Why should Hillary Clinton go to Myanmar? The short answer is to encourage the best chance at real political change in a country that effectively cloistered itself under harsh military rule for nearly five decades. Myanmar, or Burma, has been the virtual political ball and chain of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), which it joined in 1997. Secretary Clinton plans to visit Dec. 1–2, becoming the first US secretary of state to do so since John Foster Dulles 50 years ago.