|
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton's votes and remarks on many issues provide an outline of her political views. Homeland Security In a speech on December 8, 2004, regarding the passage of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, Senator Clinton delivered remarks on her approach to homeland security. "This legislation calls for dramatic improvements in the security of our nation's transportation infrastructure, including aviation security, air cargo security, and port security. Through this legislation, the security of the Northern Border will also be improved, a goal I have worked toward since 2001. Among many key provisions, the legislation calls for an increase of at least 10,000 border patrol agents from Fiscal Years 2006 through 2010, many of whom will be dedicated specifically to our Northern Border. There will also be an increase of at least 4,000 full-time immigration and customs enforcement officers in the next 5 years *." Later in the speech, Senator Clinton described her satisfaction with the way in which the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 tackles what she views as the root causes of terrorism by improving education around the world and establishing schools in Muslim countries that will replace the current madrassas. "I am also pleased that the legislation addresses the root causes of terrorism in a proactive manner. This is an issue that I have spent a good deal of time on in the past year because I believe so strongly that we are all more secure when children and adults around the world are taught math and science instead of hate. The bill we are voting on today includes authorization for an International Youth Opportunity Fund, which will provide resources to build schools in Muslim countries. The legislation also acknowledges that the U.S. has a vested interest in committing to a long-term, sustainable investment in education around the globe. Some of this language is modeled on legislation that I introduced in September, The Education for All Act of 2004, and I believe it takes us a small step towards eliminating madrassas and replacing them with schools that provide a real education to all children *." Clinton voted for the USA PATRIOT Act in October 2001 when it was first enacted (as did all but one Senator, Russ Feingold). In December 2005, when a political battle ensued over its renewal, Clinton supported a general filibuster against it, on the grounds that the renewal legislation did not apportion enough money to New York for anti-terrorism efforts. * Regarding the December 2005 NSA warrantless surveillance controversy, Clinton stated that she was "troubled" by President Bush's 2002 actions. In a statement, she said: "The balance between the urgent goal of combating terrorism and the safeguarding of our most fundamental constitutional freedoms is not always an easy one to draw. However, they are not incompatible, and unbridled and unchecked executive power is not the answer." * Clinton has sponsored and co-sponsored several bills relating to protecting Americans from acts of terrorism * * as well as providing assistance to the victims of such acts.* Humanitarian intervention abroad In a February 2005 speech at the annual Munich Conference on Security Policy, Clinton expressed regret that the international community had failed to effectively intervene in the 1990s during the Rwandan Genocide and early in Bosnian War, and praised the United Nations and NATO interventions that did occur, later in the Bosnian War (leading to the Dayton Agreement), in the Kosovo War, and in East Timor. Regarding the ongoing large-scale killing in Darfur, Sudan, she then advocated "at least a limited NATO role in logistics, communication and transportation in Darfur in support of the African Union." * Islam At a February 20, 1996 address to members of the American Muslim Council, that was also the first-ever White House celebration of the Muslim holiday Eid al, First Lady Clinton accepted two gifts of Qur'an, and said: “I am honored to have these gifts… one for my husband, and one for me, as Chelsea already has her copy. ... I have to admit that a good deal of what my husband and I have learned about Islam has come from my daughter.” * Later that year, she remarked to the Los Angeles Times that “Islam is the fastest-growing religion in America, a guide and pillar of stability for many of our people...” * Iraq War Clinton voted to give President Bush authority for the Iraq war. During an April 20, 2004 interview on Larry King Live, Clinton was asked about her October 2002 vote in favor of the Iraq war resolution. "Obviously, I've thought about that a lot in the months since. No, I don't regret giving the president authority because at the time it was in the context of weapons of mass destruction, grave threats to the United States, and clearly, Saddam Hussein had been a real problem for the international community for more than a decade.... The consensus was the same, from the Clinton administration to the Bush administration. It was the same intelligence belief that our allies and friends around the world shared.' But, she said, the Bush Administration "really believed it. They really thought they were right, but they didn't let enough sunlight into their thinking process to really have the kind of debate that needs to take place when a serious decision occurs like that." * In a November 29, 2005 letter to her constituents, Senator Clinton said, "There are no quick and easy solutions to the long and drawn out conflict the Bush Administration triggered ... I do not believe that we should allow this to be an open-ended commitment without limits or end. Nor do I believe that we can or should pull out of Iraq immediately." * On June 8, 2006, Clinton said of the