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The sects messianic leader, David Koresh,... |
31st July 2010, 10:58 |
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The sects messianic leader, David Koresh, believed he was Christ reincarnate, the only person who knew the secret of the seven seals referred to in the book of RevelationKoresh had almost hypnotic mind control over the men, women, and children who followed him; a large arsenal of weapons, which he was obviously prepared to use; and enough food to hold out for a long timeThe standoff between the Davidians and the FBI dragged out for almost two monthsDuring that time, several adults and children left, but most of them stayed, with Koresh promising to surrender but always finding an excuse to delay doing so
On Sunday night, April 18, Janet Reno came to the White House to tell me that the FBI wanted to storm the compound, apprehend Koresh and any of his followers who had taken part in killing the agents or some other crime, and free the rest of themJanet said she was concerned by FBI reports that Koresh was sexually abusing children, most of them pre-teens, and that he might be planning a mass suicideThe FBI had also told her that it couldnt keep so many of its resources tied down in one place foreverThey wanted to raid the compound the next day, using armored vehicles to break holes in the buildings, then blast tear gas into them, a maneuver they estimated would force all the members to surrender within two hoursReno had to approve the assault knock off tiffany jewelry and wanted my okay first
Several years earlier, I had faced a similar situation as governorA right-wing extremist group had established a compound in the mountains of north ArkansasAmong the men, women, and children who lived there were two suspects wanted for murderThe people lived in several cabins, each of which had a trapdoor that led to a dugout from which they could fire on approaching authoritiesAnd they had a lot of weapons to fireThe FBI wanted to storm them, tooAt a meeting I convened with the FBI, our state police, and cooperating law-enforcement people from Missouri and Oklahoma, I listened to the FBIs case, then said that before I could approve the action, I wanted someone whod fought in the jungles of Vietnam to fly over the place in a helicopter and make an assessmentThe battlewise veteran who made the inspection for me returned to say, If those people can shoot at all, youll lose fifty men in the assaultI called off the raid, put a blockade around the camp, cut off food-stamp aid to the several families who had been receiving it, and prevented anyone who left the premises to get supplies from going backEventually the holdouts gave in, and the suspects were apprehended with no loss of life
When Janet made her case to me, I thought we should try what had worked in Arkansas before we approved the FBI raidShe countered that chanel vintage jewelry the FBI was tired of waiting; that the standoff was costing the government a million dollars a week and tying up law-enforcement resources needed elsewhere; that the Branch Davidians could hold out longer than the Arkansas people had; and that the possibilities of child sexual abuse and mass suicide were real, because Koresh was crazy and so were many of his followersFinally, I told her that if she thought it was the right thing to do, she could go ahead
The next day, as I watched CNN on a television just outside the Oval Office, I saw Koreshs compound in flamesThe raid had gone terribly wrongAfter the FBI fired the tear gas into the buildings where the people were holed up, the Davidians started a fireIt got worse when they opened the windows to let the tear gas out and also let in a hard wind off the Texas plains, which stoked the flamesWhen it ended, more than eighty people had died, including twenty-five children; only nine survivedI knew I needed to speak to the press and take responsibility for the fiascoSo did Dee Dee Myers and Bruce LindseyBut several times during the day, when I wanted to go ahead, George Stephanopoulos urged me to wait, saying we didnt know whether anyone was still alive or whether, if Koresh heard my words, he might snap and kill them, tooJanet Reno did appear before the cameras, explained what happened, and took louis vuitton white speedy full responsibility for the raidAs the first woman to hold the attorney generals post, she thought it was important not to pass the buckBy the time I finally talked to the press about Waco, Reno was being praised and I was being criticized for letting her take the fall
For the second time in less than twenty-four hours, I had accepted advice that ran counter to my instinctsHe was young and cautious and had given me his honest, albeit mistaken, opinionBut I was furious at myself, first for agreeing to the raid against my better judgment, then for delaying a public acknowledgment of responsibility for itOne of the most important decisions a President has to make is when to take the advice of the people who work for him and when to reject itNobody can be right all the time, but its a lot easier to live with bad decisions that you believed in when you made them than with those your advisors say are right but your gut says are wrongAfter Waco, I resolved to go with my gut
Perhaps one reason I didnt trust my instincts enough is that the administration was being hammered hard in Washington and I was being second-guessed at every turnAfter a great initial appearance on Capitol Hill, Hillary was being criticized for the closed meetings of her health-care task forceSince they were consulting with hundreds of people, nothing they did was secret; they black and white chanel were simply trying to move with dispatch over many immensely complicated matters to reach my overly ambitious goal of presenting a health-care plan to Congress within one hundred daysThe task force heard testimony from over 1,100 groups, had more than 200 meetings with members of Congress, and held public meetings all around the countryIts reputation for being secretive was exaggeratedIn the end, the task force operation proved too unwieldy and was allowed to expire, and we couldnt make the hundred-day deadline anyway
As if all this werent enough, I also suffered the defeat of my short-term stimulus package, which was designed to create 500,000 jobs by getting money out quickly to cities and states for infrastructure projectsThe economy was still growing slowly, it needed the boost, and the modest nonrecurring expenditures wouldnt have made our deficit problem worseThe House passed the bill handily and the Senate was for it, too, but Bob Dole had more than forty Republican senators who were willing to filibuster itAfter the first filibuster vote, we should have tried to negotiate a smaller package with Dole, or accepted a less ambitious compromise proposal offered by Senators John Breaux and David Boren, two conservative DemocratsSenator Robert Byrd, who was handling the proposal, was adamant that if we didnt bend, we could break the christian dior saddle bag filibuste |
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Its true that the overwhelming focus of the... |
30th July 2010, 10:50 |
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Its true that the overwhelming focus of the campaign had been on domestic issues; our economic troubles demanded thatBut, as I had said over and over, increasing global interdependence was erasing the divide between foreign and domestic policyAnd the new world order President Bush had proclaimed after the fall of the Berlin Wall was rife with chaos and big, unresolved questions
Early on, my national security advisor, Tony Lake, had declared that success in foreign affairs is often defined by preventing or defusing problems before they develop into headaches and headline grabbersIf we do a really good job, he said, the public may never know it, because the dogs wont barkWhen I took office, we had a whole kennel full of barking hounds, with Bosnia and Russia howling the loudest, and several others, including Somalia, Haiti, North Korea, and Japans trade policy, growling in the background
The breakup of the Soviet Union and the collapse of communism in the Warsaw Pact nations raised the prospect that Europe might become democratic, peaceful, and united for the first time in historyWhether it would happen turned on four great questions: Would East and West Germany be reunited; would Russia become a truly democratic, stable, nonimperial nation; what would happen to Yugoslavia, a cauldron of diverse ethnic provinces, which had been held together by the iron will of Marshal Tito; and would Russia and the former Communist countries be integrated into the European Union and the transatlantic NATO alliance with the United States and Canada?
