer of drugmaker Merck & Co.

With the death of her health-care plan in September 1994 and the election that gave Republicans control of Congress, Clinton's daily activities became more social and ceremonial.

more at link: http://news.yahoo.com/s/bloomberg/20080319/pl_bloomberg/aubvzzfnsa8g_1

[sniffa]

1. Ready to take on a social and ceremonial role on day 1!

K&motherfuckingR

[BuyingThyme]

3. Ouch!

[sniffa]

15. Did she hit you with her KARATE CHOP?

I apologize on her behalf. I blame the Lasik operation. :hug:

[BuyingThyme]

23. I hear she was the first First Lady black-belt.

[sniffa]

34. Not true.

Her "finisher" - the KARATE CHOP - has only been learned in the 2008 campaign. It's used to stun her audience and distract them from the deflating speech that she's currently giving.



http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x4641019

[Liberal Veteran]

2. Remember...she'll never stop fighting for what she believes in.

Unless of course, it becomes a little difficult in which case, like piss in a slanted room, she takes the path of least resistance.

[OzarkDem]

4. She had a lower profile

She still worked on important policy initiatives, but because of the attacks from insurance and pharma companies, she took a lower profile. But she was still active, as many who worked with her claim.

Its not surprising, considering she didn't want her activity to bring more unwarranted criticism on important programs. Remember, she was being vilified daily on right wing news shows at that time, much more so than the criticism she receives today.

[Recursion]

7. Stephanopolous claims she was specifically kept off policy

A whole lot of All Too Human is about how he and Carville were for a while tasked with keeping her out of policy decisionmaking.

[OzarkDem]

Because of attacks by the news media

nothing more.

[Liberal Veteran]

28. So then you admit her claims of vast involvement in policy while First Lady are grossly inflated?

[OzarkDem]

31. No, I don't

She was involved in policy projects and she kept a low profile while doing it.

[Liberal Veteran]

39. How conveeeeeenient!

That way she can trumpet how successful she was behind the scenes without having to provide any evidence for it.

:eyes:

[earthlover]

37. excuses, excuses....fact is, she didn't have much of a role. no security clearance either

[Recursion]

41. Whatever the reason, she was still kept out

She lobbied for some bills. That's really it.

[Liberal Veteran]

12. That's her CLAIM....but she has little to show in the way of supporting evidence.

Vague references to "working behind the scenes" and "voicing my concerns" are sadly lacking.

[OzarkDem]

20. I'll vouch for her

I've stated numerous times in this forum that I know personally of a women's health agenda that she worked on all through the years her husband was President. It involved several important bills for funding research and health care. I was even present at the WH ceremony honoring one of the bills and thanked her personally for her work.

She continues to work on this important women's health issue in the Senate and has received numerous awards, including a Lifetime Achievement Award for her ongoing support.

On edit: Carville and Staph weren't involved and didn't keep her out of the work.

[Liberal Veteran]

24. Every politician under the sun has a wall of "awards"....

...but where's the beef?

[OzarkDem]

32. Wrong again

She did more than get an award, she was very involved.

Do you have a problem reading?

[Recursion]

47. Your claim is vague -- what does "worked on" mean?

Wrote? Lobbied for?

[earthlover]

33. Oh...you can bet that if she gets the nomination, the Villification of Hillary will begin...

[panader0]

5. The release of her schedules is only meant to quiet the roar for

the release of the Clinton's tax returns. Now when people say, "You are not open" she can point to this BS release. I wonder how long it took her crew to go through these schedules and edit them. Even so, the stuff about NAFTA could play against her.

[tekisui]

8. There was still much redacted from this release.

[bigtree]

50. purposefully redacted and purposeful omissions, because of the investigations

. . . which were ongoing. To suggest that these records represent the totality of her work over those years is not credible. Many efforts aren't included in this list and many which are included do not accurately represent her involvement. If you read the accounts from the major dailies, you'll see that this is just an outline, not a definitive record of her activities and involvement.

[Bonobo]

6. I knew it. That's when she gave up on ideals and started tacking with the wind.

[bigtree]

9. This'll confuse and confound the Obama camp

Who can't decide whether their position is that she was organizing for NAFTA or holding tea parties.

