I don’t know much about Rwanda, but I do know the sound of an excuse. Neither spoke- nor I nor Bill Clinton knows how the Republicans would have reacted, nor do we know how Clinton might have dealt with that reaction. All we know is that Clinton didn’t try.
Please don’t blame the Republcans for hypotheticals.
december is quite correct. The Pubbies might have expressed complete and utter solidarity with thier Commander in Chief in such a situation!
And monkeys might fly out of my butt, singing the “Internationale”.
Hypothetically, that is.
Why should that matter? When something’s right, isn’t it up to the president to exhibit LEADERSHIP?
I wasn’t a huge detractor of Clinton’s. I thought he did a lot of good things, and he was a pretty good ambassador for America to the rest of the world. But if one charge can reasonably be leveled at him, it’s that he lacked backbone. Everything was political to him. You could never pin him down on anything.
I would think those on the left would be even more incensed at him over his lack of spine, because it caused him to govern more like a moderate Republican than as a Democrat. The Clinton of the first two years was FAR different than the Clinton of the last six. He entered the presidency as a pretty far-left figure. By the time he left, he was governing from the center-right.
Isn’t that the way it always is, Sam? No matter which side of the spectrum the president is on when elected, he get’s pulled toward the center.
Even Bush is wagging his tail for the left. As the election approaches I think we’ll see him pissin’ all over himself.
Peace,
mangeorge
Unbelievable! Republican shills griping that Clinton wasn’t enough of an interventionist, wasn’t enough of an internationalist.
I think my irony meter is about to explode.
It’s always true to some degree. Clinton just took it to new levels.
Look at Bush - When he started beating the war drums against Iraq, he had a hostile congress, almost no world support, and a skeptical public. Rather than abandoning that position and accepting a ‘compromise’, he’s stuck to his guns and fought for his case. And now people are coming around, congress is in line, the American people support him, and in the end I think he’ll wind up with a good measure of world support.
That’s the difference between modifying your behaviour based on polls, and using leadership to CHANGE the polls.
This is not to say that Bush does that on everything - his caving in to the steel industry was a monumental mistake, done purely for political reasons. But in the case of Iraq, the administration really has been driving the debate rather than responding to it.
Faced with the extermination of 800,000 human beings, Clinton should have taken the case to the people. He should have pounded the table at the U.N. He should have CHANGED the debate. Instead, it was an election year, and polls showed no support for intervention in Rwanda, and the Republicans were hostile to the idea. So instead of making the case for Rwandan intervention, the Clinton administration became the main opponents of intervention in the U.N., and effectively stopped the Canadian effort to lead a multinational force.
Clinton admits this today. I believe he thinks it’s the biggest mistake of his presidency.
Oh, and let me add this - SHAME on the Republicans. Their continual partisan bickering and muckracking is what caused the Clinton administration to withdraw into its shell in the first place. The same Republicans who are hawkish on war with Iraq today were the first ones to level ‘wag the dog’ accusations at Clinton when he actually tried to do something. They did the same when he tried to get Osama Bin Laden. So there’s plenty of blame to go around when examining the ineffectual policies of the Clinton administration.
Sarcasm is no substitute for having an argument. How the Pubbies would have responed verbally is unknown. Maybe they would have criticized Clinton, as you suggest.
However, their legal response pretty clear. They couldn’t have prevented any action the President chose to take, and I don’t think they would have tried to do so.
Your claim that Clinton permitted genocide to take place because he was too thin-skinned to take criticism is not supported by cites. Furthermore, that’s not much of a defense.
If your going to put words in my mouth, may I at least insist they not be yours?
But grace us with your logistical acumen. At what airbase will the troops, the guns, etc. arrive? By what roads will the mobile infantry move? To what strategic centers?
Suppose the Airborne establishes a base at Hellandgone, Rwanda. A sanctuary of sorts, shall we say.
And then every desperate and starving refugee will come poring down on that location, will they not? How many thousands of hungry homeless, carrying how many third world diseases, to gather around our soldiers for protection. How many tents will be needed? How many doctors? There is a very good reason why Africa was known as the White Man’s Graveyard. Black water fever. Mombassa fever, and the great Grandaddy of them all, malaria.
