Condolences is not intelligent.

She is politically ASTUTE--within a gringo context.

OUtisde of that she falls off her Ferragamos and makes a fool of herself.

She did it in Panama in June at the OAS meeting, where Venezuela's Secretary of State made mincemeat out of her and she literally ran out of the meeting to lick her wounds.

The Ferragamo stilettoes were powerless against a man of intelligence and honesty.

The lower order of Scorpio is what she is--just lilke Hillary.

They are both scum--it's in their nature.

Like the scorpion who stung the frog he was carrying across a river....

"I do not think she has enough gravitas to play ball with the big boys"

A curious, gratuitously mean-spirited sentence, and a meandering article.

As to the alleged incompatibility of the smarts and experience of Cheney and Rumsfeld with the undeniably disastrous results they got in Iraq: one can be very smart and still have tunnel vision born of hubris and stubbornness and ideological blinders. And that's what happened.

[I don't include Powell with those two, as the author does, because he was so despised within the administration for his moderation that he never had a chance to be effective.]

With Rice and Gates, at least moderation [or what passes for moderation within a radical presidency] is front and center now instead of being given lip service and then pushed aside. It's probably too late.

And for whatever reason, Cheney still has the president's ear as well. The next 14-15 months can't pass fast enough.

Media Lizzy has enough sense to ask if the only woman to have had an oil tanker named after her has the gravitas to do the job. But she asks the question far too late in the woman's term for it to be of any value.

Hypotheticals have a way of informing our national press corps to ask the right questions. For instance: Is it ever appropriate for a female staffer to publicly assert a close, personal relationship with her boss? Is it ever appropriate for a female staffer to publicly assert a close, personal friendship with her boss - who is married? Does the single, childless, female staffer publicly declaring her close relationship with the married boss create a hostile or uncomfortable working environment?

Section 9:
Precisely my point... Secretary Rice has encouraged such questions about her relationship with the President, rather than delivering tangible results. Her portfolio is the one most compromised, the most criticized, and the least successful of the entire Bush 43 administration.

On Middle Eastern issues alone, the Secretary has failed. A complete lack of focus is the hallmark of her tenure. She has done very little to encourage cultural understanding between the average American and our Islamic counterparts.

As for her involvement in the North Korean efforts, the deal she has negotiated is virtually identical to the Clinton era deal. It is containment-du-jour, neither remarkable nor tangible. And like Madeline Albright before her - she has been fooled by the very astute negotiators.

As for Gates - I beg to differ. Rice's relationship with Gates - yes, they have a pre-existing, staff-to-staff level relationship. However, it was Gates' experience as a part of the Persian Gulf war / Bush 41 team that led to his appointment on the Iraq Study Group - and eventual nomination as SecDef to Bush 43. Gates was National Security Council staff and developed a close working relationship with Cheney and James Baker.

And while she also knew General Petraeus, he is qualified - and was chosen - not because of Secretary Rice but because he knew the senior players. Powell. Cheney.

I spoke with one of Petraeus' colleagues from West Point this week - and it is Petraeus' very specialized career path that brought him to the War Council's attention, not Condi Rice who is not revered by most career officers or non-comms.

Furthermore - Gates & Petraeus are running the Department of Defense's efforts. She deserves ZERO credit for the miracles performed on a daily basis my our soldiers, sailors, airmen & Marines.

In Iraq, it is the diplomatic portfolio that is failing. The embassy in Bagdhad is plagued by construction delays and overspending, and a lack of native Arabic speakers. Her fiscal management of State resources is an abomination. Prime Minister Maliki is seldom held to account for his inability or unwillingness to push for political progress.

Also, Secretary Rice should have lobbied Congress far more forcefully over the Armenian Genocide resolution. Instead, she toured the Middle East and ignored the 60,000 troops massing on the Turkish border with Iraq/Kurdistan. How is it possible that the sitting Secretary of State would be absent from discussions of such diplomatic sensitivity - her portfolio - when the US House is poised to cast a vote that may jeopardize American forces in Iraq? One-third of the fuel and supplies for our troops in Iraq pass through the border with Turkey. If Secretary Rice is that tone-deaf, please allow her Deputy John Negroponte a more public role.

