It took me too long to figure that...
It took me too long to figure that out

September began with a memorable trip to Hawaii to commemorate the fiftieth anniversary of the end of World War II, followed by Hillarys trip to Beijing to address the United Nations Fourth World Conference on WomenHillary gave one of the most important speeches delivered by anyone in our administration during our entire eight years, asserting that human rights are womens rights and condemning their all-too-frequent violation by those who sold women into prostitution, burned them when their marriage dowries were deemed too small, raped them in wartime, beat them in their homes, or subjected them to genital mutilation, forced abortions, or sterilization on themHer speech got a standing ovation and struck a responsive chord with women all over the world, who knew now, beyond a doubt, that America was pulling for themOnce again, despite the abuse she had been taking on Whitewater, Hillary had come through for a cause she deeply believed in, and for our countryI was so proud of her; the unfair hard knocks she had endured had done nothing to dull the idealism that I had fallen in love with so long ago

By the middle of the month, Dick Holbrooke had persuaded the foreign ministers of Bosnia, Croatia, and Yugoslavia to agree on a set of basic principles as a framework to settle the Bosnian conflictMeanwhile, NATO air strikes and cruise missile chanel white j12 watch attacks continued to pound Bosnian Serb positions, and Bosnian and Croatian military gains reduced the percentage of Bosnia controlled by the Serbs from 70 to 50 percent, close to what a negotiated settlement would likely require

September 28 capped off a good month in foreign policy, as Yitzhak Rabin and Yasser Arafat came to the White House for the next big step in the peace process, the signing of the West Bank accord, which turned over a substantial portion of land to Palestinian control

The most significant event occurred away from the camerasThe signing ceremony was scheduled to occur at noon, but first Rabin and Arafat met in the Cabinet Room to initial the annex to the agreement, three copies that included twenty-six different maps, each reflecting literally thousands of decisions the parties had reached on roads, crossings, settlements, and holy sitesI was also asked to initial the pages as the official witnessAbout midway through the process, when I had stepped outside to take a call, Rabin came out and said, We have a problemOn one of the maps, Arafat had spotted a stretch of road that was marked as under Israeli control but that he was convinced the parties had agreed to turn over to the PalestiniansRabin and Arafat wanted me to help resolve the disputeI took them into my private dining room and they began to talk, with Rabin saying he wanted to be a good prada clutch neighbor and Arafat replying that, as descendants of Abraham, they were really more like cousinsThe interplay between the old adversaries was fascinatingWithout saying a word, I turned and walked out of the room, leaving them alone together for the first timeSooner or later, they had to develop a direct relationship, and today seemed the right moment to begin

Within twenty minutes they had reached an agreement that the disputed crossing should go to the PalestiniansBecause the world was waiting for the ceremony and we were already late, there was no time to change the mapInstead, Rabin and Arafat agreed to its modification with a handshake, then signed the maps before them, legally binding themselves to the incorrect designation of the disputed road

It was an act of personal trust that would have been unthinkable not long beforeAnd it was risky for RabinSeveral days later, with Israelis evenly divided on the West Bank accord, Rabin survived a no-confidence vote in the Knesset by only one voteWe were still walking a tightrope, but I was optimisticI knew the handover would proceed according to the handshake, and it didIt was the handshake even more than the official signing that convinced me that Rabin and Arafat would find a way to finish the job of making peace

The fiscal year ended on September 30, and we still didnt have a budgetWhen I wasnt working on Bosnia and the Middle replica pasha cartier East, I had spent the entire month traveling the country campaigning against the Republicans proposed cuts in Medicare and Medicaid, food stamps, the direct student-loan program, AmeriCorps, environmental enforcement, and the initiative to put 100,000 new police officers on the streetThey were even proposing to cut back the Earned Income Tax Credit, thus raising taxes on lower-income working families at the same time they were trying to cut taxes for the wealthiest AmericansAt virtually every stop, I pointed out that our fight was not about whether to balance the budget and reduce the burden of unnecessary government, but how to do itThe big dispute involved what responsibilities the federal government should assume for the common good

In response to my attacks, Newt Gingrich threatened to refuse to raise the debt limit and thus put America in default if I vetoed their budget billsRaising the debt limit was merely a technical act that recognized the inevitable: as long as America continued to run deficits, the annual debt would increase, and the government would be required to sell more bonds to finance itIncreasing the debt limit simply gave the Treasury Department authority to do thatAs long as Democrats were in the majority, Republicans could cast symbolic votes against raising the debt limit and pretend that they hadnt contributed to the necessity to do itMany Republicans in hermes wallet the House had never voted to raise the debt limit and didnt relish doing so now, so I had to take Gingrichs threat seriously

If America defaulted on its debt, the consequences could be severeIn more than two hundred years, the United States had never failed to pay its debtsDefault would shake investor confidence in our reliabilityAs we headed into the final showdown, I couldnt deny that Newt had a bargaining chip, but I was determined not to be blackmailedIf he followed through on his threat, he would be hurt, tooDefault ran the risk of increasing interest rates, and even a small increase would add hundreds of billions of dollars to home mortgage paymentsTen million Americans had variable-rate mortgages tied to federal interest ratesIf Congress didnt raise the debt limit, people could pay what Al Gore called a Gingrich surcharge on their monthly mortgage paymentsThe Republicans would have to think twice before letting America go into default

In the first week of October, the pope came to America again, and Hillary and I went to meet him at Newarks magnificent Gothic cathedralAs we had in Denver and at the Vatican, His Holiness and I met alone and mostly talked about BosniaThe pope encouraged our efforts for peace, with an observation that stuck with me: he said the twentieth century had begun with a war in Sarajevo, and I must not allow the century to end with a war in classic chanel handbag Saraj