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Clinton would bring experience, star power to State

BY CRAIG GORDON | craig.gordon@newsday.com

November 15, 2008

WASHINGTON - Traveled to more than 80 countries - check. Formulated foreign policy platform as presidential candidate - check. Serve on Senate Armed Services Committee - check.

But the junior senator from New York has one more big qualification for the job of secretary of state: She's Hillary Rodham Clinton.

As one of the most famous political leaders in the world, Clinton would immediately add megawatt star power and instant global recognition to the foreign policy team of President-elect Barack Obama.

And in a job where influence, stature, political heft and a lot of jawboning are the tools of the trade, Clinton's credentials make her more than ready to take the job, experts and even critics agreed. Many said she even outshines her apparent rivals for the post, like John Kerry and Bill Richardson.

"Of all the candidates that have been mentioned for secretary of state, she's head and shoulders above the rest," said David Rothkopf, who has written books on U.S. foreign policy and international relations.

Presidents have certainly chosen rivals for vice president - think John F. Kennedy picking Lyndon Johnson - but there isn't much precedent for putting a political rival at State.

But Obama seems intrigued by the "Team of Rivals" approach favored by Abraham Lincoln, who stocked his cabinet with political opponents. And throughout history, there haven't been many presidential rivals quite like Clinton, who combines an already established political persona with significant foreign-policy grounding, both as first lady and U.S. senator.

Fred Greenstein, a presidential historian at Princeton University, said Clinton could help Obama precisely because she is a political force in her own right.

"If Obama makes genuine consultative use of the people in his inner circle, she would weigh in and say things as she saw them, and I think she would put a huge amount of energy into the job," Greenstein said. "She is a celebrity and a major figure in the United States, so she's to be taken seriously."

There are potential pitfalls. One of Clinton's biggest stumbles in the primary campaign came when she said she came under sniper fire on a trip to Bosnia in 1996 - though video clips of the arrival showed no such thing. Clinton would have to keep separate from Bill Clinton's overseas business and charitable ventures.

And foreign leaders would have to be convinced that these former rivals truly were a team - and that speaking to Clinton was like speaking to Obama. During President George W. Bush's administration, many leaders knew Condoleezza Rice was closer to Bush than Secretary of State Colin Powell, and it diminished Powell's effectiveness.

But, Greenstein noted, perhaps a strong stint at State for Clinton could revive a tradition from the earliest days of the United States - when the secretary of state was viewed as the heir apparent to the president.