TOM JOYNER: Good one, Sib.
HILLARY CLINTON: Well, that’s a very good way of asking the question.
TOM JOYNER: Yeah, I could see it, I like it, I like.
HILLARY CLINTON: Yeah, that’s real good, I love that. You know, at the end of my book, in my epilogue.
SYBIL WILKES: Right?!
HILLARY CLINTON: Here’s what I say. I say; Look, the most important questions for anybody thinking about running are ‘Are you going to run and can you win?’ But really, what’s your vision for the country and can you lead us there? And, you know, part of what I learned over eight years in the Senate and four years working with President Obama, is that you really have to know where you want to lead the country.
That doesn’t mean you’ll get it done easily, because as we’ve seen with the President, there are all these obstacles and obstinance and just plain paralysis that the other side has employed to prevent him from doing what, I think, you and I would agree, he should do for all of us. And he keeps on plugging along and keeps pushing forward. So you have to know where you want to go, even though you might have to take some detours; maybe you go over the pass instead of under the pass.
But I think that for us we have two big crises. We’ve got a crisis in our economy, it is not working for everybody, and it needs to start working again for every single person who is willing to work hard and be responsible, and that’s the vast majority of Americans. And secondly, we’ve got a crisis in our democracy because it’s not working the way it should work.
SYBIL WILKES: And so how do you change that, given what the President has? And let’s say you are President in 2017.
TOM JOYNER: I see that.
SYBIL WILKES: And you do have the same type of makeup in the Congress, for the House and for the Senate, how do you change all of that paralysis with such horrific negativity?
HILLARY CLINTON: Yeah, the negativity is so, to me, foreign to America. I mean we’re, at root, optimistic people, and we like to get out roll our sleeves up, solve problems together. I think, look, if you look at the President’s first term, in my opinion, and obviously, I’m biased because, you know, he and I not only were partners, but became good friends. He saved the economy. People now act like, ‘Oh, it was a walk in the park.’ Yeah, it was terrible, but I mean, really.
No, I mean the economy was on a downward slide, not only in our country but around the world. And his action to boost it up preserved the opportunity for us to climb out of the deep hole that we were in. The Affordable Care Act is starting to help tens of millions of Americans. We have to stay on course. There will have to be some amendments to it to make it work better. But look, as somebody who worked hard for healthcare reform twenty years ago, I applaud our country getting it done under the President’s leadership.
And I think in, you know, in lots of areas of foreign policy, the world is never going to be easy. It’s going to constantly be forcing us to make hard choices. I try to pull the curtain back so people can look at the book and see what we had to struggle with. But, you know, [President Obama] said he would get us out of Iraq. It’s been the Iraqis who are the ones who have, in my opinion, squandered the opportunity to have a unified country with everybody building a better future for the Iraqi people.
And with Afghanistan, the President has said and he followed through, that we’re going to do everything we can to help the Afghans build up a security force, so that then we can also be exiting with our combat troops. So if you look at what he said he would do and what he’s gotten done, yes, there are many more things, like immigration reform, like working to make sure that we have a fair shake for everybody in the economy, that he is still fighting with the other side about.
But he got a lot done for the good of the country. And I think that’s the attitude you have to go into it with, Tom. You got to say, look, you know, this is a ground game, maybe you can control a long pass every so often, but get up every day, suit up and go to work for the American people.
TOM JOYNER: We got some more suggestions here. First Grandma.
HILLARY CLINTON: (Laughs)
J. ANTHONY BROWN: You like that one?
HILLARY CLINTON: That’s a good one.
TOM JOYNER: Nanna President.
(Laughter)
SYBIL WILKES: Congratulations to you.
TOM JOYNER: Congratulations, Mrs. Clinton.
HILLARY CLINTON: Awww, thank you.
Read an excerpt of Hard Choices here.
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Will Hillary Run? TJMS Gets The Scoop On That And More was originally published on blackamericaweb.com
