The Hollywood Liberal

Clinton: We’re ‘Not Getting Through’ to Pakistanis
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton faced the unenviable task of trying to change U.S.-Pakistani relations for the better during her three-day diplomacy spree in the South Asian nation. However, it was unclear as her visit drew to a close whether she’d made any headway, as she herself acknowledged on Friday.  —KA AP via The Miami Herald: Clinton put her case directly to the public Friday in televised appearances in Islamabad, the Pakistani capital, fielding angry questions about the alleged activities of U.S. contractor Blackwater in Pakistan, the tough conditions that came with a $1.5 billion-a-year American aid package and alleged U.S. favoritism toward Pakistan’s archenemy, India. One tribesman bluntly told her: “Your presence in the region is not good for peace.” “We are fighting a war that is imposed on us. It’s not our war. It is your war,” journalist Asma Shirazi told Clinton during the women’s meeting. “You had one 9-11. We are having daily 9-11s in Pakistan.” Clinton later told CNN that she was well aware of the “pretty negative situation” in Pakistan before she got here. “I wanted to have these interactions. … I don’t think the way you deal with negative feelings is to pretend they’re not there … or just come with happy talk.” Read more Watch Clinton describe the U.S. position in Pakistan in Lahore on Friday in this AP clip: READ THE WHOLE ITEM

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton faced the unenviable task of trying to change U.S.-Pakistani relations for the better during her three-day diplomacy spree in the South Asian nation. However, it was unclear as her visit drew to a close whether she’d made any headway, as she herself acknowledged on Friday.? —KA

AP via The Miami Herald:

Clinton put her case directly to the public Friday in televised appearances in Islamabad, the Pakistani capital, fielding angry questions about the alleged activities of U.S. contractor Blackwater in Pakistan, the tough conditions that came with a $1.5 billion-a-year American aid package and alleged U.S. favoritism toward Pakistan’s archenemy, India.

One tribesman bluntly told her: “Your presence in the region is not good for peace.”

“We are fighting a war that is imposed on us. It’s not our war. It is your war,” journalist Asma Shirazi told Clinton during the women’s meeting. “You had one 9-11. We are having daily 9-11s in Pakistan.”

Clinton later told CNN that she was well aware of the “pretty negative situation” in Pakistan before she got here. “I wanted to have these interactions. … I don’t think the way you deal with negative feelings is to pretend they’re not there … or just come with happy talk.”

Read more

Watch Clinton describe the U.S. position in Pakistan in Lahore on Friday in this AP clip:

READ THE WHOLE ITEM

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Numerous conservative media outlets are pushing a distortion of comments made by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during a roundtable discussion with business leaders in Pakistan to suggest that she celebrated the notion that “[w]e tax everything that moves and doesn’t move,” in contrast to lower tax rates in Pakistan. But in her comments, Clinton actually called on Pakistan to raise more revenue of its own, rather than relying on U.S. aid, and said that U.S. taxpayers and Congress say, “[W]e want to help those who help themselves.”

Pakistan’s Daily Times crops Clinton’s comments

Daily Times: Clinton says Pakistan’s taxes “among the lowest in the world… We (the United States) tax everything that moves and doesn’t move.” Reporting on comments Clinton made during the October 29 roundtable discussion, the Daily Times reported that Clinton said, “The percentage of taxes on GDP (in Pakistan) is among the lowest in the world… We (the United States) tax everything that moves and doesn’t move, and that’s not what we see in Pakistan.”

Clinton discussed tax disparity and foreign aid and said taxpayers and Congress “want to help those who help themselves.” During her roundtable discussion, Clinton called on Pakistan to raise more of its own revenues, rather than relying on foreign aid.

From Clinton’s October 29 roundtable comments:

CLINTON: I appreciate too the idea of a sustainable, long-term partnership, and to highlight the opportunities that exist and to use the tools that are already at our disposal, tools like OPIC or the Export-Import Bank or making sure that travel visas get issued. These are all the kind of nuts-and-bolts issues that we can address and try to resolve together.

But I think too that it is only fair to take a hard look internally about what Pakistan needs to do. And at the risk of maybe sounding undiplomatic, Pakistan has to have more internal investment in your public services and in your business opportunities. By any fair measure, for example, the percentage of taxes of GDP is among the lowest in the world. The United States, we tax ourselves, depending upon who is in power, somewhere between 16 and 23 percent of GDP, and right now, it usually hovers around the 20 percent. You’re less than half of that.

And so at some point, when you ask for partnership, you have to ask what the equity state is that Pakistan itself is looking to make, because it is difficult to go to our taxpayers and say we consider Pakistan a strategic partner, we consider it a long-term friend and ally, we have supported it since its inception in 1947, we want to continue to do so, and have our taxpayers and our members of Congress say, well, we want to help those who help themselves, and we tax everything that moves and doesn’t move, and that’s not what we see happening in Pakistan.

And I can say that because I think there has to be, in any partnership, but more importantly in any plan for your own economic future, a hard look at where you’re going to get the resources to meet these needs. You do have somewhere between 170 and 180 million people. Your population is projected to be about 300 million as the current birth rates, which are among the highest in the world, continue - 2.6 birth rate. I don’t know what you’re going to do with that kind of challenge unless you start planning right now.

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Drudge: “Hillary: ‘We tax everything that moves and doesn’t move.’ “ The Drudge Report linked to the Daily Times article on October 31 with the headline, “Hillary: ‘We tax everything that moves and doesn’t move.’ “

Fox Nation: “Hillary: ‘We tax everything that moves.’ “ Linking to the Daily Times article on October 30, the Fox Nation featured the headline, “Hillary: ‘We tax everything that moves.’ “

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GOP establishment-backed candidate Dede Scozzafava withdraws from NY-23 special election.
In recent weeks, the special congressional election in New York’s 23 district has been heating up, with “big tent” and “establishment” Republicans — such as Newt Gingrich, the RNC, and the NRCC — backing Dede Scozzafava, and “purist” Republicans — such as Sarah Palin, Rick Santorum, and Bill Kristol — backing Conservative Party candidate Doug […]

In recent weeks, the special congressional election in New York’s 23 district has been heating up, with “big tent” and “establishment” Republicans — such as Newt Gingrich, the RNC, and the NRCC — backing Dede Scozzafava, and “purist” Republicans — such as Sarah Palin, Rick Santorum, and Bill Kristol — backing Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman. Scozzafava had been “under siege” from these conservatives “because she supported gay rights and abortion rights and was considered too liberal on various fiscal issues.” Today — just three days before the election — Scozzafava has announced that she’s withdrawing because polling shows her too far behind to win:

“Today, I again seek to act for the good of our community,” Ms. Scozzafava wrote in a letter to friends and supporters. “It is increasingly clear that pressure is mounting on many of my supporters to shift their support. Consequently, I hereby release those individuals who have endorsed and supported my campaign to transfer their support as they see fit to do so. I am and have always been a proud Republican. It is my hope that with my actions today, my party will emerge stronger and our district and our nation can take an important step towards restoring the enduring strength and economic prosperity that has defined us for generations.

Scozzafava has not yet thrown her support behind either Hoffman or Democratic candidate Bill Owens, and her name will remain on the ballot. Gingrich recently slammed his fellow conservatives for the “precedent” they’re setting, saying, “So I say to my many conservative friends who suddenly decided that whether they’re from Minnesota or Alaska or Texas, they know more than the upstate New York Republicans? I don’t think so. And I don’t think it’s a good precedent.”

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