-
Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.
Bernie Sanders is right: Hillary Clinton praising Henry Kissinger is outrageous
- Thread starter injurai
- Start date
- Status
Big Baybee
Member
It was a bad look.
excelsiorlef
Member
And on the very thing Clinton said she talked to him about.
That's not what is being said though, and people shouldn't take it to mean that.
Dixon's Jet
Banned
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_...0/12/how_can_anyone_defend_kissinger_now.html
Please read this. Hitchens was a goddamn sage.
The emigration of Jews from the Soviet Union is not an objective of American foreign policy. And if they put Jews into gas chambers in the Soviet Union, it is not an American concern. Maybe a humanitarian concern. -Henry Kissinger
Please read this. Hitchens was a goddamn sage.
The emigration of Jews from the Soviet Union is not an objective of American foreign policy. And if they put Jews into gas chambers in the Soviet Union, it is not an American concern. Maybe a humanitarian concern. -Henry Kissinger
gutter_trash
Banned
so what? if you had to pick Hillary or Jeb?
you would pick a Bush (who would continue the Dubya Doctrine) just because some old Secretary of State said nice things about the newer Secretary of State?
you would pick a Bush (who would continue the Dubya Doctrine) just because some old Secretary of State said nice things about the newer Secretary of State?
For anyone mildly interested in this psychopath.
http://www.alternet.org/world/top-10-most-inhuman-henry-kissinger-quotes
http://www.alternet.org/world/top-10-most-inhuman-henry-kissinger-quotes
You can be a complete asshole and still find a decent point now and again, as demonstrated by the first few graphs of that very article. Opening China was a very good thing, it doesn't erase all the bad, but we can at least admit it was good right?
Prodigal Son
Member
Of course it is, but people won't admit it. They think Hillary Clinton is a good candidate and person and will work backwards from that conclusion.
Exactly. People and the world cannot be distilled into evil and good, black and white. There are shades of grey in almost everything.
You know all those countless times you've dogged on Sanders for his wording.
Clinton not once dissented against or acknowledged Kissinger's war crimes. Her narrative is one that justifies his policy being necessary for America's interest. It is right to criticize this mentality. It was a mistake for Clinton to invoke Kissinger and not stand on her own foreign policy. You can't cut it any other way.
This...I don't understand the writer when they wrote the exact same thing Hilary said.
Was opening China a bad thing? Yes or no?
Not everything is binary. Total fucking assholes can have a good idea every now and again, broken clocks are right at least once a day.
Kissenger was a total schmuck, no one will disagree, but opening China was a good thing.
Because you can't deny those were good things. They don't fix the all bad, but they were good.
Vigilant Walrus
Member
It makes sense that Hillary likes her, as her own foreign policy of arming rebel groups in the middle east is very comparable to the destabilization of asian and south american countries through CIA during the cold war era.
theignoramus
Member
There are no shades of grey in Kissinger, he is a criminal, through and through.
Helped organize a coup in Chile which brought about the Pinochet regime, set the conditions for genocide in Cambodia, and devastated the innocent people of Laos in the process.
"Grey" is what NATO did to Serbia in its bombing campaign, attacking "dual use" infrastructure, bombing a Serb media outlet and killing about 1200 Serb civilians in the course of forcing the Serb withdrawal from Kosovo. Thats grey.
There is no grey in genocidal bombing campaigns that destroy a whole region.
And yet.. " While Kissinger deserves real credit for some of America's most important Cold War victories, including Nixon's diplomatic opening to China..."
There was some small world changing good, even the article concedes it. Of course it does not balance out, nor erase the atrocities.
ChosenPredator
Banned
My friend from chile when i went there to visit, lord the things i heard about Pinochet, jesus.
veloxStrix
Banned
They acknowledge that Kissinger did, in fact, do something to get his name in the history books. It's not praise but a statement - one important for the reader to understand who Kissinger is. Kissinger is, at best, a destructive black mark on the history of America and, at worst, an international war criminal. Trying to compare the opening line of the article to the praise from Hilary in the last debate, her book, and her relatively recent review of Kissinger's "World Order" is laughable.
So is the problem that Hilary isn't criticizing the non good things? I am not trying to troll or anything I literally don't understand the complaint and i am trying to re-read here.
I do think the previous guilt be association comment by another poster may hold some ground here, cause I don't really see how you can go by this alone considering her general policies and actions, which are both good and bad depending on what you look at but certainly don't mirror Kiss or anyone else like em in particular. I am not even sure she really praised him considering how closely the article matches her words if the author isn't.
I'll just stop til i get better informed though. i feel like I am missing something here.
shoplifter
Member
If I met Henry Kissinger on a street corner I wouldn't think twice about spitting in his face. He has the morals of a Bond villain.
tycoonheart
Member
Always had a soft spot for Kissinger, only because my grandpa and him were friends.
What?
This isn't praise. This is how you open an article with facts. If he didn't write the first part of the statement, people would call him out for ignoring the good Kissinger did and only pushing a false narrative or some shit
FloatingDivider
Member
That seems like a weird reason to have a soft spot for a confirmed genocidal mass murderer? Just saying.