By the time I became President, Germany had been reunited under the visionary leadership of men's gucci wallet Chancellor Helmut Kohl, with the strong support of President Bush and despite reservations in Europe about the political and economic power of a resurgent GermanyThe other three questions were still open, and I knew that one of my most important responsibilities as President was to see that they were answered correctly
During the election campaign, both President Bush and I had supported aid to RussiaAt first I was more assertive than he was, but after prodding by former president Nixon, Bush announced that the G-7, the seven largest industrial nationsthe United States, Germany, France, Italy, the United Kingdom, Canada, and Japanwould provide $24 billion to support democracy and economic reform in RussiaBy the time Yeltsin came to Washington in June 1992 as Russias president, he was grateful and openly supporting Bushs reelectionAs I mentioned earlier, Yeltsin did agree to a courtesy meeting with me at Blair House on June 18, thanks to the friendship between Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev and Toby Gati, one of my foreign policy advisorsIt didnt bother me that Yeltsin was supporting Bush; I just wanted him to know that if I won, I would support him
In November, a couple of days after the election, Yeltsin called to congratulate me and to urge me to come to Moscow as soon as possible to reaffirm Americas support for his reforms in the face of mounting opposition at homeYeltsin had a hard row to hoeHe had been elected president of Russia in June 1991, when Russia was still part of the crumbling Soviet UnionIn August, Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev was put under house arrest at his summer retreat on the Black Sea by conspirators intent louis vuitton mahina on staging a coup dtatRussian citizens took to the Moscow streets in protestThe defining moment of the drama came when Yeltsin, in office for just two months, climbed on a tank in front of the Russian White House, the parliamentary building under siege by the coup plottersHe urged the Russian people to defend their hard-won democracyIn effect, he was telling the reactionaries, You may steal our freedom, but youll have to do it over my dead bodyYeltsins heroic clarion call galvanized domestic and international support, and the coup failedBy December, the Soviet Union had dissolved into a collection of independent states, and Russia had taken the Soviet seat on the United Nations Security Council
But Yeltsins problems were not overReactionary elements, smarting from their loss of power, opposed his determination to withdraw Soviet troops from the Baltic nations of Estonia, Lithuania, and LatviaEconomic disaster loomed, as the rotting remains of the Soviet economy were exposed to free-market reforms, which brought inflation and the sale of state-owned assets at low prices to a new class of ultra-rich businessmen called oligarchs, who made Americas robber barons of the late nineteenth century look like Puritan preachersOrganized-crime networks also moved into the vacuum created by the collapse of the Soviet state and spread their tentacles across the globeYeltsin had destroyed the old system, but had not yet been able to build a new oneHe also had not developed a good working relationship with the Duma, Russias parliament, partly because he was by nature averse to compromise, partly because the Duma was full of people who longed for the chanel watch women old order or an equally oppressive new one rooted in ultra-nationalism
Yeltsin was up to his ears in alligators, and I wanted to help himI was encouraged to do so by Bob Strauss, whom President Bush had sent to Moscow as our ambassador even though he was an ardent Democrat and a former chairman of the Democratic National CommitteeStrauss said I could work with Yeltsin and give him good political advice, and he urged me to do both
I was inclined to accept Yeltsins invitation to go to Russia, but Tony Lake said Moscow shouldnt be my first foreign stop, and the rest of my team said it would divert attention from our domestic agendaThey made strong arguments, but the United States had a big stake in Russias success, and we sure didnt want hard-liners, either Communists or ultra-nationalists, in control thereBoris made it easier when he suggested a meeting in a mutually acceptable third country
About this time, I persuaded my old friend and Oxford housemate Strobe Talbott to leave Time magazine and come to work in the State Department to help us with policy on the former Soviet UnionBy then, Strobe and I had been discussing Russian history and politics for almost twenty-five yearsEver since he translated and edited Khrushchevs memoirs, Strobe had known and cared more about Russia and the Russian people than anyone else I knewHe had a fine analytical mind and a fertile imagination behind his proper professorial faade, and I trusted both his judgment and his willingness to tell me the unvarnished truthThere was no position in the State Department hierarchy that described what I wanted Strobe to do, so he set out to create one, with the tiffany diamond blessing of Warren Christopher and the help of -bleep- Holbrooke, an investment banker and veteran foreign policy hand who had provided advice during the campaign and who would become one of the most important figures in my administration
Eventually, Strobes new job had a title: ambassador-at-large and special advisor to the secretary of state on the new independent states of the former Soviet UnionHe later became deputy secretary of stateI dont think five people could repeat Strobes title, but everybody knew what he did: he was our go to man on RussiaFor eight years, he was by my side in all my meetings with Presidents Yeltsin and Vladimir Putin, eighteen with Yeltsin aloneSince Strobe spoke fluent Russian and took copious notes, his participation with me and his own interactions with the Russians guaranteed a precision and accuracy in our work that would prove invaluableStrobe chronicles our eight-year odyssey in his book The Russia Hand, which is remarkable not only for its insights but for the verbatim accounts of the colorful conversations I had with YeltsinUnlike what happens in most books of the genre, the quotes are not reconstructions; they are, for good or ill, what we actually saidStrobes main point is that I became my own Russia hand because, while not an expert on Russia, I knew one big thing: on the twin issues that had constituted the casus belli of the cold wardemocracy versus dictatorship at home and cooperation versus competition abroadYeltsin and I were, in principle, on the same side
During the transition period, I had talked to Strobe a lot about the deteriorating situation in Russia and the imperative of averting fake cartier watches disa |
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The value of the peso had been declining... |
29th July 2010, 19:40 |
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The value of the peso had been declining precipitously, undermining Mexicos ability to borrow money or to repay existing debtsThe problem was exacerbated because, as Mexicos condition deteriorated, in order to raise money it had issued short-term debt instruments called tesobonos, which had to be repaid in dollarsAs the value of the peso continued to decline, it took more and more of them to finance the dollar value of Mexicos short-term debtNow, with only $6 billion in reserves, Mexico had $30 billion of payments due in 1995, $10 billion in the first three months of the year
