Carolyn Lumsden, The Courant's editorial page editor, is attending a State Department briefing of the National Conference of Editorial Writers in Washington, D.C., today. The briefing was planned long ago, but the timing was auspicious. Midmorning, to everyone's surprise, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton walked into the room. Clinton joked that it had been "an eventful 24 hours." Here are Lumsden's notes of what else Clinton told the 15 editorial writers from Connecticut, Texas, D.C., Oregon, Pennsylvania and other states.
Bringing Osama bin Laden to justice took sustained, intense effort. We worked to forge an anti-terrorist network., to shape the narrative, to convince people that bin Laden was a murderer, not a martyr. He murdered more Muslims than anyone else. He was a mass murderer of Muslims. He most severely impacted Pakistan --crucial in finally leading us to bin Laden.
Many believe the State Department and USAID -- U.S. Agency for International Development -- are not affordable anymore. Yet dangers and threats are greater than ever.
Part of reason we were successful with bin Laden is not because we were any more determined than others who came before. Everybody was determined and focused. But our tools are so much better and our relationships evolved in ways that allowed us to obtain information that was actionable.
The budget for State and USAID is so much smaller than many think. At a town hall, people will stand up and say foreign aid is 20 percent of our budget. How much should it be? No more than 10 percent, they'll say. In fact it's about 1 percent.