[BuyingThyme]

10. It looks like she was organizing tea parties for NAFTA enthusiasts.

[tekisui]

11. The article clearly suggests she was involved with NAFTA and

her healthcare attempt. When the healthcare failed, she was no longer involved in policy(only the tea parties). For the next six years, from 1994 to 2000.

[bigtree]

26. It's really a slim thread that her critics are promoting on the two NAFTA meetings

. . . where she, reportedly, came in at the end and made a few remarks on behalf of her husband's initiative. I don't expect those accounts, fashioned from her WH schedule, to hold water for too long. Besides, Gergen already dismissed suggestions she was for NAFTA, and he's mentioned in these accounts.

[Liberal Veteran]

36. And yet her own words prior to this election cycle tell a different story.

1996: Hillary said “I think NAFTA is proving its worth.”

1997: Hillary went to Mexico and proclaimed “NAFTA is working, working for you and working for the American people… We must accelerate the pace of these efforts, to reach more people and more communities.”

1998: Hillary went before the World Economic Forum and lauded multinational corporations for mounting “a very effective business effort in the U.S. on behalf of Nafta.”

2002: Hillary went before the DLC and listed NAFTA as one of her husband’s greatest accomplishments.

2003: Hillary wrote in her book Living History that she actively supported pushing forward with NAFTA while in the Clinton Administration: “Creating a free trade zone in North America—the largest free trade zone in the world—would expand U.S. exports, create jobs and ensure that our economy was reaping the benefits, not the burdens, of globalization. Although unpopular with labor unions, expanding trade opportunities was an important administration goal. The question was whether the White House could focus its energies on two legislative campaigns at once . I argued that we could and that postponing health care would further weaken its chances.”

[bigtree]

44. You present five half quotes as 'support for NAFTA'

. . . are you as one-dimensional as you suppose Hillary Clinton is?


Carl Bernstein: Hillary Clinton and NAFTA

Bernstein: "Hillary Clinton’s economics, the ones she preached to her husband in the White House are much closer to John Edwards then you would think. She argued with Bill Clinton when she was First Lady, her husband, she said ‘Bill, you are doing Republican economics when you are doing NAFTA.’ She was against NAFTA. And if she would somehow come out and tell the real story of what she fought for in the White House and failed in a big argument with her husband she would end up moving much closer to those Edwards followers."

listen to Bernstein: http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/01/31/carl-bernstein-says-hillary-clinton-fought-against-nafta-when-bill-implemented-it


"In August in '92, we had to make a decision," Mickey Kantor the former U.S. secretary of Commerce, Clinton adviser and free trade advocate recalled for the Huffington Post. "President Clinton had to make a decision as governor, whether or not he would support NAFTA, and of course he did. ... Hillary Clinton was one of the great skeptics in the discussion as to whether he should do. So she was always skeptical beginning in 1992 and onward."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/02/14/did-hillary-clinton-reall_n_86674.html


ANDERSON COOPER 360 DEGREES

Aired February 25, 2008 - 22:00 ET

DAVID GERGEN, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: "If I could just add one other postscript, Anderson, on NAFTA, I was actually there in the Clinton White House during the NAFTA fight. And I must tell you, Hillary Clinton was extremely unenthusiastic about NAFTA.

(LAUGHTER)

GERGEN: She -- and I think that's putting it mildly.

I'm not sure she objected to all the provisions of it. She just didn't see why her husband and why the -- that White House had to go do that fight. She was very unhappy about it, wanted to move on to health care. So, I do think there's some justification for her camp saying, you know, that she's never been a great backer of NAFTA.

ANDERSON COOPER, CNN ANCHOR: Interesting.

GLORIA BORGER, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL ANALYST: But it did have to do with health care, David, right? Because health care was her baby, and NAFTA was the president's baby.

GERGEN: Well, that's right. But you -- as you remember, Gloria, they had to -- Bill Clinton, I thought it was one of his most courageous decisions. I'm a NAFTA backer. But he had to take on the labor unions, had to a lot of her Democratic constituencies that she wanted to keep firm for the health care fight.