If Mexico defaulted on its obligations, the economic meltdown, as Bob Rubin tried to avoid calling it, could accelerate, with massive unemployment, inflation, and, very likely, a steep and prolonged recession because the international financial institutions, other governments, and private investors would all be unwilling to put more money at risk there
As Rubin and Summers explained, the economic collapse of Mexico could have severe consequences for the United StatesFirst, Mexico was our third-largest trading partnerIf it couldnt buy our products, American companies and employees would be hurtSecond, economic dislocation in Mexico could lead to a 30 percent increase in illegal immigration, or half a million more people each yearThird, an impoverished Mexico would almost certainly become more vulnerable to increased activity by illegal drug chanel logo earrings cartels, which were already sending large quantities of narcotics across the border into the United StatesFinally, a default by Mexico could have a damaging impact on other countries, by shaking investors confidence in emerging markets in the rest of Latin America, Central Europe, Russia, South Africa, and other countries we were trying to help modernize and prosperSince about 40 percent of American exports went to developing countries, our economy could be hurt badly
Rubin and Summers recommended that we ask the Congress to approve $25 billion in loans to allow Mexico to pay its debt on schedule and retain the confidence of creditors and investors, in return for Mexicos commitment to financial reforms and more timely reporting on its financial condition, in order to prevent this from happening againThey warned, however, that risks were attached to their recommendationMexico might fail anyway and we could lose whatever money we had extendedIf the policy succeeded, it could create the problem economists call moral hazardMexico was on the brink of collapse not only because of flawed government policies and weak institutions, but also because investors had continued to finance its operations long past the point of prudenceBy giving the money to Mexico to repay wealthy investors for unwise decisions, we might create an expectation that such decisions were risk free
The risks were compounded by the fact that most men's omega watch Americans didnt understand the consequences to the American economy of a Mexican defaultMost congressional Democrats would think the bailout proved that NAFTA was ill advised in the first placeAnd many of the newly elected Republicans, especially in the House, didnt share the Speakers enthusiasm for international affairsA surprising number of them didnt even have passportsThey wanted to restrict immigration from Mexico, not send billions of dollars there
After I listened to the presentation, I asked a couple of questions, then said we had to go forward with the loanI thought the decision was clear-cut, but not all my advisors agreedThose who wanted to speed my political recovery after the crushing midterm defeat thought I was nuts, or, as we say in Arkansas, three bricks shy of a full loadWhen George Stephanopoulos heard Treasurys $25 billion figure for the loan, he thought Rubin and Summers must have meant $25 million; he thought I was about to shoot myself in the footPanetta favored the loan, but warned that if Mexico didnt repay us, it could cost me the election in 1996
The risks were considerable, but I had confidence in Mexicos new president, Ernesto Zedillo, an economist with a doctorate from Yale who had stepped into the breach when his partys original candidate for president, Luis Colosio, was assassinatedIf anybody could bring Mexico back, Zedillo could
Besides, we simply couldnt stand aside and let vintage omega watches Mexico fail without trying to helpIn addition to the economic problems it would cause both for us and for the Mexicans, we would be sending a terrible signal of selfishness and shortsightedness throughout Latin AmericaThere was a long history of Latin American resentment of America as arrogant and insensitive to their interests and problemsWhenever America reached out in genuine friendshipwith FDRs Good Neighbor Policy, JFKs Alliance for Progress, and President Carters return of the Panama Canalwe did betterDuring the Cold War, when we supported the overthrow of democratically elected leaders, backed dictators, and tolerated their human rights abuses, we got the reaction we deserved
I called the congressional leaders to the White House, explained the situation, and asked for their supportAll of them pledged it, including Bob Dole and Newt Gingrich, who aptly described the Mexico problem as the first crisis of the twenty-first centuryAs Rubin and Summers made the rounds on Capitol Hill, we picked up support from Senator Paul Sarbanes of Maryland, Senator Chris Dodd, and Republican senator Bob Bennett of Utah, a highly intelligent, old-fashioned conservative who quickly grasped the consequences of inaction and would stick with us throughout the crisisSeveral governors were also supportive, including Bill Weld of Massachusetts, who had a great interest in Mexico, and George WBush of Texas, whose state, along with mulberry bags California, would be hardest hit if the Mexican economy collapsed
Despite the merits of the case and the support of Alan Greenspan, it became obvious by the end of the month that we werent doing well in CongressAnti-NAFTA Democrats were sure the aid package was a step too far, and the new Republican members were in open revolt
By the end of the month, Rubin and Summers had begun to con-sider acting unilaterally, by providing the money to Mexico out of the Exchange Stabilization FundThe fund was created in 1934, when America took the dollar off the gold standard, and was used to minimize currency fluctuations; it had about $35 billion and could be used by the Treasury secretary with the Presidents approvalOn the twenty-eighth, the need for American action took on even greater urgency when the Mexican finance minister called Rubin and told him default was imminent, with more than a billion dollars worth of tesobonos coming due the following week
The matter came to a head on Monday night, January 30Mexicos reserves were down to $2 billion, and the value of the peso had dropped another 10 percent during the dayThat evening, Rubin and Summers came to the White House to see Leon Panetta and Sandy Berger, who was handling the issue for the National Security CouncilIn blunt terms, Rubin told them, Mexico has about forty-eight hours to liveGingrich called to say he couldnt pass the aid package for another two weeks, if at chanel jumbo flap bag all |
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Prime Minister John Major, President Hosni... |
28th July 2010, 09:12 |
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Prime Minister John Major, President Hosni Mubarak, and Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto of Pakistan and Prime Minister Tansu Ciller of Turkey, two intelligent, very modern women leaders of Muslim countries, came to see me