U.S. airstrike that killed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi: "I saw firsthand the terrible consequences of Zarqawi's terrorist network when Bill, Chelsea and I visited the hotel ballroom in Amman, Jordan last November where Zarqawi's followers had detonated a bomb at a wedding, killing and wounding innocent people. We owe our thanks to our men and women in uniform and others in Iraq who have been fighting Zarqawi and other insurgents and who are responsible for today's success." * On June 15, 2006, Hillary charged that President Bush, “rushed to war” and “refused to let the UN inspectors conduct and complete their mission.” “We need to be building alliances instead of isolation around the world,” she advised. “There must be a plan that will begin to bring our troops home.” But she said, controversially, “I do not think it is a smart strategy either for the president to continue with his open-ended commitment which I think does not put enough pressure on the Iraqi government, nor do I think it is a smart policy to set a date certain.” (Full speech here)* Israel and the Middle East conflict Clinton is a strong supporter of Israel. At a pro-Israel rally in New York in front of the United Nations on July 18, 2006, Clinton spoke in support of Israel's efforts in the 2006 Israel-Lebanon conflict: "We are here to show solidarity and support for Israel. We will stand with Israel, because Israel is standing for American values as well as Israeli ones." She condemned Hamas, Hezbollah, Syria, and Iran. * Clinton has also approved of the Israeli West Bank barrier, which she views as a counter-terrorism protective measure. On November 13, 2005, she said that she supports its building, and that the onus is on the Palestinian Authority to fight terrorism. "This is not against the Palestinian people," Clinton said during a tour of a section of the wall being built around Jerusalem. "This is against the terrorists. The Palestinian people have to help to prevent terrorism. They have to change the attitudes about terrorism." * Strong United Nations On February 13, 2005, at the Munich Conference on Security Policy, Senator Clinton outlined her support for a strong United Nations. "My first observation is simple but it must govern all that we do: The United Nations is an indispensable organization to all of us - despite its flaws and inefficiencies. This means quite simply, that everyone here today, and governments everywhere, must decide that our global interests are best served by strengthening the U.N., by reforming it, by cleaning up its obvious bureaucratic and managerial shortcomings, and by improving its responsiveness to crises, from humanitarian to political." Senator Clinton continued, "At its founding in San Francisco sixty years ago, fifty members signed the Charter. Today, the U.N. has 191 members, and, quite frankly, many of them sometimes act against the interests of a stronger U.N., whether consciously or not, with alarming regularity. Since the U.N. is not, in the final analysis, an independent hierarchical organization, like for example a sports team or a corporation, but no more - or less - than a collection of its members, the U.N. becomes progressively weakened by such action. Ironically, "the U.N." - an abstraction that everyone from journalists to those of us in this room use in common discussions - is often blamed for the actions (or inactions) of its members.*" Clinton has co-sponsored a Senate resolution "expressing the sense of the Senate on the importance of membership of the United States on the United Nations Human Rights Commission." Immigration Clinton has drawn praise from conservative commentators and lawmakers for her tough stance on illegal immigration. *. Clinton wants to create a system whereby workers can immigrate to the United States legally and be tracked. Senator Clinton has strongly criticized businesses for hiring illegal immigrants. * Clinton took a somewhat different tack on March 8, 2006, when she strongly criticized H.R. 4437, a bill passed by the House of Representatives in December 2005 and sent to the Senate, that would impose harsher penalties for undocumented workers. Clinton called the measure "a rebuke to what America stands for." Furthermore she said that it would be "an unworkable scheme to try to deport 11 million people, which you have to have a police state to try to do." The solution to the illegal immigration problem was, in her opinion, to make "a path to earned citizenship for those who are here, working hard, paying taxes, respecting the law, and willing to meet a high bar for becoming a citizen." * On March 27, 2006, Clinton again vowed to block the bill. Speaking before a New York group of open border advocates, she said: "The bill is certainly not in keeping with my understanding of the Scriptures because this bill would literally criminalize the Good Samaritan and probably even Jesus himself." * On April 5, 2006, speaking to the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, Clinton said her work for her New York constituents could fall afoul of the bill since some of her constituents are illegal immigrants. "I realize I would be a criminal, too. My staff would be criminal. We help people with all kinds of problems." * Trade Clinton, together with fellow New York Senator Charles Schumer, welcomed a decision by the United States Commerce Department that called for a 108.3% duty on imports from Chinese candlemakers, as the imports sought to circumvent an Anti-dumping Duty Order. * Clinton stated that: "This is a real victory for the Syracuse candle-making industry. Our manufacturers deserve a level playing field and we owe it to them to make sure that others do not unfairly circumvent our fair trade practices. Syracuse has a proud history