Touchy question gets Clinton a bit undiplomatic
By now, I’m sure you’ve all heard about the touchy question (which appears to have been mistranslated) that Secretary Clinton was asked by a student yesterday: What did her husband, Bill Clinton, think about Chinese financial contracts with the Democratic Republic of the Congo? Clinton’s blunt, sharp response revealed she was obviously irked: You want me ...
By now, I’m sure you’ve all heard about the touchy question (which appears to have been mistranslated) that Secretary Clinton was asked by a student yesterday: What did her husband, Bill Clinton, think about Chinese financial contracts with the Democratic Republic of the Congo?
Clinton’s blunt, sharp response revealed she was obviously irked:
You want me to tell you what my husband thinks? My husband is not the secretary of state, I am. You ask my opinion. I will tell you my opinion; I’m not going to channel my husband."
Given this summer’s talk about how she has been in "the shadows," it’s understandable that the question (which appears to have asking about President Obama’s opinion, not Bill’s) would touch a raw nerve for the women’s-rights-supporting secretary of state. And context is important, too. Clinton is in a country were women often have second-class status and where rape has been used as a weapon of war.
As the State Department’s P.J. Crowley put it:
If Africa, if Congo is going to advance, women have to play a more significant role. She was in the setting of a town hall, and the questioner was interested in what two men thought, not the secretary."
Nevertheless, Clinton is a diplomat. She didn’t need to snap at the student; she could have used grace and humor to get through a question that angered her. At least she patched things up with the student afterward.
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