Meanwhile, Newt Gingrich gave a speech on his first hundred days as SpeakerTo hear him tell it, you would think the Republicans had revolutionized America overnight, and in the process changed our form of government to a parliamentary system under which he, as prime minister, set the course for domestic policy, while I, as President, was restricted to handling foreign affairs
For the moment, the Republicans were dominating the news, based on the novelty of their control of Congress and their assertions that they were making big changesActually, they had enacted only three relatively minor parts of their contract, all of which I supportedThe hard decisions were still ahead of them
In a speech to the American Society of Newspaper Editors, I spelled out the parts of the contract I agreed with, on which I would seek compromise, and those I opposed and would vetoOn April 14, four days after Senator Dole announced his candidacy for President, I quietly filed for reelectionOn the eighteenth, I held a press conference and was asked more than twenty questions about a wide variety of topics, foreign and domesticThe next day they would all be forgotten and there would be only two words on the lips of every American: Oklahoma City
In late morning I learned that a truck bomb had exploded outside the Alfred PMurrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, leaving the building a rubble and killing an unknown number of peopleI immediately declared a state of emergency and sent an investigative team to the siteWhen gucci backpack the magnitude of the recovery effort became apparent, firefighters and other emergency workers came from all over the country to help Oklahoma City dig through the rubble in a desperate attempt to find any survivors
America was riveted and heartbroken by the tragedy; it claimed the lives of 168 people, including nineteen children who were in the buildings day-care center when the bomb explodedMost of the dead were federal employees who worked for the several agencies that had offices in the Murrah BuildingMany people assumed that Islamic militants were responsible, but I cautioned against jumping to conclusions about the perpetrators identity
Soon after the bombing, Oklahoma lawmen arrested Timothy McVeigh, an alienated military veteran who had come to hate the federal governmentBy the twenty-first, McVeigh was in FBI custody and had been arraignedHe had chosen April 19 to bomb the federal building because it was the anniversary of the FBI raid on the Branch Davidians at Waco, an event that, to right-wing extremists, represented the ultimate exercise of arbitrary, abusive government powerAnti-government paranoia had been building in America for years, as more and more people took the historical skepticism of Americans toward government to a level of outright hatredThis animus led to the rise of armed militia groups that rejected the legitimacy of federal authority and asserted the right to be a law unto themselves
The atmosphere of hostility was intensified by right-wing radio talk-show hosts, whose venomous rhetoric pervaded the airwaves daily, and by Web sites encouraging people to rise up against the government and offering practical assistance, including easy-to-follow instructions on how to make bombs
In the knock off chanel earrings wake of Oklahoma City, I tried to comfort and encourage those who had lost their loved ones, and the country at large, and to step up our efforts to protect Americans from terrorismIn the more than two years since the World Trade Center bombing, I had increased counterterrorism resources for the FBI and CIA and instructed them to work together more closelyOur law-enforcement efforts had succeeded in returning several terrorists to the United States for trial after they fled to foreign countries and in preventing terrorist attacks on the United Nations, on the Holland and Lincoln tunnels in New York City, and on planes flying out of the Philippines to Americas West Coast
Two months before Oklahoma City, I had sent anti-terrorism legislation to Congress asking, among other things, for one thousand more law-enforcement officials to fight terrorism; a new counterterrorism center under the direction of the FBI to coordinate our efforts; and approval to use military experts, normally prohibited from involvement in domestic law enforcement, to help with terrorist threats and incidents within the country involving chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons
After Oklahoma City, I asked the congressional leaders for expedited consideration of the legislation and, on May 3, proposed amendments to strengthen it: greater law-enforcement access to financial records; authority to conduct electronic surveillance on suspected terrorists when they move from place to place, without having to go back to court for a new order to tap each specific site; increased penalties for knowingly providing firearms or explosives for terrorist acts against current or former federal employees and their families; and a requirement that markers, called large gucci bag taggants, be put into all explosive materials so that they could be tracedSome of these measures were bound to be controversial, but, as I said to a reporter on May 4, terrorism is the major threat to the security of AmericansI wish I had been wrong
On Sunday, Hillary and I flew to Oklahoma City for a memorial service at the Oklahoma State FairgroundsThe service had been organized by Cathy Keating, the wife of Governor Frank Keating, whom I had first met more than thirty years earlier when we were students at GeorgetownFrank and Cathy were obviously still in a lot of pain, but they and the mayor of Oklahoma City, Ron Norick, had risen to the challenge of the search-and-recovery operation and of meeting Oklahomans need for grievingAt the service, the Reverend Billy Graham got a standing ovation when he said, The spirit of this city and of this nation will not be defeatedIn moving remarks, the governor said that if anyone thought Americans had lost the capacity for love and caring and courage, they should come to Oklahoma
I tried to speak for the nation in saying, You have lost too much, but you have not lost everythingAnd you have certainly not lost America, for we will stand with you for as many tomorrows as it takesI shared a letter I had received from a young widow and mother of three whose husband had been killed by the terrorist downing of Pan Am 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland, in 1988She asked those who had lost loved ones not to turn their hurt into hate, but instead to do the things their loved ones had left undone, thus ensuring they did not die in vainAfter Hillary and I met with some of the victims families, I needed to remember those wise words tooOne of the Secret Service agents killed was Al Whicher, who cartier tank louis had served on my detail before going to Oklahoma; his wife and three children were among the families there
So often referred to by the demeaning term federal bureaucrats, the slain employees had been killed because they served us, helping the elderly and disabled, supporting farmers and veterans, enforcing our lawsThey were family members, friends, neighbors, PTA members, and workers in their communitiesSomehow they had been morphed into heartless parasites of tax dollars and abusers of power, not only in the twisted minds of Timothy McVeigh and his sympathizers but also by too many others who bashed them for power and profitI promised myself that I would never use the thoughtless term federal bureaucrat again, and that I would do all I could to change the atmosphere of bitterness and bigotry out of which this madness had come
