Obama’s Irish ex-adviser leaves us with a lesson in political standards

IN politics honesty is not necessarily the best policy. Just ask Samantha Power.

Last Thursday I interviewed her both about her new book — a biography of Sergio Vieira de Mello, a major UN figure who was killed in Iraq in 2003 — and about her role as a foreign policy adviser to Barack Obama.

Less than 24 hours later I was telling listeners that the woman who had been sitting in my studio only the day before had been forced to resign from Obama’s campaign.

This ended speculation that the Irishwoman — who emigrated to the US at the age of nine but who has come on holidays here since regularly — would receive a senior position in any White House administration the putative Democrat presidential candidate might form.

The circumstances of her resignation or dismissal are very interesting. The initial story was that Power had been forced to resign because of the embarrassment caused to the Obama campaign by her calling Hillary Clinton a “monster” during an interview with The Scotsman newspaper. Power had qualified her comment by telling the interviewer immediately that her comment was “off-the-record”, but somewhat surprisingly the newspaper did not delete the comment from the written record and published it. It was Power who got damned.

This was a breach of the normal protocol that applies in print interviews, although some people might argue that the truthful thing for a newspaper to do was to repeat accurately what Power said and not give her the opportunity to recant or rectify a mistake.

Her quote — if reported accurately — included an immediate retraction of what she had said, so The Scotsman’s decision appears cheap, knowing that it gave it a bigger story than it would have had otherwise.

Had she tried to change the quote at a remove, The Scotsman would have been more justified in its actions. In her resignation statement Power apologised to Clinton for her comments, although this apology was probably less sincere than her original comment.

However, it emerged subsequently that it was another interview that she gave — to the BBC last week as well, as part of her book tour — that really did for her.

When you think about it, her comments about Clinton may have been foolish and misguided — given that the Democrats have to rally behind whoever wins the nomination — but they were not a sacking offence. It was what she said about Obama’s policy on Iraq that did for her.

Obama has made much of his anti-war credentials when it comes to Iraq. More importantly he has positioned himself differently to both Clinton and Republican candidate, John McCain, by committing his administration to a swift withdrawal of US troops from Iraq should it win office. But Power admitted this was a best-case scenario and that reality could intrude, making such an aspiration unattainable.

Power is probably entirely correct in her analysis, but political necessity demanded she should not say it because the truth would undermine Obama’s carefully crafted position.

She was unfortunate that her gaffe — if that’s what telling the truth is regarded as — followed a similarly revealing comment from another aide that Obama’s position on the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) was as much expedient as principled.

Truth-telling is politically dangerous, especially from an aide to a candidate who is seeking votes on a particular platform at odds with those comments.

But if Power was correct about what will happen in Iraq, then it is Obama who is engaged in the lie or, if you think that word is too strong, misrepresentation to entice voters to his promised strategy should he win control of the White House.

And it would appear she was required to tell a lie about the reasons for her resignation — apologising for her insult about Clinton — when it was really her Iraq gaffe — which wasn’t mentioned — that created the crisis in the Obama camp.

It tells you a lot about how politics really operates, and not just in the US.

However, there is a difference in our political culture by comparison not just with the US, but also with Britain. Here our politicians don’t resign unless it is over far more serious issues.

Imagine though that Power had not emigrated to the US — where she has become a professor at Harvard university and has won many awards for her books and journalism, including a prestigious Pulitzer Prize — and that, remaining in Ireland, she had become involved politically. Let’s assume that, given her obvious brain power, she would have risen to near the top of the tree, even if there is little tradition of intellectuals becoming very involved in Irish politics.

It’s more likely that she would have become a backroom adviser rather than someone who would have sought votes for elected office. It’s also more likely that her public appearances would not have been as often or high-profile as similar people in backroom positions in American politics enjoy. But, to continue the hypothesis, let’s assume that she called a political opponent here in Ireland a “monster”. There would have been all sorts of huff-and-puff about, mock outrage in the Dáil and in broadcast studios, but she would have been able to brazen it out. Nobody would take too much umbrage. It would not have been a resigning issue.

But given that Power didn’t have to resign from the Obama campaign for that reason, let’s apply the real reason to an Irish circumstance.

Imagine if she had admitted during the general election campaign that a specific policy was there only for show and that it probably would not be implemented if her party won office.

POWER might have been reprimanded internally and sidelined for the duration of the campaign but a high-profile show trial and ‘execution’ would have been unlikely. That’s not the Irish way politically. You only resign when there is absolutely no other option. Wherever possible you bluff it out. And here in Ireland politicians have elevated cynical disregard for the truth to a breathtaking level.

Bertie Ahern’s explanations as to his financial dealings while minister for finance have been exposed as exceptionally partial and misleading and entirely unconvincing, for example.

Yet many people understand and accept this, believing it was up to others to prove he had done something wrong and that it would have been foolish for Ahern to have committed political hari-kari by offering information that would have been damaging to him.

But the penny has dropped for many only recently with the revelation that constituency money was going to Celia Larkin’s use, completely at variance with his contention that anything that had happened was due to his marital separation.

He got away with evasiveness before the general election and he continues to do so as Fianna Fáil refuses to move against its man. Plain speaking would not have suited him. Truth-telling would have brought him down.

Given the respective experiences of Power and Ahern, is it any wonder that many people are cynical about politics?

The Last Word with Matt Cooper is broadcast on 100-102 Today FM, Monday to Friday, 4.30pm to 7pm.