Hillary's Word Games

This mini-controversy between the Clinton and Obama camps over remarks at the YouTube debate is simply absurd. Obama responded to a question about meeting with world leaders from "enemy states" in overly broad terms, setting out a vision of not negotiating out of fear, but never fearing to negotiate. Clinton took that and twisted it into "OMG Obama wants to have tea with Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez America Hater ZOMG!!!"

That's silly, and we've been down this road before:

When Nancy Pelosi went to Syria earlier this year, she got reamed for it in the conservative mediasphere and blogs. The Confederate Yankee labeled it "propaganda coup that will be used by Syria, the terrorists they sponsor, and Islamists worldwide." Michael Rubin writing in National Review Online wondered before the trip "if she will cede the Assad regime a propaganda victory, as did Sen. Arlen Specter?"

You remember the whole spiel. At the time, I think most liberals -- and, indeed, most Americans -- understood this to be both unfair and also reflective of a pretty weird and wrongheaded underlying worldview. And yet, this is pretty similar to what Hillary Clinton's saying in her criticism of Barack Obama. There's this similar notion that the US can be mortally wounded by perfidious leaders having their photos taken with important American politicians, or that engaging in high-level diplomacy with a country is a reward we offer for good behavior rather than a standard method of relating to the world.

As well as Clinton does in debates, and as much as her campaign has the netroots' back in this jihad from Bill O'Reilly, it's stuff like this that both make me think that (a) she's a devastating campaigner and (b) I don't want any part of this ignorant campaigning. Anyone with the brain of a 4 year-old knew what Obama was saying, just like said 4 year-olds understood John Kerry when he said unilateral wars of choice have to meet "the global test" and that we want to reduce terrorism to a "nuisance." If you're going to campaign by playing silly word games, it's hard for me to believe that you're serious about running the country as much as you are serious about simply running to win.

I don't want to see this same kind of ignorant talk about diplomacy, as if it's a gift to be bestowed on people instead of a way to engage in the world and reach global solutions. There's this depressing streak of almost neoconservative hawkishness here that really disturbs me.

(I also think that this was designed to reach conservatives more than to attack a chief rival, which is smart for someone who's in front in the primary election and is looking toward the general, but it still smacks of playing to the basest impulses in the electorate, which I cannot endorse.)