Whitewater World didnt stop for Oklahoma CityThe day before Hillary and I left for the memorial service, Ken Starr and three aides came to the White House to question usI was accompanied to the session in the Treaty Room by Ab Mikva and Jane Sherburne of the White House counsels office, and my private attorneys, David Kendall and his partner Nicole SeligmanThe interview was uneventful, and when it concluded, I asked Jane Sherburne to show Starr and his deputies the Lincoln Bedroom, with its furniture brought to the White House by Mary Todd Lincoln and a copy of the Gettysburg Address, which Lincoln had written in his own hand after the fact so that it could be auctioned to raise money for war veteransHillary thought I was being too nice to them, but I was just behaving as Id been raised to do, and I hadnt yet given up all my illusions that the inquiry would, in the end, follow a legitimate silver handbags co |
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Now Barak wanted to start them up again, though... |
27th July 2010, 19:24 |
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Now Barak wanted to start them up again, though as yet he was unwilling to reaffirm the precise words of the Rabin pocket commitment
Barak had to contend with a very different Israeli electorate from the one Rabin had ledThere were many more immigrants, and the Russians in particular were opposed to giving up the GolanNatan Sharansky, who had become a hero in the West during his long imprisonment in the Soviet Union and had accompanied Netanyahu to Wye in 1998, explained the Russian Jews attitude to meHe said they had come from the worlds largest country to one of its smallest ones, and didnt believe in making Israel even smaller by giving up the Golan or the West BankThey also considered Syria to be no threat to IsraelThey werent at peace but were not at war eitherIf Syria attacked Israel, the Israelis could win easilyWhy give up the Golan?
While Barak didnt agree with this view, he had to contend with itNevertheless, he wanted to make peace with Syria, was confident the issues could be resolved, and wanted me to convene negotiations as soon as possibleBy January, I had been working for more than three months with the Syrian foreign minister, Farouk al-Shara, and by telephone with President Assad to set the stage for the talksAssad was not in good health and wanted to regain the Golan before he died, but he had to be carefulHe wanted his son Bashar to succeed him, and apart from his own conviction that Syria should get back all the land it had occupied before June 4, 1967, he had to make an agreement that would not be subject balenciaga dix motorcycle to attack from forces within Syria whose support his son would need
Assads frailty and a stroke suffered by Foreign Minister Shara in the fall of 1999 heightened Baraks sense of urgencyAt his request, I sent Assad a letter saying I thought Barak was willing to make a deal if we could resolve the definition of the border, the control of water, and the early-warning post, and that if they did reach agreement, the United States would be prepared to establish bilateral relations with Syria, a move Barak had urgedThat was a big step for us, given Syrias past support of terrorismOf course, Assad would have to stop supporting terrorism in order to achieve normal relations with the U but if he had the Golan back, the incentive to support the Hezbollah terrorists who attacked Israel from Lebanon would evaporate
Barak wanted peace with Lebanon, too, because he had committed to withdrawing Israeli forces from the country by the end of the year, and a peace agreement would make Israel safer from Hezbollah attacks along the border, and would not make it appear that Israel had withdrawn because of the attacksAs he well knew, no agreement with Lebanon would come without Syrias consent and involvement
Assad replied a month later in a letter that appeared to back away from his previous position, perhaps because of the uncertainties in Syria that his and Sharas health problems had causedHowever, a few weeks after that, when Madeleine Albright and Dennis Ross went to see Assad and Shara, who seemed completely recovered, Assad told them that he balenciaga blue wanted to resume negotiations and was ready to make peace because he believed Barak was seriousHe even agreed to have Shara negotiate, something he had not done before, as long as Barak would personally handle the Israeli side
Barak accepted eagerly and wanted to begin immediatelyI explained that we could not do it during the Christmas holidays, and he agreed to our timetable: preliminary talks in Washington in mid-December, to be resumed early in the New Year with my participation and to continue uninterrupted until agreement was reachedThe Washington talks got off to a bit of a rocky start with an aggressive public statement by SharaNevertheless, in the private talks, when Shara suggested that we should start where the talks had left off in 1996, with Rabins pocket commitment of the June 4 line provided Israels needs were met, Barak responded that while he had made no commitment on territory, we do not erase historyThe two men then agreed that I could decide the order in which the issuesincluding borders, security, water, and peacewould be discussedBarak wanted the negotiations to continue uninterrupted; that would require the Syrians to work through the end of Ramadan on January 7 and not go home to celebrate the traditional feast of Eid Al Fitr at the end of the fasting periodShara agreed, and the two sides went home to prepare
Although Barak had pushed hard for the early negotiations, he soon began to worry about the political consequences of giving up the Golan without having prepared the Israeli public for itHe wanted some louis vuitton backpacks cover: the resumption of the Lebanon track to be conducted by the Syrians in consultation with the Lebanese; the announcement by at least one Arab state of an upgrade of relations with Israel; clear security benefits from the United States; and a free-trade zone on the GolanI agreed to support all these requests and took things a step further, calling Assad on December 19 and asking him to resume the Lebanese track at the same time as the Syrian talks and to help retrieve the remains of three Israelis still listed as missing in action from the Lebanon war almost twenty years earlierAssad agreed to the second request and we sent a forensics team to Syria, but unfortunately the remains werent where the Israelis thought they would beOn the first issue, Assad hedged, saying the Lebanese talks should resume once some headway had been made on the Syrian track
Shepherdstown is a rural community a little more than an hours drive from Washington; Barak had insisted on an isolated setting to minimize leaks, and the Syrians didnt want to go to Camp David or Wye River because other high-profile Middle East negotiations had occurred thereThat was fine with me; the conference facilities in Shepherdstown were comfortable, and I could get there from the White House in about twenty minutes by helicopter
