It's like the divorce attorneys...chew each other up and the opposing clients in court by day... and go out for drinks and chat about the family. One was reported to tell a friend...potential client..."You can either sign your home over to me now, or start mediation and settle out of court. The choice is yours."

All in a day's work. It's the paid (partisan) staff that gets "personal" about it.

Remember...

Ronald Reagan & George H.W. Bush?
John F. Kennedy & Lyndon B. Johnson?

And, over in Israel...Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres?


One day, you're best friends...a few years later, you're bitter adversaries. After yet another few years, you're "strategic allies."

Both were relaxed; neither were positioning to get air time; Croft respected the dynamic and was willing to let Barack and Hillary tell their own story, but asked pointed questions.

It was on of the best political interviews I have seen in decades. However, I am sure we will hear about it tomorrow from the Republicans.

Let them bleed!

and quite possibly genuine friendship, but in the end, they are both skilled politicians who will do what's necessary to get the job done

I love them both.

Hillary 2016!

I'm so glad Pres Obama and SOS Hillary did this, however.. they had to know what Steve Kroft is like by now.



Courtesy of http://theobamadiary.com/

and think only big things count.

For instance, you would have to say that Obama and Biden deserve the credit for Iraq ending. Biden was the point person there and Obama set the macro course. You would then say of killing OBL, that it was the intelligence guys, the Seals, and again Obama.

This ignores that there was a team and everyone had some part in what happened. It also ignores good things done that subtly shift countries in better, more peaceful directions. For instance, I think that the peace corps did create significant goodwill, but I don't think it was ever linked to any big peace deal. (I used that because it has been there for 50 years and is relatively uncontroversial except to the very far right. Hillary has spoken of distributing the efficient cookstoves. Though not world peace, how many thousands found their lives far better due to that? ) Not all gains come as major treaties ending war.

I think only decades from now will it really be possible to judge the Obama foreign policy. Even then, it will not be easy. Much of the chaos in the world that they had to deal with was already set in motion. This includes not just the inflamed middle and near east, but the fact that the world's financial system was on the verge of going over the cliff.

Just as the Reagan "are you better off now than 4 years ago" was a bogus measure in August 2012 and still not fair in November because it ignores things set in motion, just comparing the state of the world then and now, ignores the impact of things set in motion before Obama. As to new actions, it is always impossible to know what other (not taken) choices would have led to.

In addition, with foreign policy, it is incredibly arrogant to think that we have control over the actions of the rest of the world. However, even without the hindsight of history, you can argue that the US is in a better position with the rest of the world than we were in January 2009. ( For Bush, the answer is already so obvious that the Republicans have not invited him to 2 conventions! )

Granted, I had a knee-jerk reaction to that statement by Kroft; you've nicely presented the longer view.

I think it is obvious that there has been no block buster American led foreign policy triumph, but JUST leading America to return to where it was before Bush IS a very good thing.

It was also classy for the president to have suggested that they do an interview together. They appear to have forged a good working relationship.

They seemed both fond and respectful of each other.

Made my heart sing!