Clinton Gets Her Irish Up
by Perry Bacon Jr.
Link to ArticleSenator Hillary Clinton, facing criticism this week for allegedly overstating her role in some of the successes of her husband's administration, today defended campaign statements from her campaign that she helped along the peace process in Northern Ireland and the creation of a health care program for low-income children here in the U.S."I actually went to Belfast more than Bill," Clinton said
on the Northern Ireland question. In describing her role in the State Children's Health Insurance Program, Clinton told reporters on her campaign plane "I was very much involved in helping create it." Her influence in Northern Ireland was a particularly important topic as the New York Senator courted the Irish-Americans in Pennsylvania today. She appeared at St. Patrick's Day parades in Pittsburgh and Scranton in her fourth day in Pennsylvania in just the last week. The Keystone State holds the next Democratic presidential primary on April 22. After Clintons wins in Texas and Ohio last week, Obama aides and the press have increasingly focused on Clinton's claims about her experience during her husband's White House terms. Clinton visited more than 80 countries as First Lady but she did not have a foreign policy staff (Clinton had aides who worked on domestic policy) or have any major initatives on foreign policy like she had in health care, where she essentially directed White House policy during the administration's first two years.Her role in Northern Ireland seems to have been as engaged participant in the peace talks but not one of the chief negotiators. She says she has remained involved in the issue, meeting with Britain's secretary of the state for Northern Ireland earlier this week. On health care, Senators Ted Kennedy and Orrin Hatch provided much of the energy behind getting the children's health care bill signed, although the Clinton administration and the former First Lady supported the idea. Clinton declined to directly answer about whether SCHIP would have become law had she not been in the White House, instead noting she was "very much involved." These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. If you have accounts on these bookmarking sites, you can post this story to share it with others.
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