So she was just the little wifey
Hillary Clinton’s boasts that she gained major foreign policy experience as First Lady have been undermined after 11,046 pages of her White House schedules provided scant evidence to back up her claims.
The documents were made public by the US national archives after pressure from her rival Barack Obama and freedom-of-information groups.
Many details were redacted at the request of lawyers acting for former president Bill Clinton, citing privacy and national security concerns.
Mrs Clinton’s staff insisted that the schedules illustrated her “extensive and exhaustive work” while arguing that they “of course cannot reflect all of Senator Clinton’s activities as First Lady”.
But her visits to Northern Ireland indicate that she went little beyond the traditional role of a president’s wife attending social events, meeting women’s groups and greeting children.
Despite Mrs Clinton’s claim last week that she was “instrumental” in bringing peace to Northern Ireland, the schedules do not record her attending a single policy meeting in the province.
While her husband was in the White House, she accompanied him to the province three times and made two visits on her own.
During the first trip in November 1995 the only separate items on her schedule were a visit to a women’s drop-in centre and two business parks.
Read more about Hillary’s sweetly womanly duties here.
