WASHINGTON — Hillary Rodham Clinton characterized rival Barack Obama on Monday as rash and inconsistent on foreign policy issues.
Meanwhile, a photograph circulating in the Internet of the Illinois senator dressed in traditional local garments during a visit to Kenya in 2006 is causing a dustup in the presidential campaign over what constitutes a smear.
Clinton paired two of Obama’s campaign statements to support her conclusion on his foreign policy.
“He wavers from seeming to believe that mediation and meetings without preconditions can solve some of the world’s most intractable problems to advocating rash, unilateral military action without the cooperation of our allies in the most sensitive part of the world,” the New York senator said in a speech at George Washington University.
The former first lady has sharply criticized her rival for saying last summer that he would be willing as president to meet with the leaders of Cuba, Iran and other hostile nations without preconditions. He reiterated that willingness last week.
“We simply cannot legitimize rogue regimes or weaken American prestige by impulsively agreeing to presidential talks that have no preconditions,” Clinton said. “It may sound good, but it doesn’t meet the real-world test of foreign policy.”
Obama has also said he would be willing to send U.S. troops into Pakistan if there were “actionable intelligence” that the country is harboring terrorists.
Anticipating Clinton’s criticism, Obama’s foreign policy advisers held a conference call with reporters before she delivered her speech. Top Obama adviser Susan Rice said Clinton had shown poor judgment on a variety of issues, including voting to authorize the invasion of Iraq and supporting legislation declaring the Iranian National Guard as a terrorist organization.
“Those are critical foreign policy judgments. They are judgments that any candidate should be held accountable for. And obviously we look forward to Sen. Clinton’s explanation of how and why she got those critical judgments wrong,” Rice said.
Clinton portrayed Obama as a national security novice and suggested he would need a “foreign policy instruction manual” to keep the country safe.
NAFTA controversy
Also Monday, former President Bill Clinton said Obama’s ads unfairly portrayed his wife as a supporter of NAFTA, which she says she is working to change.
The North American Free Trade Agreement is unpopular in Ohio, which has lost blue-collar jobs to other countries.
Over the weekend, Obama told an Ohio audience: “She was saying great things about NAFTA until she started running for president.”
Clinton also responded to Obama’s flyers on NAFTA by placing automated phone calls Monday to voters in Ohio with a message accusing Obama of distorting her record.
“NAFTA has hurt Ohio families, and I have a plan to fix it,” Clinton says in the call. “My opponent does not. I’ll appoint a trade prosecutor to enforce our trade agreements, and crackdown on China’s unfair trade practices. I’ll eliminate tax breaks for companies that ship our jobs overseas, and invest in creating good jobs right here in Ohio.”
The Obama campaign, in turn, accused the Clinton camp of misrepresenting his views.
Photo creates buzz
In another brewing flap, a photograph was posted Monday showing Obama wearing a white turban and a wraparound white robe presented to him by elders in Wajir, in northeastern Kenya. Obama’s late father was Kenyan and Obama visited the country in 2006, attracting thousands of well-wishers.
The gossip and news Web site The Drudge Report first posted the picture and said it was being circulated by “Clinton staffers” and quoted an e-mail from an unidentified campaign aide. Drudge did not include proof of the e-mail in the report.
“I just want to make it very clear that we were not aware of it, the campaign didn’t sanction it and don’t know anything about it,” Clinton spokesman Howard Wolfson said.
In December, two Clinton volunteers resigned after forwarding a hoax e-mail that falsely said Obama is a Muslim possibly intent on destroying the United States. Obama is a member of the United Church of Christ and says he has never been a Muslim, but false rumors are circulating on the Internet.
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