of candle production but attempts by importers to undercut our producers have put that tradition at risk. I am pleased that the Department of Commerce heeded our call to take action against these unfair practices and recognized the importance of this decision to local producers, especially here in Syracuse. We will continue to make the case on behalf of Syracuse candle-makers as the Commerce Department considers its final determination." Free trade proponents at the Cato Institute made a connection to Frédéric Bastiat's Candlemakers' petition, a satire of protectionism. * Energy policy Clinton supports energy conservation, releasing oil reserves, increasing the number of hydrogen-powered vehicles, and ratification of the Kyoto Protocol, but opposes drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and the Bush administration's energy policy. * Fiscal responsibility In her address to the 2000 Democratic National Convention on August 14, 2000, Clinton asserted that it is fiscally responsible for the United States government to stay out of debt. She stressed her support for the social programs, Social Security and Medicare, that were established during the presidency of Franklin Roosevelt. "We’ll never accomplish what we need to do for our children if we burden them with a debt they didn’t create. Franklin Roosevelt said that Americans of his generation had a rendezvous with destiny. It’s time to protect the next generation by using our budget surplus to pay down the national debt, save Social Security, modernize Medicare with a prescription drug benefit, & provide targeted tax cuts to the families who need them most." In a 2004 fund-raising speech in San Francisco, she was highly critical of George W. Bush's tax cuts, saying that "Many of you are well enough off that ... the tax cuts may have helped you. We're saying that for America to get back on track, we're probably going to cut that short and not give it to you. We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good." * Clinton has sponsored legislation designed to reduce the deficit by rebalancing recent tax cuts. She has co-sponsored legislation related to debt and deficit reduction. Universal health care Clinton supports incremental reforms that would provide universal access to health care by subsidizing insurance premiums for those unable to pay, but not Single-payer health care. In a speech to Harvard Medical School on June 4, 1998, Clinton outlined general support for universal health care for Americans. "There are 41 million people without health insurance. Who will take care of these people in the future? How will we pay for their care? How will we pay for the extra costs that come when someone is not treated for a chronic disease or turned away from the emergency room? The job of health care reform cannot be done when access to care depends on skin color or the neighborhood they live in or the amount of money in their wallet. Let’s continue to work toward universal affordable, quality health care *." Clinton has subsequently said that health care coverage improvements need to be made incrementally over time, in contrast to the more ambitious, wide-ranging plan that failed in 1993-1994. Clinton has recently collaborated with former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich on joint proposals for incremental health care improvements that would involve both private insurers and government. * * However, Clinton has always rejected a Canadian-style Single-payer health care plan as politically unrealistic, from the 1993 Clinton health care plan (Dead on arrival: why Washington's power elites won't consider single payer health reform, Washington Monthly, Sept. 1993, Tom Hamburger) to the present *. Education vouchers Clinton is against education vouchers for use at private schools. On September 13, 2000, she said, " I do not support vouchers. And the reason I don’t is because I don’t think we can afford to siphon dollars away from our underfunded public schools." * Outlining a different objection, on February 21, 2006, she said: "Next parent that comes and says, 'I want to send my child to the school of the Church of the White Supremacist ...' The parent says, 'The way that I read Genesis, Cain was marked, therefore I believe in white supremacy. ...' So what if the next parent comes and says, 'I want to send my child to the School of the Jihad'? ... I won't stand for it." * Abortion Clinton has been a staunch supporter of the legal right of a woman to end her pregnancy by abortion as determined in the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision of 1973. Clinton considers herself an "anti-abortionist" who believes that the criminalization of abortion will not end its practice. Clinton claims that the acceptance and availability of birth control and sex education will eliminate unwanted pregnancies and bring an end to abortion. (Few other political figures use "anti-abortionist" with this meaning, however.) In a speech on January 24, 2005, to the New York State Family Planning Providers, Senator Clinton outlined her stance on abortion. "When I spoke to the conference on women in Beijing in 1995 — ten years ago this year — I spoke out against any government interfering with the reproductive rights and decisions of women and families. So we have a lot of experience from around the world that is a cautionary tale about what happens when a government substitutes its opinion for an individual's. There is no reason why government cannot do more to educate and inform and provide assistance so that the choice guaranteed under our constitution either does not ever have to be exercised or only in very rare circumstances." Senator Clinton emphasized that, "I believe we can all recognize that abortion in many ways represents a sad, even