It quickly became apparent that the two sides were not that far apart on the issuesSyria wanted all of the Golan back but was willing to leave the Israelis a small strip of land, 10 meters (33 feet) wide, along the border of the lake; Israel wanted a chanel quilted handbag wider strip of landSyria wanted Israel to withdraw within eighteen months; Barak wanted three yearsIsrael wanted to stay in the early-warning station; Syria wanted it manned by personnel from the UN or perhaps from the UIsrael wanted guarantees on the quality and quantity of water flowing from the Golan into the lake; Syria agreed as long as it got the same guarantees on its water flow from TurkeyIsrael wanted full diplomatic relations as soon as withdrawal began; Syria wanted something less until the withdrawal was complete
The Syrians came to Shepherdstown in a positive and flexible frame of mind, eager to make an agreementBy contrast, Barak, who had pushed hard for the talks, decided, apparently on the basis of polling data, that he needed to slow-walk the process for a few days in order to convince the Israeli public that he was being a tough negotiatorHe wanted me to use my good relationship with Shara and Assad to keep the Syrians happy while he said as little as possible during his self-imposed waiting period
I was, to put it mildly, disappointedIf Barak had dealt with the Syrians before or if he had given us some advance notice, it might have been manageablePerhaps, as a democratically elected leader, he had to pay more attention to public opinion than Assad did, but Assad had his own political problems, and had overcome his notorious aversion to high-level involvement with the Israelis because he trusted me and had believed Baraks assurances
Barak had not been in politics long, and I thought he had gotten some very bad relojes omega ad |
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The election had presented a simple choice: the... |
26th July 2010, 19:16 |
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The election had presented a simple choice: the Democrats wanted to save Social Security first, hire 100,000 teachers, modernize schools, raise the minimum wage, and pass the Patients Bill of RightsThe Republicans were against all thatBy and large they ran a single-issue campaign, on impeachment, although in some states they also ran anti-gay ads, essentially saying that if the Democrats won Congress, we would force every state to recognize gay marriagesIn states like Washington and Arkansas, the message was reinforced by pictures of a gay couple kissing or at a church altarNot long before the election, Matthew Shepard, a young gay man, was beaten to death in Wyoming because of his sexual orientationThe whole country was moved, especially after his parents bravely talked about it in publicI couldnt believe the Far Right would run the gay-bashing ads in the wake of Shepards death, but they always needed an enemyThe Republicans were also weakened because they were deeply divided over the late October budget agreement; the most conservative members thought they had given away the store and gotten nothing in return
In the months before the elections, I had decided that the sixth-year jinx was way overrated, that citizens historically had voted against the Presidents party in the sixth year because they thought that the presidency was winding down, that the energy and new ideas were running out, and that they might as well give the other side a chanceIn 1998, they saw me working on the Middle East and other foreign and domestic issues right up to the election, and they knew we had an agenda omega replica watches for the coming two yearsThe impeachment campaign galvanized the Democrats to vote in larger numbers than they had in 1994, and blocked any other message swing voters might have heard from the RepublicansBy contrast, the incumbent Republican governors who essentially ran on my platform of fiscal responsibility, welfare reform, commonsense crime-control measures, and strong support for education did very wellIn Texas, Governor George WBush, after handily defeating my old friend Garry Mauro, gave his victory speech in front of a banner that said Opportunity, Responsibility, two-thirds of my 1992 campaign slogan
Large turnouts of African-American voters helped a young lawyer named John Edwards defeat North Carolina senator Lauch Faircloth, Judge Sentelles friend and one of my harshest critics, and in South Carolina, black voters propelled Senator Fritz Hollings to a come-from-behind victoryIn New York, Congressman Chuck Schumer, an outspoken opponent of impeachment with a strong record on crime, easily defeated Senator Al DAmato, who had spent much of the last several years attacking Hillary and her staff in his committee hearingsIn California, Senator Barbara Boxer won reelection and Gray Davis was elected governor with far higher margins than their pre-election polls indicated, and the Democrats picked up two House seats on the anti-impeachment momentum and a large turnout of Hispanic and African-American voters
In the House elections, we won back the seat that Marjorie Margolies-Mezvinsky had lost in 1994 when our candidate, Joe Hoeffel, who had lost in 1996, ran again and opposed chanel bags pink impeachmentIn Washington State, Jay Inslee, who had been defeated in 1994, won his seat backIn New Jersey, a physics professor named Rush Holt was behind by 20 percent ten days before the electionHe pushed one TV ad highlighting his opposition to impeachment, and won a seat no Democrat had held in a century
We all did our best to close the vast fund-raising gap and I taped telephone messages that were directed to the homes of Hispanics, blacks, and other likely Democratic votersAl Gore campaigned vigorously all over the country, and Hillary probably made more appearances than anybody elseWhen her foot became badly swollen during a campaign stop in New York, a blood clot was discovered behind her right knee and she was put on blood thinnersMariano wanted her to stay in bed for a week, but she kept going, giving confidence as well as support to our candidatesI was really concerned about her, but she was determined to push onAs angry as she was with me, she was even more upset about what Starr and the Republicans were trying to do
Surveys by James Carville and Stan Greenberg and by Democratic pollster Mark Mellman had indicated that, nationwide, voters were 20 percent more likely to vote for a Democrat who said that I should be censured by the Congress and that we should get on with the publics business than for a Republican who favored impeachmentAfter the results came in, Carville and others implored all the challengers with a chance to win to adopt this strategyIts power was evident even in races we lost narrowly that the Republicans should have won easilyFor example, in New Mexico, Democrat omega seamaster replica watches Phil Maloof, who had just lost a special election in June by six points and was down by ten a week before the November election, began anti-impeachment ads the weekend before the electionHe won on election day, but lost the election by one percent because a third of the voters had cast early ballots before they heard his messageI believe the Democrats would have won the House if more of our challengers had run on our positive program and against impeachmentMany of them didnt do so because they were afraid; they simply couldnt believe the plain evidence in the face of the massively negative coverage I had received, and the near-universal view of the pundits that what Starr and Henry Hyde were doing would be bad for Democrats rather than Republicans
