“The international community will not wait indefinitely for evidence that Iran is prepared to live up to its international obligations,” Clinton said at a news conference. – Haaretz
According to people in the room, Obama’s big HRC speech wasn’t very big at all. Joe Subday says it all in his post:
According to Obama, “we are moving ahead on ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.’” Obama said, “I will end Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” But, there was no timeline. Nothing even approaching a timeline. No idea of how it will be done. [...] This speech offered less than the cocktail party speech for the A-listers back in June.…
Sullivan had even harsher words for the Human Rights Campaign:
HRC, of course, is putting no pressure on him; Joe Solmonese’s disgraceful email actually took all pressure off him by saying he’d be happy to wait till 2017 for HRC to hold Obama accountable. HRC are putting pressure, as they always have, on gay people to go to the back of the line and be grateful a president attends their fundraising event. The only word for this is a racket. And if gay people do not rise up and demand change from this organization and stop funding a group whose goal has always been to sell the Democrats to gay people rather than secure civil rights, then they will continue to suffer the discrimination they live under day after day.
I can’t speak to HRC pressure one way or the other, but on DADT talking about what he’s going to do is way past getting old. Read “I didn’t Tell. It Didn’t Matter” if you’re not yet convinced.
Looking around the world…
Someone has finally put a number on the bottom troop escalation needed. David Kilcullen says 25,000 troops at a minimum, with Obama needed to get moving on implementation. Again, I’ve said it before, but Obama’s taking too much time with this, with plenty already known and enough in to push forward.
CNN reports that three Iranian protesters have been “tentatively” sentenced to death, though they can appeal.
Three Iranians have been tentatively sentenced to death in connection with post-election protest activities, according to semi-official state media. …
The siege in Pakistan ended.
Recapping on the carnage in Guinea, which I tweeted when it happened, Clinton’s remarks still ring out after the atrocities:
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Tuesday that Guinea’s military junta must recognize “they cannot remain in power” after she voiced outrage over killings and rapes. Her comments come as pressure mounts on the regime from both the Guinean opposition and the international community.
“We were appalled and outraged by the recent violence in Guinea,” the chief US diplomat told reporters when she appeared outside her offices in Washington with visiting Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi.
[...] “The indiscriminate killing and raping that took place under government control by government troops was a vile violation of the rights of the people of that country,” the chief US diplomat said. …
And there was some high drama at what was supposed to be a done deal between the Turks and Armenian, with Secretary Clinton doing her job and getting it done. (Thanks to reader HEP for sending this one my way.)
To round it out, David Milliband in news conference with Clinton:
“I think that Iran’s history of covert, secret programs … explains why the international community does not have confidence in the Iranian regime’s protestations about the purely peaceful aspects or purely peaceful purposes of their nuclear program,” he said.
Having met and spoken with both Milliband and Clinton, of course, seeing these two diplomats speaking strongly about Iran says something very good about the hands the world is in, especially compared to the last crew.
