Is Obama taking us back to the future

And so it appears that the dream ticket envisioned back in the spring is going to happen in a different form. Only I’m not sure if this is a dream or a nightmare.

Hillary Clinton, according to The New York Times, is ready to accept an offer from Barack Obama to be his secretary of state.

Her selection is still to be formalized and will not be announced until after Thanksgiving. It would be yet another direction in the unlikely journey of a onetime political spouse in Arkansas who went on to build a political base of her own and become a symbol of achievement to many women.

The role, though a supporting one, would make her one of the most influential players on the international stage, and it would represent at least one more act for one of the nation’s most prominent public families, as former President Bill Clinton would also become an ad hoc member of the Obama team.

From my perspective, as a progressive, a dove, as someone suspicious of the foreign policy establishment, the appointment of Hillary Clinton poses serious dangers to an Obama administration — or at least to progressives’ assumptions about what an Obama administration would be.

Clinton voted for the war in Iraq and has been dangerously hawkish on Iran. But a close read of Obama’s statements on foreign policy raise questions about how far from Clinton he really is — he did, after all, say he would go into Pakistan to chase al Qaeda and is planning a troop surge in Afghanistan.

At the same time, it will be Obama who is setting the policies and Clinton enacting them. While she publicly jabbed at Obama over his willingness to sit down with so-called rogue nations, she will have to do so if that is the policy that the president intends.

So, while a Clinton appointment is certainly a disappoinment, it doesn’t have to become a disaster — especially if Obama controls the appointments of undersecretaries and other lower-level appointments.

I think John Nichols at The Nation makes the most obvious point:

Clinton has many strengths — she really does know the world, she really is respected by key players in international hotspots, she really does care about poverty issues that have been too long neglected. Obama recognizes these strengths, and he has made the team-of-rivals calculation that they will benefit his presidency. He may be right. But neither he, nor his nominee for Secretary of State, should ever forget that Obama prevailed over Clinton and McCain because he was seen as someone who would be more rational, more responsible and, yes, more conciliatory in his relations with the rest of the world.

Author: hankkalet

Hank Kalet is a poet and freelance journalist. He is the economic needs reporter for NJ Spotlight, teaches journalism at Rutgers University and writing at Middlesex County College and Brookdale Community College. He writes a semi-monthly column for the Progressive Populist. He is a lifelong fan of the New York Mets and New York Knicks, drinks too much coffee and attends as many Bruce Springsteen concerts as his meager finances will allow. He lives in South Brunswick with his wife Annie. View all posts by hankkalet