On the day after the election I called Newt Gingrich to talk about some business; when the conversation got around to the election, he was very generous, saying that as a historian and the quarterback for the other team, he wanted to congratulate meHe hadnt believed we could do it, he said, and it was a truly historic achievementLater in November, Erskine Bowles called to tell me about a very different conversation he had had with GingrichNewt told Erskine that they were going to go forward with the impeachment despite the election results and the fact that many moderate Republicans didnt want to vote for itWhen Erskine asked Newt why they would proceed with impeachment instead of other possible remedies such as censure or reprimand, the Speaker replied, Because we can
The right-wing Republicans who controlled the House believed that they had men's gucci wallet now paid for impeachment so they should just go on and do it before the new Congress came inThey thought that by the next election there would be no more impeachment losses because the voters would have other things on their mindsNewt and Tom DeLay believed that they could bring most of the moderates into line through pressurefrom right-wing talk shows and activists in their districts; with threats to cut off campaign funds, or to come up with opponents in the Republican primary, or to take leadership positions away; or with offers of new leadership positions or other benefits
The right-wingers in the House caucus were seething over their defeatMany actually believed they had lost because they had given in to too many White House demands in the last two budget negotiationsIn fact, if they had run on the balanced budgets of 1997 and 1998, the Childrens Health Insurance Program, and the 100,000 teachers, they would have done well, just as the Republican governors hadBut they were too ideological and angry to do thatNow they were going to seize back control of the Republican agenda through impeachment
I had already had four showdowns with the radical right: the 94 election, which they won, and the budget shutdown, the 96 election, and the 98 election, which went our wayIn the interim I had tried to work in good faith with Congress to keep the country moving forwardNow, in the face of overwhelming public opinion against impeachment, and the clear evidence that nothing I was alleged to have done rose to the level of an impeachable offense, they were coming back for another bitter ideological chanel logo earrings fig |
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Syria wanted Israel to withdraw within eighteen... |
25th July 2010, 20:11 |
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Syria wanted Israel to withdraw within eighteen months; Barak wanted three yearsIsrael wanted to stay in the early-warning station; Syria wanted it manned by personnel from the UN or perhaps from the UIsrael wanted guarantees on the quality and quantity of water flowing from the Golan into the lake; Syria agreed as long as it got the same guarantees on its water flow from TurkeyIsrael wanted full diplomatic relations as soon as withdrawal began; Syria wanted something less until the withdrawal was complete
The Syrians came to Shepherdstown in a positive and flexible frame of mind, eager to make an agreementBy contrast, Barak, who had pushed hard for the talks, decided, apparently on the basis of polling data, that he needed to slow-walk the process for a few days in order to convince the Israeli public that he was being a tough negotiatorHe wanted me to use my good relationship with Shara and Assad to keep the Syrians happy while he said as little as possible during his self-imposed waiting period
I was, to put it mildly, disappointedIf Barak had dealt with the Syrians before or if he had given us some advance notice, it might have been manageablePerhaps, as a democratically elected leader, he had to pay more attention to public opinion black gucci bags than Assad did, but Assad had his own political problems, and had overcome his notorious aversion to high-level involvement with the Israelis because he trusted me and had believed Baraks assurances
Barak had not been in politics long, and I thought he had gotten some very bad adviceIn foreign affairs, polls are often useless; people hire leaders to win for them, and its the results that matterMany of my most important foreign policy decisions had not been popular at firstIf Barak made real peace with Syria, it would lift his standing in Israel and across the world, and increase the chances of success with the PalestiniansIf he failed, a few days of good poll numbers would vanish in the windAs hard as I tried, I couldnt change Baraks mindHe wanted me to help keep Shara on board while he waited, and to do it in the isolated setting of Shepherdstown, where there were few distractions from the business at hand
Madeleine Albright and Dennis Ross tried to think of creative ways to at least clarify Baraks commitment to the Rabin pocket commitment, including opening a back channel between Madeleine and Butheina Shaban, the only woman in the Syrian delegationButheina was an articulate, impressive woman who had always served as Assads cartier tank watch interpreter when we metShe had been with Assad for years, and I was sure she was in Shepherdstown to guarantee the president an unvarnished version of what was happening
On Friday, the fifth day, we presented a draft peace agreement with the two sides differences in bracketsThe Syrians responded positively on Saturday night, and we began meetings on border and security issuesAgain, the Syrians showed flexibility on both matters, saying they would accept an adjustment of the strip of land bordering Galilee to as much as 50 meters (164 feet), provided that Israel accepted the June 4 line as the basis of discussionThere was some practical validity to this; apparently the lake had shrunk in size in the last thirty yearsI was encouraged, but it quickly became apparent that Barak still had not authorized anyone on his team to accept June 4, no matter what the Syrians offered
On Sunday, at a lunch for Ehud and Nava Barak at Madeleine Albrights farm, Madeleine and Dennis made a last pitch to BarakSyria had shown flexibility on what Israel wanted, providing its needs were met; Israel had not responded in kindWhat would it take? Barak said he wanted to resume the Lebanese negotiationsAnd if not, he wanted to break for several days and come back
Shara was borse replica in no mood to hear thisHe said that Shepherdstown was a failure, that Barak was not sincere, and that he would have to say as much to President AssadAt the last dinner, I tried again to get Barak to say something positive that Shara could take back to SyriaHe declined, instead telling me privately that I could call Assad after we left Shepherdstown and say he would accept the June 4 line once the Lebanese negotiations resumed or were about to startThat meant Shara would go home empty-handed from negotiations he had been led to believe would be decisive, so much so that the Syrians had been willing to stay through the end of Ramadan and the Eid
To make matters worse, the latest bracketed text of our treaty leaked in the Israeli press, showing the concessions that Syria had offered without getting anything in returnShara was subjected to intense criticism at homeIt was understandably embarrassing to him, and to AssadEven authoritarian governments are not immune to popular opinion and powerful interest groups
