But what distinguishes Hillary Clinton from Madeleine Albright or Condoleezza Rice is where she was willing to go for her education. She did not stay in the air-conditioned hotels and the parliamentary chambers of the nations she visited; she went to tiny impoverished villages, to places where women walk six kilometres a day for water, to places where women were basing their families' prosperity on a $20 loan for a sewing machine. She sat on mud floors and sandy village commons to hear from these communities about their issues and priorities, and she took on controversial and culturally sensitive subjects, such as female genital mutilation and bride burning.


Yet the respect she showed for the various cultures and people whom she was engaging did a great deal to allow such challenges to move forward without bitterness, and in a spirit of real dialogue. Hillary is adored by many women in the developing world for those journeys, and I am certain that they taught her crucial lessons about global policy - lessons that built up a world view that Obama, a child of international experiences, also shares.