Perhaps more could have been done, likely so. Could enough have been done?
As to the political consequences? Catastrophic. When American soldiers start to die, not from enemy action, which we can somberly accept, but shitting themselves to death from diseases we have long forgotten. But soft! The Pubbies are far too ethical, too noble to make political hay from such!
And you are the Queen of Romania.
I hate it when people do this. “The American People” do NOT support him. That is a gross misstatement, and frankly I resent it. The implication, especially given who we’re talking about (If ya ain’t fer us yer agin us), is that those who do NOT support him in this are not really Americans. Or at least, * good * Americans.
I haven’t looked at the latest polls, but I’m just gonna make a WAG that he doesn’t have 100% support on this. Or even 90%. Or even 80%. I’ll even go so far as to say he doesn’t even have 70%…wait, I’m going out on that limb…not even 60!
Now I’ve inspired myself to go look, and whaddya know!
Support for War Against Iraq Drops
But that’s a month ago. Let’s look at 2 weeks… wait! Again!
Depending on what is included in the question, up to something like 55 % of Americans do NOT support Koko’s hard-on for Saddam.
Fancy that.
What you are doing is what the adminstration itself does. Act as if…
And as for this…
You say leadership, I say contemptible manipulation. Let’s call the whole thing off.
Sure Bush “stuck to his guns”. Pretty risk-free position, if you ask me. If he loses, it’s “Oh well, I tried” and the dems get the blame. And If he wins support? Buncha dead Iraqis, and we get oil. You think he doesn’t have the last encounter with Iraq in the back of his mind?
I’m pretty sure you weren’t comparing Iraq to Rwanda. Were you? Nah.
Peace,
mangeorge
That was exactly what I took away from it as well, Elvis. The strong impression that the direction this country is headed in now is the wrong one. Whatever (demonstrably debatable) faults or strengths Clinton exhibited in office, his words last week were words of wisdom.
As for someone who takes action rather than discussing what actions should be taken, I can only respond that just taking action often leads to ill-considered, dangerous, flawed actions. Examples abound around us today. I far prefer Clinton’s willingness to lead through strong discourse to Bush’s tendency to lead by gut reaction. I think Clinton was a better leader for it. YMMV.
Remember, you can fool all of the people some of the time, but fool me twice can’t be fooled again.
“Sticking to your guns” is bad strategy if they are lousy guns. Hitler “stuck to his guns” at Stalingrad and lost an army of something like, was it 300000? He refused to learn and again “stuck to his guns” after the breakout from Normandy, thereby losing most of the equipment and a lot of the men from another army. And that was despite the fact that we screwed up that attempted entrapment.
“Sticking to your guns” can also be called “pigheaded” under some circumstances.
And I still haven’t found out why the Canadians didn’t send that division to Rwanda to do that quick and inexpensive mission. Or was their plan not designed for them but rather to tell the US what it should do? Sort of an “I’ll hold your coat” deal?
I didn’t say it, David Simmons, ol’ Sam Stone said it. Besides, you screwed up the quote. 
But I agree with most of what you said.
Anyway, I was trying to point out that there isn’t much political risk in Bush insisting on war with Iraq. What negative consequences could there be?
On the other hand, entervention in Rwanda could have had a very bad outcome, as pointed out here by others. Canada was willing to risk it, we weren’t.
mangeorge
Intervention. 
Finally.
Thank you David.
Why did the rest of the UN members who were willing to go help the people in Rwanda cease action because the US didn’t uphold its end of the bargain? Surely they had no political reasons for staying out of it? Surely they wouldn’t let 800,000 people be slaughtered just because one country decided not to help?
Even if the US had made “strong arguments” against helping those vulnerable people, certainly the other world leaders would have the moral fortitude to send their troops anyway.
Right?
Oh sure, I know that it wasn’t your statement but was that of Sam Stone. My post was poorly worded in not making that clear.