General Hayden: Clinton was "quickest study", more inclined to get involved in Mideast troublespots

Disgusting PNAC affiliate who has signed on to be on Jeb Bush's foreign policy team was asked about Hillary Clinton's Benghazi testimony. On the one hand he said that the messages sent from the embassy to State did not indicate "hair on fire" to him, and further that the people assigned there knew just how dangerous and insecure the situation was.
Those comments called to my mind Star Wars, the movie: the difficulties that the Empire faced in Star Wars in quashing local rebellions everywhere... And the fact that 60 people were killed at various U.S. embassies around the world during the Bush administration.

He then want on to say what a "quick study" Hillary was, that she was the fastest of all the people he had to brief on foreign policy situations to absorb his briefings. That's cool, speaks to how smart she is and knowledgable. And from a certain preserve-the-Empire point of view, that she is very well prepared.

Dang it, I just don't like Empires. Well, I'm old enough now to know that I know nothing. Maybe Hillary with a sane, intelligent but hawkish foreign policy can crack the nut of ISIS and the numerous countries where America is reviled that are breeding regressive misogynist cultures. Maybe she would be able to re-install thuggish but pro-capitalist Western-friendly regimes, that can repress the populists and the jihadists alike, like in the good old days. Would THAT be progress? I don't know. Maybe she will have a creative solutions or some new approach, because she's smart and has deep experience and I believe that she would be motivated to leave a legacy of solving these intractable problems. Certainly Bill Clinton's war, and foreign policy, was way better than Bush's.

Hayden praising Hillary was a bit unnerving but he's a war wonk, not a politics guy per se. He's probably happy to not have to dumb down his briefings so much as he did when he was talking to W.

I want Bernie for aggressive domestic infrastructure programs and build-up-social-security strategies. Foreign policy? Who the hell knows? Seems like a royal mess with no solutions.

If you're looking for a conclusion at the end of this post, there's only this: We have two powerful candidates.