During several interviews on Sunday, the Secretary of State defended President Obama’s recent commitment to remove the majority of American troops from Iraq by the end of the year. On Fox News, Clinton “shied away from engaging directly with the criticisms lobbed at Obama by his GOP presidential rivals,” though she did say this:
“You can’t, on the one hand, say you’re all for democracy and sovereignty and independence where people get to make their own choices, and on the other hand say that when a choice is made that is foreseen by our own government going back to the Bush administration and validated by the Obama administration and the current government in Iraq, that that somehow is not appropriate … Because that is what we were there for, to give the Iraqi people the chance to make their own decision.”
Clinton went on to praise Obama’s foreign-policy decisions over the last two and a half years, saying “smart leadership in a complex world is paying off,” noting the death of Osama bin Laden and the eventual success of the United States’ intervention in Libya. And, during a later chat with ABC’s Christiane Amanpour, she managed to avoid taking what strikes us as an irresistible shot at one particular rival:
Elegant.
Hillary Clinton stands firm behind Obama [Politico]
