As if it weren’t enough that business loves Hillary, she’s William Kristol’s top Dem as well. As he tells the Washington Post (Kornblut, Anne E., “Clinton’s Foreign Policy Balancing Act,” 7 August 2007, p. A4):

Obama is becoming the antiwar candidate, and Hillary Clinton is becoming the responsible Democrat who could become commander in chief in a post-9/11 world.

It’s not exactly an endorsement, but as Matthew Yglesias points out (“Clinton Wins Coveted Bill Kristol Endorsement,” The Atlantic OnLine, 7 August 2007), when Bill Kristol says you’re the war candidate, you’re the war candidate.

And if you need still more, at today’s debate she lambasted her opponents for being too open with the electorate and the world about their foreign policy objectives:

Well, I do not believe people running for president should engage in hypotheticals and it may well be that the strategy that we have to pursue on the basis of actionable intelligence — but, remember, we’ve had some real difficult experiences with actionable intelligence — might lead to a certain action. But I think it is a very big mistake to telegraph that, and to destabilize the Musharraf regime which is fighting for its life against the Islamist extremists who are in bed with Al Qaeda and Taliban. And remember: Pakistan has nuclear weapons. The last thing we want is to have Al Qaeda-like followers in charge of Pakistan and having access to nuclear weapons. You can think big, but remember you shouldn’t always say everything you think if you’re running for president, because it has consequences across the world. And we don’t need that right now.

Of course, this sentiment won’t stop Senator Clinton from posturing on trade issues at the expense of Chinese sensitivities — the Chinese being an economically precarious leadership similarly likely to react poorly to too loose a U.S. tongue. And despite the fact that once in office a Hillary Clinton administration — or any other Democratic administration — will immediately revert to the same policy of economic liberalization that the U.S. has pursued toward China for the last 35 years, the campaign will discount future foreign policy damage for a few populist points at home with a clear conscience.