Believe me, I despise Hillary as much as anyone but come on! We can derider for more important things. Like saying WE are to blame for messyco's problems.
Posted on 03/30/2009 4:34:13 AM PDT by marktwain
Thus far, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has made two diplomatic blunders during her visit to Mexico that the U.S. Old Media are shockingly uninterested in highlighting. One was a policy blunder and the other a cultural/religious one.
Clinton's first mistake was in imagining she is still a Senator that can make pronouncements on pending laws and policy plans instead of a mere envoy of the president, a mouth piece that hasn't the same freedom to invent policy prescriptions and laws that a Senator does. Last week, Clinton told Mexican officials that "we" -- as in the U.S. government -- are considering re-upping the so-called assault rifle ban because Mexico's drug violence is "our" fault.
Story Continues Below Ad ↓
When asked on March 27 about plans to return to the 1994 law banning "assault weapons" (a vague and illegitimate term at best), Obama's press secretary replied that he was unaware of "any plans" to reinstitute the ban.
Clinton obviously spoke out of turn making promises to Mexican officials that she was not authorized to make.
"Who painted it?"
The second Clinton gaffe concerned her abstruse question at the Basilica of Our Lady of Guadalupe on Thursday, March 26. Her question showed that Clinton was woefully uninformed about the most important feature of the church, the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe enshrined there since 1531.
Catholic tradition holds that the image of Our Lady of Guadalupe was miraculously imprinted by Mary on a cloak belonging to Saint Juan Diego in 1531. As Monsignor Diego Monroy brought Clinton before the shrine, Clinton asked her blundering question.
After observing it for a while, Mrs. Clinton asked “who painted it?” to which Msgr. Monroy responded “God!”
Now, perhaps Clinton being so woefully ignorant of anything religious isn't such a surprise, but for a Secretary of State to be visiting one of the most famous and important churches in the region, one holding a much beloved religious relic, without even finding her staff informing her "who painted" the image reveals a shocking lack by professionalism of both the Secretary of State and her staff.
Add this to the "button gaffe" of March 7 where Clinton's staff failed to find out how to spell a simple word in Russian and we are seeing a Secretary of State failing in the simplest of tasks making a mockery of our "diplomatic" outreach.
Sadly, the Old Media is letting her off the hook with aplomb.
....pretty much characterizes the entire 0bama administration. I KNEW he was stupid, but Hillary's gaffe's are rather surprising. Who painted it? Staggering lack of sensitivity. No one on her staff did their homework?
She thought it was an art gallery. Perhaps she was looking for a crucifix in a jar of urine.
Probably. She’s disgusting
Believe me, I despise Hillary as much as anyone but come on! We can derider for more important things. Like saying WE are to blame for messyco's problems.
LOL at the MSM.
Did she cover her head as all women do entering a Catholic church in a Latin country?
Why point this out? Perhaps because it is one of the world’s best known religious icons and she is our SoS.
I was raised Catholic and never heard of this till today. Like I said it looks just like a painting the way its framed and hung. Granted Hellery's a piece of dung but...
Clinton is really OVERCHARGING for her feeble attempts at being SoS.
As a diplomat, she SHOULD have people who find out and tell her such details. She, then, is responsible for keeping these details in mind for the duration of the event - usually a day or two.
The fact that this SoS and her entourage (I’d say “posse”, but Huma might object) is so shockingly inept at diplomacy is the issue. Basic research into the sites being visited should be pro-forma. With Clinton et al, it’s apparently no-forma.
I understand but repeat, she is the Secretary of State. At the very least her staff should have done their homework.
It is one of the best known religious images in the world.
It certainly is a major part of Mexican culture.
Everyone knows the story in Mexico, even if they aren’t catholic.
Maybe you wouldn’t have known, but if you were SOS and had a competent staff who planned your itinerary - don’t you think someone should have pointed out this centuries old story behind this famous image?
I cannot imagine just walking in there with no background knowledge of what I was about to see!
Abstruse has gotta be the Word-of-the-Year...
This was not a tough one. Asking who painted Mary of Guadalupe is like asking who painted the Shroud of Turin. You may not believe in the artifact yourself, but the question is deeply offensive to anybody who does.
The Guadulupe story isn’t in that huge family Bible Hill made Bill carry to Foundry Methodist in DC, is it?
WHAT AN IGNORANT PUTZ she is- and her dismal prep work for her diplomatic duties is typical of her selected aging birkenstock-wearing staffers, from what we DC folks experienced when she was “First Wymyn”
This is the only shot of Hillary I find rather humanizing.
Really, you guys are too funny. Expecting Hillary and the Odumbnuts administration to have any respect or knowledge beyond statism is such a stretch.
I would think that, by now, it should be clear that Hillary and Odumbnuts are simply going through the motions vis-a-vis foreign diplomacy albeit, very badly.
They have no respect for anything other than their own desire for socialism. They CHOOSE to ignore anything that anyone else respects unless it can further the state.
Yes, what she's been doing is reprehensible. But, do you really think they care?
Hey, she can just hit the “Reset” button and get a do-over.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.