tragic choice to many, many women." She praised the role of moral values in preventing unwanted pregnancies while supporting continued research into the most effective means of preventing these pregnancies. "Research shows that the primary reason that teenage girls abstain is because of their religious and moral values. We should embrace this — and support programs that reinforce the idea that abstinence at a young age is not just the smart thing to do, it is the right thing to do. But we should also recognize what works and what doesn't work, and to be fair, the jury is still out on the effectiveness of abstinence-only programs. I don't think this debate should be about ideology, it should be about facts and evidence." * A July 13, 2005 New York Times article titled "The Evolution of Hillary Clinton" characterizes Clinton as seeking to find middle ground between voters with various views on the criminalization of abortion. * Clinton has a National Abortion Rights Action League score of "100%", voting in favor of maintaining the legality of abortion with every vote on the subject *. Civil unions / same-sex marriage On December 7, 2003, in an interview with John Roberts of CBS News, Senator Clinton expressed her opposition to same-sex marriage while affirming her support for some form of civil unions for gay couples. As is generally the case with large, non-specified audiences, she doesn't actually claim it is her own viewpoint, but the result of polling data: "I think that the vast majority of Americans find gay marriage to be something they can't agree with. But I think most Americans are fair. And if they believe that people in committed relationships want to share their lives and, not only that, have the same rights that I do in my marriage, to decide who I want to inherit my property or visit me in a hospital, I think that most Americans would think that that's fair and that should be done *." However, when speaking before conservative or faith-based audiences, Senator Clinton says that she personally is against same-sex marriage on moral and historical grounds. *. In the same interview with Roberts, Senator Clinton expressed opposition to the Federal Marriage Amendment, a proposed constitutional amendment banning gay marriage. "I think that would be a terrible step backwards. It would be the first time we've ever amended the Constitution to deny rights to people. And I think that should be left to the states. You know, I find it hard to believe in one program health care I'm agreeing with Newt Gingrich, now I'm about to agree with Dick Cheney. But I think Vice President Cheney's position on gay marriage is the right one." Clinton supports the Defense of Marriage Act that allows each state to decide whether to recognize a same-sex marriage performed in another state; it also codifies that for federal purposes, only the marriage of one man and one woman is recognized as valid *. Following a 2006 New York State Appeals Court ruling that denied any state constitutional right to same-sex marriage, Clinton reiterated her support for "full equality" under the civil unions mechanism. * Prayer in public schools Clinton supports students' individual right to pray at public schools, but on their own time and not during class. She does not, however, wish to inhibit students from free expression of their religious beliefs in school assignments. Clinton also affirms schools' right to teach religion and moral values, but only for appropriate educational purposes. * Flag burning Clinton supports making flag burning illegal, but without adopting the constitutional Flag Desecration Amendment to do so. * Gun control In 1992 Hillary Clinton supported the Federal assault weapons ban before the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act was passed in 1993 and signed by President Clinton•. In 1993 the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act which included the Federal assault weapons ban moved more towards the cosmetic appearance to firearms rather than the functions of already restricted firearms in the United States. During a 1999 press conference at the White House, First Lady Hillary Clinton stated, "And since the crime bill was enacted, 19 of the deadliest assault weapons are harder to find on our streets. We will never know how many tragedies we've avoided because of these efforts."• In the 1999 Proposition B in Missouri campaign, Robin Carnahan's Safe Schools and Workplaces Committee, on the weekend prior to voting day, coordinated a taped phone message from Hillary Clinton that automatically dialed 75,000 homes statewide with the message, "Just too dangerous for Missouri families." • Hillary Clinton favors "sensible gun control legislation" and not limiting gun control lawsuits. •. She made gun control issues part of her 2000 Senate campaign.• Hillary Clinton was one of 16 Senators who voted against the 2006 Vitter Amendment, which prohibits the funding of the confiscation of lawfully-held firearms during a disaster. * Video games On March 29, 2005 , Clinton called the popular video game Grand Theft Auto a "major threat" to morality. She said, "Children are playing a game that encourages them to have sex with prostitutes and then murder them. This is a silent epidemic of media desensitisation that teaches kids it’s OK to diss people because they are a woman, they’re a different color or they’re from a different place." * On December 16, 2005, Clinton proposed the Family Entertainment Protection Act, S.2126 *, a bill that would prohibit the sale of violent video games to anybody under the age of 18. The bill has not been considered in Congress since that time and due to Congressional policy, will lapse if it is not passed by the end of the term in January 2007. | |||||||
|
| ||||||||
 |
|
| |