Prodigal Son
Member
Ultimately a good thing? Sure? Questionable under circumstances at the time? Very. That's also entirely irrelevant.
No one should be 'flattered' to receive praise from Henry fucking Kissinger. That has nothing to do with the quality of his advice.
excelsiorlef
Member
She she said she doesn't agree with him but sought his advice on China...
Is it shitty she's friends with Kissenger? Absolutely. Would it have been grand if she had called him every thing in the book? Sure! Does it change really anything about her? Nope. Was her time as SoS anywhere comparable to Kissenger's? Nope.
Is this largely guilt by association? You betchya
The thing is, there's a lot of people, Bernie included, and some in this thread, who never even bothered to remember that fact or will outright dismiss it.
The guy deserves all the worst things in life, no one disagrees with that, but even the people we disagree with the most can have insight we can find useful in our decision making.
shoplifter
Member
Meh, I can see someone being likable as a family friend in spite of being a War criminal.
theignoramus
Member
Bernie Sanders has no FP team because Hillary Clinton is either employing them or theyre holding Sanders at bay in hopes of getting a job in a Clinton White House.
I read that in Vox, yesterday.
I read that in Vox, yesterday.
Prodigal Son
Member
excelsiorlef
Member
Yes?
Am I supposed to now go well fuck her she's a horrible person, this changes everything?
That's only what was said at the last debate though. Her commendations, admiration and respect for him go beyond that.
For example, she believes Kissinger shares a conviction of "just and liberal order", and also see's him as a "close friend". Might be one of the many reasons her and Obama's foreign policy has been so shit. Clinton on Kissinger.
Hilary Clinton said:
Hilary Clinton said:
Hillary Clinton and Henry Kissinger: It's Personal. Very Personal.
Hillary Clinton reviews Henry Kissinger’s ‘World Order’
shoplifter
Member
Yeah, fuck those people in Chile. They don't know enough to democratically decide the course of their nation's future, here's a coup for you instead.
dave is ok
aztek is ok
There is a lot more smoke than with Obama/Ayers, that's for sure
Psychoward
Banned
There's a difference between taking selective advice and being friends with him.
excelsiorlef
Member
So again what you're saying is guilt by association.
Her voting record (again 93% to that of Sanders) and her time as SoS demonstrate that she's not Kissenger.
shoplifter
Member
I really wish there were a good list of that pesky 7% difference.
Edit: I'm being facetious here. That 7% is likely a far greater difference than the "she voted with Sanders 93% of the time" would lead most people to believe, and very likely a large amount of them are deal breakers for current Sanders supporters, much like the Iraq authorization.
Just saying I'd like a good list with specific examples because I'm too lazy to look them all up.
Edit: I'm being facetious here. That 7% is likely a far greater difference than the "she voted with Sanders 93% of the time" would lead most people to believe, and very likely a large amount of them are deal breakers for current Sanders supporters, much like the Iraq authorization.
Just saying I'd like a good list with specific examples because I'm too lazy to look them all up.
I view the Iraq war as one of America's greatest ever political blunders. Hilary was for it, Sanders wasn't (and neither was Obama for that matter). That's not a pesky difference of opinion, and I think the millions of people who have been or are still hugely affected by it, have had their lives completely destroyed or lost loved one's as a result of it, would agree.
excelsiorlef
Member
And Clinton has since said that was a mistake.
The reality is this both are excellent candidates and I back Hillary because I think she's the better politician.
Spoiled Milk
Banned
Nope. Since WWII secretaries of state have operated largely the same. We have not had a serious shift in 60 years, so if we're going to condemn Kissinger, we need to condemn everyone else equally. You want to know who the least chaotic secretary of state was in recent years?
Hillary Clinton. Which is actually what Kissinger meant when he said she ran the State Department better than he did.
Hillary Clinton. Which is actually what Kissinger meant when he said she ran the State Department better than he did.
Most people were for the Iraq War. Blame no one but Bush for lying.
Psychoward
Banned
For someone whose area of expertise is foreign policy not realizing it was a mistake beforehand is a pretty big dark spot.
If guilt by association is being uncomfortable with her for refusing to condemn Kissinger then sure.excelsiorf said:
As far as I'm concerned that does't exonerate her for it. It shows an immeasurable callousness and lack of foresight and judgement.
googleplex
Member
Let not forget that the vast majority of the american people Including her, believed the Bush administrations bullshit Intel.
googleplex
Member
You make it sounds like she was on the ground directing troops. She cast one vote out of many to move forward with that war.
shoplifter
Member
Because they wanted to believe it and couldn't do the least amount of fact checking.
Oh, for sure. I about fell off the couch and had to explain to my wife why last night when it came up. If someone had told me a year ago that he'd be a central plot point of the debates I'd have laughed in their face.
// it sure wasn't "have WMDs in 2003"
Oh, for sure. I about fell off the couch and had to explain to my wife why last night when it came up. If someone had told me a year ago that he'd be a central plot point of the debates I'd have laughed in their face.
// it sure wasn't "have WMDs in 2003"
- Status