Revolution#120, February 17, 2008
Hillary Is the One Who Can Stand Up to the Republicans?
Give Us a Fucking Break!
Hillary Clinton claims she is the one who can stand up to the Republican attack machine. Please! Hillary Clinton has gone along with, rolled over in the face of, or actively supported Bush and the Republicans in essence on every substantial issue.
The War: After all the lies that have been exposed, all the horrors that have been unleashed, Hillary Clinton will still not say that she was wrong to vote to authorize Bush to invade Iraq! Before the war, she even voted against the Levin Amendment that would have asked the United Nations to approve authorization of force against Saddam Hussein before the U.S. invaded, because she said it would have made the U.S. “subordinate” to the United Nations. She says Bush’s “surge” of sending in more troops is “working,” and that the problem with Bush is “We’re just years too late in changing our tactics.” Clinton’s promises to withdraw troops from Iraq are vague, open-ended, and would leave U.S. bases in Iraq in any event. And recently she voted to put elements of the Iranian army on the U.S. “terrorist” list—ratcheting up and justifying threats of a U.S. military attack on Iran.
Torture: How is Hillary Clinton going to stand up to the Republicans on torture when her position is at least as pro-torture as McCain’s? Speaking to the New York Daily News editorial board on October 11, 2006, Clinton said she recognized that in some situations interrogations called for “severity.” According to Daily News columnist Elizabeth Benjamin, “[I]t emerged that she’s not actually against torture in all instances, and that her dispute with McCain and Bush is largely procedural.” On Guantánamo, she just wants to move it somewhere.
Government Spying and Repression: Clinton voted FOR the USA Patriot Act in October 2001 when it was first enacted. Then in March 2006 she voted to renew it. She supports making flag-burning as a form of political protest illegal. And don’t forget that the foundation for the post-9/11 attacks on civil liberties was laid by Bill Clinton’s 1996 Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act. Clinton (like Obama) refused to filibuster the Military Commissions Act that fundamentally overturns habeas corpus. And nobody is going to outdo Clinton in upholding the criminalization of Black people and the imprisonment of 2.3 million people in the U.S. According to ABC News, Clinton aides recently fed the network a story attacking Obama because in the past he said he was opposed to mandatory minimum sentences for federal crimes.
Ann “We Should Invade Their Countries, Kill Their Leaders and Convert Them to Christianity” Coulter has said she would campaign for Hillary Clinton over John McCain. The point is not “guilt by association,” much less that John “100 Years Of War” McCain is a positive alternative to anything. But this Medieval fascist has a point when she says that Hillary voted for the war, supports the “surge,” is not against torture and is a good fit for her (Coulter’s) politics.
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