When I called Assad with Baraks offer to affirm the Rabin commitment and demarcate the border on the basis of it as long as the Lebanese negotiations also started, he listened without commentA few days later, Shara called Madeleine prada clutch Albright and rejected Baraks offer, saying the Syrians would open negotiations on Lebanon only after the border demarcation was agreed uponThey had been burned once by being flexible and forthcoming, and they werent about to make the same mistake again
For the time being we were stumped, but I thought we should keep tryingBarak still seemed to want the Syrian peace, and it was true that the Israeli public had not been prepared for the compromises that peace requiredIt was also still in Syrias interest to make peace, and soonAssad was in ill health and had to pave the way for his sons successionMeanwhile, there was more than enough still to do on the Palestinian trackI asked Sandy, Madeleine, and Dennis to figure out what we should do next, and turned my attention to other things
On January 10, after a White House celebration with Muslims marking the end of Ramadan, Hillary and I went to the UNaval Academy Chapel in Annapolis, Maryland, for the funeral of former chief of naval operations Bud Zumwalt, who had become our friend through Renaissance WeekendAfter I took office, Bud had worked with us to provide aid to the families of servicemen who, like his late son, had become ill as a result of their exposure to Agent Orange during the Vietnam roxanne mulberry bag |
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That was worth staying up for
On the morning of... |
24th July 2010, 10:54 |
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That was worth staying up for
On the morning of the eighth day, I was feeling both anxious and hopeful, anxious because I had been scheduled to leave for the G-8 summit in Okinawa, which I had to attend for a variety of reasons, and hopeful because Baraks sense of timing and his enormous courage had kicked inI delayed my departure for Okinawa by a day and met with ArafatI told him that I thought he could get 91 percent of the West Bank, plus at least a symbolic swap of land near Gaza and the West Bank; a capital in East Jerusalem; sovereignty over the Muslim and Christian quarters of the Old City and the outer neighborhoods of East Jerusalem; planning, zoning, and law-enforcement authority over the rest of the eastern part of the city; and custodianship but not sovereignty over the Temple Mount, which was known as Haram al-Sharif to the ArabsArafat balked at not having sovereignty over all of East Jerusalem, including the Temple MountHe turned the offer downI asked him to think about itWhile he fretted and Barak fumed, I called Arab leaders for supportMost wouldnt say much, for louis vuitton diaper bags fear of undercutting Arafat
On the ninth day, I gave Arafat my best shot againIsrael had gone much further than he had, and he wouldnt even embrace their moves as the basis for future negotiationsAgain I called several Arab leaders for helpKing Abdullah and President Ben Ali of Tunisia tried to encourage ArafatThey told me he was afraid to make compromisesIt looked as if the talks were dead, and on disastrous termsBoth sides clearly wanted a deal, so I asked them to stay and work while I was in OkinawaThey agreed, though after I left, the Palestinians still refused to negotiate on the basis of the ideas I had advanced, saying they had already rejected themThen the Israelis balkedThat was in part my faultApparently I had not been as clear with Arafat as I thought I had been about what the terms of staying on should be
I had left Madeleine and the rest of our team with a real messShe took Arafat to her farm and Barak to the famous Civil War battlefield at nearby GettysburgIt lightened them up, but nothing happened between themShlomo Ben-Ami and Amnon Shahak, himself a former general, seamaster de ville had good talks with Mohammed Dahlan and Mohamed Rashid, but they were the most forward leaning of their respective groups; even if they agreed on everything, they probably couldnt get their leaders on board
I returned on the thirteenth day of discussions, and we worked all night again, mostly on security issuesThen we did it again on the fourteenth day, going well past 3 abefore giving up when effective control over the Temple Mount and all East Jerusalem was not enough for Arafat without the word sovereigntyIn a last-ditch effort I offered to try to sell Barak on full sovereignty for East Jerusalems outer neighborhoods, limited sovereignty over the inner ones, and custodial sovereignty over the HaramI shut down the talksIt was frustrating and profoundly sadThere was little difference between the two sides on how the affairs of Jerusalem would actually be handled; it was all about who got to claim sovereignty
I issued a statement saying I had concluded that the parties could not reach agreement at this time given the historical, religious, political, and emotional dimensions of chanel white ceramic watch the conflictTo give Barak some cover back home and indicate what had occurred, I said that while Arafat had made clear that he wanted to stay on the path of peace, Barak had shown particular courage, vision, and an understanding of the historical importance of this moment
I said that the two delegations had shown each other a genuine respect and understanding unique in my eight years of peacemaking around the world, and for the first time had openly discussed the most sensitive matters in disputeWe now had a better idea of each sides bottom line and I still believed we had a chance to reach an agreement before the year was out
Arafat had wanted to continue the negotiations, and on more than one occasion had acknowledged that he was unlikely to get a future Israeli government or American team so committed to peaceIt was hard to know why he had moved so littlePerhaps his team really hadnt worked through the hard compromises; perhaps they wanted one session to see how much they could squeeze out of Israel before showing their handFor whatever reasons, they had left Barak exposed in miu miu nappa a precarious political situationIt was not for nothing that he was the most decorated soldier in the history of IsraelFor all his brusque bullheadedness, he had taken great risks to win a more secure future for IsraelIn my remarks to the press, I assured the people of Israel that he had done nothing to compromise their security and said they should be very proud of him
Arafat was famous for waiting until the very last minute to make a decision, or five minutes to midnight as we used to sayI had only six months to go as PresidentI certainly hoped Arafats watch kept good time
W hile the Camp David talks were going on, positive things happened elsewhereCharlene Barshefsky completed a sweeping trade agreement with Vietnam, and the House adopted an amendment by my longtime supporter Maxine Waters that funded a down payment on our share of the Millennium Debt Relief effortBy this time debt relief had an amazing array of supporters, led by Bono
By then Bono had become a fixture in Washington political lifeHe turned out to be a first-class politician, partly through the element of hermes kelly handbag surpris |
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