So, there was a lot about NAFTA she didn't really like, but she had to keep her mouth shut, because, after all, she was -- he was the president.

COOPER: Fascinating.

David Gergen, thank you..."

http://securingamerica.com/ccn/node/14842

[Liberal Veteran]

46. Oh, come now....surely you can't be that blindly partisan.

Up until it became an issue in the primaries, she had nothing but good things to say about NAFTA, then magically she's Norma Rae and Karen Silkwood all rolled up into one nice little package.

She's a phony. A fake. A charlatan. A con artist.

She is the candidate of the DLC which has dragged this party closer and closer to republican corporate worship.

She is not to be trusted.

[bigtree]

49. why should I take your biased word? These folks repudiate what you claim.

Bernstein, one of the original pair of Watergate reporters, is no supporter of Clinton. Gergen is mentioned in the reports which folks are using to accuse her of advocating for NAFTA.

And these folks are specific in their assertions that Hillary Clinton opposed NAFTA. You may not like it, but there's no evidence Hillary Clinton supported NAFTA. Those little puff quotes don't prove it, and neither does the strident rhetoric you've provided in criticizing her character.

[OzarkDem]

27. They can't get their story straight on this one

She singlehandedly passed NAFTA BUT she wasn't involved in policy.... :crazy:

[Liberal Veteran]

42. I'm pretty sure it was HILLARY who made the case that she was a major player in policy.

...while First Lady.

But don't let the facts get in the way of that.

She's the one who claimed that she raised all those concerns (behind the scenes, of course) which she either did and it fell on deaf ears (which gives lie to her claims of influence) or she didn't and she's lying about raising any concerns.

[tekisui]

13. In other words, she had her policy chance with healtcare. She failed

and received no new assignments.

[Liberal Veteran]

16. But. But. But. She'll never stop fighting!

She'll lie in wait like a cobra until the time is just right and then she'll spring into action for our benefit and if takes 20 or 40 years of sitting on her ass ticking the years on a calendar for the right time, it's a sacrifice she's willing to make.

[XemaSab]

35. Like a deer tick on a twig

she's just been biding her time until the proper moment. :crazy:

[zulchzulu]

14. She should do an infomercial about how to tinkle teacups at 3AM

I'll watch (and laugh my ass off)....

[Bonobo]

17. I knew it. She failed at her one and only real attempt at reform. She has given up and sold out.

[Liberal Veteran]

19. It is hardly surprising. The Clintons talk a good game, but when push comes to shove....

...they roll over. The only time they ever took a real stand was on issues that were relatively unimportant to the American populace. If they got any blowback, they backed down.

It's a pattern of behavior and it is why we don't need a second Clinton administration.

[Upton]

18. Where's all that "experience" I keep hearing about?

sounds more like she was closer to just your typical run of the mill first lady.

[Liberal Veteran]

21. Obviously you just don't see the vital importance of greeting and giving tours to dignitaries.

:rofl:

[OzarkDem]

22. See my post #20

[Liberal Veteran]

25. By that standard, Laura Bush activities on literacy make her as qualified as Hillary Clinton.

[OzarkDem]

29. Ummm... nope

She was involved in the "nuts and bolts" of helping develop the policy agenda and pushing to get it through Congress.

Does Laura do that? Nah, I don't think so.

[Liberal Veteran]

38. Sure she was. Given her successes in stopping NAFTA and providing universal health care....

....why shouldn't I believe how "involved" she was.

[RamboLiberal]

30. Also you have her mostly playing tourist on foreign trips

Doesn't seem to be much substantive in the way of meetings with foreign policy leaders. And during some of the crises in Bill's term she was off playing first lady and away from the WH.

[DerekJ]

40. The GOP will use this to swiftboat her in the GE

They will show that she exaggerated and lied about her experience. She should drop out.
The GOP will use this to swiftboat her in the GE

[DerekJ]

43. K & R

[JeffR]

45. Interesting to see the schedules corroborate this, I guess.

But I think anyone paying attention back in '94 knew this anyway. It was pretty obvious.

[tekisui]

48. Light schedules, no policy, much redaction.

A lifetime of experience?

:eyes: