President Hillary Clinton? If she wants it
January 26, 2013 -- Updated 2107 GMT (0507 HKT)
Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton, pictured in October, has become one of the most powerful people
in Washington. Here's a look at her life and career through the years:
HIDE CAPTION
Hillary Clinton through the years
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
- David Rothkopf says if Hillary Clinton runs in 2016, she'll likely be the next president
- He says she's most popular politician in country, has political traction and funders in place
- He says she's excelled as secretary of state, overcome adversity, shown political wits
- Rothkopf: Whatever your party, hard to deny she lifts political discourse like few others
Editor's note: David Rothkopf is CEO and editor-at-large of
the FP Group, publishers of Foreign Policy magazine, and a visiting
scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He is the
author of, among other books, "Running The World: The Inside Story of
the National Security Council and the Architects of American Power,"
served as deputy under secretary of commerce for international trade
policy in the Clinton administration and for two years as managing
director of Kissinger Associates.
(CNN) -- There are few certainties in American
politics. But you can write it down: If Hillary Clinton wants to be the
next nominee of the Democratic Party to be president, the job is hers.
Joe Biden, Andrew Cuomo,
Mark Warner, Martin O'Malley and the others in the long list of
commander-in-chief wannabes will go about their day jobs for the next
couple years, but at the back of their minds will be only one question:
Will she or won't she?
Because, as the most
popular politician in America -- who also happens to be married to
America's most popular ex-president and who has in place a nationwide
network of donors, campaign staffers and committed supporters -- Clinton
has the power to keep potential rivals from raising money or gaining
political traction simply by saying, "I haven't decided what my plans
are." She's in control.
David Rothkopf
That she should be in
such a position at this moment is a remarkable achievement and an
extraordinary testament to her grit, gifts and track record: She has
been the most successful U.S. secretary of state in two decades. That
outcome was hardly a foregone conclusion when Barack Obama made the bold
decision to pick his former primary rival to assume the oldest and most
senior post in the Cabinet.
She had, after all, lost a
bruising campaign to him, there was tension between her team and his
and no reason to assume the two ex-rivals would work together. She had
never run a large organization before. Beyond that, the United States
was facing massive crises at home and bewildering complexity abroad.
Many of the issues she would be facing would be new to her.
Clinton was so famous
already that she could easily be seen to be upstaging the president,
something that would have undone her within the administration and made
her look bad.
Her tour de force
performance this week before Senate and House committees looking into
the Benghazi tragedy illustrated how far she has come. In a charged
political environment, she commanded the stage and deftly repulsed
effort after effort by Republican partisans to shift the focus away from
what the lessons of the attacks were and should be, turning aside their
theories of conspiracy and devious motives for the missteps surrounding
the event. She defended the president and revealed her character by
accepting responsibility.
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She had already set the
stage with her swift embrace of a blue-ribbon investigation into the
incident and her acceptance of its recommendations for avoiding such
problems in the future. She was helped by the bipartisan recognition of
her extraordinary tenure at State; her work ethic, miles traveled and
commitment were praised throughout both hearings.
Most importantly,
Clinton clearly knew her brief better than any of those questioning her.
When Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin attempted to score political points
with a cynical line of questioning, she showed her strength and stature
as a leader with a direct, unwavering response urging him to focus on
the bigger issues at hand.
When Sen. Rand Paul
announced that had he been president he would have fired her, her
response evinced an understanding of the issues and processes at play;
it was evident that only one of the two of them had any chance of
occupying the Oval Office in the future. When describing the return of
the caskets of the American victims in the Benghazi attack, she showed
her humanity. Frequently, she showed the comfort with the setting that
comes from her experience not just at State but as a senator.
Clinton's virtuosity in
such situations is no accident, nor is it a surprise to any who have
watched her grow, first as a senator and then at State. Having been
tested as few have been by the extraordinary stresses she faced as first
lady, she famously earned her stripes in the upper chamber of our
Congress by being "a workhorse not a show horse." Her close aides at
State speak with some awe about her hours spent immersed in her briefing
papers, her questioning of her staff and top experts to get up to
speed, and her political skill in translating her conclusions into
actions.
Clinton and Obama: Rivals to partners
Obama, Clinton explain joint interview
Clinton, senators clash over Benghazi
She has worked on
forging not only a good working relationship with the president but also
in building key alliances in the Cabinet, notably with former Secretary
of Defense Robert Gates and top officials in the military and the
intelligence community. When the White House limited her brief and
asserted control over key issues, from the appointment of ambassadors to
a host of issues in the Middle East, she found alternative paths to
make a difference.
The "pivot" to Asia was
one concrete example of her success -- not as merely a policy concept
but as an initiative made real by active, intensive diplomacy throughout
the region. She helped restore U.S. relations worldwide that had been
damaged by the bull-in-a-china-shop policies of the George W. Bush
administration. She actively worked
to reshape the American international agenda for the 21st century,
focusing on emerging powers, new technologies and populations -- like
the role of women worldwide -- long neglected by the U.S. foreign policy
establishment.
She led the way for the United States to be more active in Libya, to manage unprecedented international sanctions against Iran, to stand up to
the Chinese in the South China Sea. Indeed, perhaps most importantly,
at a time when the U.S. faced distractions and new constraints at home
and a national desire to avoid military entanglements worldwide, she
recognized that our greatest tools going forward would be active
diplomacy and repaired alliances, and she restored them to centrality in
U.S. foreign policy.
It is a stand-out
record, one that makes her the equal of the likes of James Baker, George
Schultz or Henry Kissinger among our leading modern secretaries of
state. What is more, she achieved her success by promoting a more
humanist international agenda than her peers at the first ranks of
American foreign policy leaders. At the same time, she maintained a
centrist course more comfortable with the appropriate use of force than
many of her more liberal colleagues in the Obama administration.
Maintaining such a balance requires exceptional skill. To do so for four
years under the conditions she faced is among the reasons she is so
widely admired.
Hillary Clinton is
likely to be the next Democratic presidential nominee because she is the
best-known active Democratic politician, because she has repeatedly
triumphed over adversity, because she has made herself well-liked at a
time that politicians are typically viewed with contempt.
But she is likely to be
the next president, the first woman to be president of the United
States, because of the quality of her character and her work on behalf
of the American people. With some luck she will use the next two years
to restore her energy and prepare for what lies ahead. Because
regardless of what political party in which you may find yourself, it is
hard to deny that she elevates our political discourse in ways that
few, if any, others do on the contemporary stage.
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