WASHINGTON — In the era of Jon Meacham, all he could muster were marketing covers pushing Sarah Palin, never thinking of a larger mission for the magazine. Tina Brown proves in her first cover why she’s indomitable. (She turned out to be right when she did her tease about Jon Huntsman, with her marketing hire of Andrew Sullivan no doubt to bring eyes to the page.) Her first cover not only makes a mouse out of Meacham’s small vision, but focuses on the most powerful woman in the world, Sect. Hillary Clinton, while including “150 WOMEN WHO SHAKE THE WORLD.”

It’s also worth noting that Ms. Brown tapped dethroned CNN hostess Kathleen Parker for a column on why women make lousy men. Never mind that the notion of women channeling men is so very 20th century. Hey, but what do you expect from a female conservative?

Not sure if Sarah Palin is included, as Ms. Brown has a low opinion of the former governor, which looks warranted if you watch Mrs. Palin’s performance with Bill O’Reilly. However, on the other side of this is Politico’s “American Idol: India preps for Sarah Palin.” The headline alone proving why Mrs. Palin remains the anti-Hillary. Star quality and celebrity over gravitas continues to be Palin’s problem for 2012.

“The U.S. figures in the Indian imagination and psyche in a very different manner to every other foreign country, and that’s why there’s a fascination with American politicians,” said Harsh Bhasin, a former Indian consul general in New York who’s now a professor at SUNY Stony Brook.

Diplomatic affairs — particularly America’s relationship with Pakistan, India’s regional rival — drive some of the focus and make Secretary of State Hillary Clinton a closely watched figure. But the interest is near-fanatical for the handful of Indian-American politicians who’ve succeeded at the highest levels of U.S. politics — particularly Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and newly elected South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, both Republicans.

Nobody, certainly no conservative, comes close to the prowess and power of Sect. Clinton.

Her fight for the women of Afghanistan has been bravely unflinching, even in the face of the Obama administration’s faltering belief it’s worth it.

There has never been a greater need for Hillary Rodham Clinton in the world today. Her mission of human rights as women’s rights should propel her forward, after she’s done with State, to create a foundation that could change the future of women around the world.

Whether she ever runs for president again, it’s clear she’s never been more presidential than she is today.

Taylor Marsh is a political analyst, writer and commentator on national politics. A veteran national politics writer, Taylor’s been writing on the web since 1996. She has reported from the White House, been profiled in the Washington Post, The New Republic, and has been seen on C-SPAN’s Washington Journal, CNN, MSNBC, Al Jazeera English and Al Jazeera Arabic, as well as on radio across the dial and on satellite, including the BBC. Marsh lives in the Washington, D.C. area. This column is cross posted from her blog.