State Department Still Unsure of Its Role One Year Later

By GottaLaff

(Image: Lance Page / t r u t h o u t; Adapted: marcn, mindfrieze)

I have a very smart friend, Allen McDuffee, who also happens to be extremely nice and a good writer. He has a new post up at Truthout. I'll share a little of it with you, and then you can read the whole thing here:

One year after Obama takes office and appoints Hillary Clinton secretary of state, the State Department struggles to determine whether it really wants to separate from the Pentagon.

At a December 3 closed briefing to a group of foreign policy journalists from the Knight Center for Specialized Journalism on the concept of "smart power" under the Obama administration, State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said that the Obama administration was taking "a more holistic approach to national affairs." [...]

Citing the Obama administration's mantra of the Three D's: Defense, Diplomacy and Development, Kelly said that implementing "smart power is a rebalancing of our foreign policy." Smart power - a concept that combines the hard power of the military with the soft power of diplomacy - has gained increasing acceptance in foreign policy and military circles as a reaction to right size the Bush administration's heavily militaristic policies.

Yet, while insisting on the smart power model as the right model for the United States, the State Department is still struggling with its relationship to the Pentagon, how it will "reimagine itself" and, ultimately, how hard and soft power will work together in practice.

It's the thought that counts.

More here.

VIDEO- 10-year-old: Pledge of Allegiance leaves out gays, lesbians; tells teacher "go jump off a bridge"

By GottaLaff

I love this kid! He's got moxie:



What a brainiac... with heart. I know a few adults who could take lessons. Very impressive, to say the least, especially because he's on the right side of the issues. Go Will!

H/t: Hippie_Cyndi

Hillary Consulted Republicans, Neocons, Liberals For Big Foreign Policy Speech

By GottaLaff

Didn't we have 8 long years of "hawkish"? Correction: Chicken hawkish. Now Hillary has got an entire smorgasbord in front of her, and here's what, or rather who, she chose to add to her plate:

Hillary is set to deliver her high-profile speech at the Council on Foreign Relations, and is set to articulate her own policy agenda, one focused on strengthening America’s “smart power,” according to The Politico. It could help settle whether she has privately favored a more hawkish stance towards hostile foreign powers, as she reportedly has.

The array of people she has consulted for this speech is striking in its diversity, boasting a notable array of Republicans, foreign policy “realists” and hawkish voices. A partial list:

Henry Kissinger, Nixon’s secretary of state; George Schultz, Reagan’s secretary of state; Zbigniew Brzezinski, Jimmy Carter’s hawkish “realist” foreign policy adviser; Paul Farmer, a doctor and international humanitarian; Joseph Nye, a major proponent of “soft power,” the idea that persuasion and attraction can be more effective than coercion; Francis Fukuyama, who helped drive the rise of neoconservatism; Brent Scowcroft; the “realist” national security adviser under George H.W. Bush; Strobe Talbott, Clinton’s deputy secretary of state; John Podesta, the head of the liberal Center for American Progress; and Richard Lugar, the Republican Senator who has praised Obama’s response to the Iran crisis.

Hillary has also consulted with administration figures like President Obama himself, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, and national security adviser James Jones.

Now we'll wait and see what tidbits she chose from that extensive buffet. I hope they run out of overcooked hawk. Or at least, that maybe the menu includes some Chateau de Dove.

Anyone got a Tums?