Clinton would bring recognition to powerful post

By WARREN P. STROBEL

WASHINGTON — She’s been a mother, a lawyer and a first lady, an aggrieved wife, a U.S. senator and a nearly victorious candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination. Now Hillary Clinton appears set to take on a new role: secretary of state.

The New York Times reported Friday afternoon on its Web site that she will accept the job, and that it’s been offered to her. Neither her office nor the transition office of President-elect Barack Obama would confirm the report, though insiders in both camps acknowledged that the job negotiations between the two were “on track.”

The junior senator from New York appears to bring much to the job, assuming she is nominated and confirmed, not the least of which is instant international name recognition.

Whether it’s flying into war-torn foreign capitals, trying to convince Arabs and Israelis that she means what she says, or presiding over international conferences, star power is a potent weapon, as the last two secretaries of state, Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powell, well knew.

However, Clinton has never — at least publicly — been a global visionary or foreign policy intellectual, leaving it unclear how she would steer America’s role in the world or act as steward of U.S. alliances.

A 2007 article she wrote as a presidential candidate for Foreign Affairs magazine was filled with familiar calls to rebuild alliances and restore U.S. leadership but was spare on details.

Moreover, it remains to be seen where Clinton and the long-underfunded State Department would fit in an Obama administration where, it appears, much foreign policy will be run out of the White House and Vice President-elect Joseph Biden is a heavyweight on international affairs.

There’s another, bigger wild card: Never before has a secretary of state had a former president for a spouse. The role of Bill Clinton, with his network of international friends and financial connections, could be a study in tightrope-walking.

Now, Obama seems certain to have the final say.

If she’s confirmed by the Senate as the 67th secretary of state, Clinton will settle into her formal office on the State Department’s seventh floor to find her inbox crowded with problems from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe, global warming to global financial meltdown.

None, however, might be as urgent or treacherous as Iran.

A report last week by the International Atomic Energy Agency said that Iran continues to enrich uranium that could be used to fuel a nuclear weapon, in defiance of the U.N. Security Council, and has stymied international inspections.

Under the most dire scenario, Iran could have the material for a nuclear weapon, if not a working device itself, sometime soon after 2010.

In her Foreign Affairs essay, Clinton harshly criticized the Bush administration’s refusal to engage with adversaries such as Iran. “True statesmanship requires that we engage with our adversaries, not for the sake of talking but because robust diplomacy is a prerequisite to achieving our aims,” she wrote.