Clinton, Pelosi May Divide Dems

They may have a lot in common on the surface, but Hillary Clinton and Nancy Pelosi differ vastly when it comes to foreign policy, Politico says. With votes to authorize the Iraq war and designate Iran’s Revolutionary Guard as terrorists, Clinton is an honest-to-goodness, unapologetic hawk, while Pelosi is devoutly dovish. If Hillary wins Democratic nomination, those differences will bubble up.

Pelosi, one scholar explains, draws policy from her base’s views, while Clinton prefers to devise policy and then sell it to the base. As the nominee, Clinton would need to support or condemn Democrat proposals such as Pelosi’s Armenian genocide bill, or John Murtha’s war tax proposal. And with Democratic unifier Bush gone, that high-wire act will grow even harder. (More Clinton 2008 stories.)