My principal point is that because of her willingness to be quoted, on the record, as being deeply concerned that she would not see the President eight times a day if she left the White House campus (as his Nat'l Sec. Adviser) for Foggy Bottom. To be taken seriously, as an equal of Cheney, Rumsfeld, Powell or Gates - Secretary Rice must not allow even a hint of impropriety. She has demonstrated a willful disregard for propriety, and it is shameful.

Much as Condolences Rice is a discredit to both her race and her sex, I would not want JOhn Death Squad Negroponte in charge of anything--much less diplomacy.

He would immediately start WW III in Latin America.

She's just a climber, adept at getting the next job up the ladder, but with neither skills nor interest in doing that job.

ML,

What ever happened to "the buck stops here!"?

Off course she's smarter than Rumsfeld and Chaney. Why the question? You yourself gave her credentials. You seem to be suggesting that those credentials have no real weight and that what we have is an other worldly craftiness at work and not who and what she is, an extraordinarily smart EMPLOYEE of PRESIDENT Bush.

Is this another subconsciously misogynistic attempt? Perhaps a hint at "the black bitch" categorization? Or dare I say the Sapphire character?

She's holding the fort. There is no one more respected around the world among that lot. Accept it and allow your world view to change.

I know, it hurts.



VIVA Springboks!!!
Boks rule the world!!!!!

She is an Aunt Jemima character--not Sapphire.

Or maybe The Dragon Lady USA style....

Not Jemima and not Saphire. Not as brave as either of those two. I'd liken her more to Pelosi.

Sorry: I couldn't think of a black woman stereotype as timid and recessive.

Little Eva?

I suggested Aunt Jemima as the equivalent to an Uncle Tom.

But updated: no headscarf and 500 dollar Ferragamo shoes--purchased while African Americans were drowning in New Orleans.

Considering that Jemima and Sapphire are fictitious and conjured up to diminish the humanity of African American women, erasing their personal endeavors and hard earned accomplishments by applying a broad, simple characterization to them, she would then have to be neither.

Rice is the most distinguished and respected member of this administration.

While I agree that she may not be qualified for the position, she is the better of all of the buffoons that have been in place (sans Powell).

I don't think that she is a sell-out. I think she is a person who wants and has a very prestigious job Americans would want that for themselves. I think that she has had to put up with all manner of stupidity and has been placed in awkward situations, having to clean up the embarrassing mess that has been propagated by the "mighty white males" of this administration.

She is a diplomat and should not be political and has not been. She is supposed to be evasive and has been. She doing her job and better than most under the circumstances.

She's the lower order of scorpio--just like Hillary.

Mad for power and influence and willing to do whatever it takes to get it--including staying with a philandering oaf or sucking up to a retarded shitkicker.

Scum, nothing more.

A discredit to her race and gender.

War whores, both of them.

MR

"Mad for power and influence and willing to do whatever it takes to get it"

This I may agree with.

The question is, how else would a woman get ahead or anyone actually, in this climate?

If you want to jump ahead of 300,000,000 people, you have to play hard ball. The important factor is WANTING to. Most of us don't care to, so we don't endeavor to. Some care to yet give up the chase. Others push and push and with some luck break through. She would be one of those people. In that journey, one is bound to loose their core principles (if they had any to start with). I would guess that one has to do a great deal of soul searching to find anything genuine within, after spinning and being spun for so long.

When I look at Obama these days, I see a glossy glazed over actor and not the impassioned man who intrigued me at he beginning of the race.

Assuming that Condie is a pragmatist and an unemotional sort, she must be operating on auto pilot.... Doing what is necessary at the moment and what contributes to our security, positive image, and what puts us in a good position to bargain tomorrow. Knowing full well just how dismissed she would be if she focused on the social mal-adjustments (class, race and gender based) she has been prudent to do the business, become the example, lead the way without controversy. She understands that she cant be the angry Black woman. If she projects herself any more than what she has, we know that she would be tagged, equated with Florance on The Jeffersons, in a split second.

Yes she is a climber but so are most leaders. Yes she has sold herself to the idiots but she has also done it with finesse and has maintained her dignity so far. What that means to me is that my daughters will have an easier ride than I did. For their contemporaries, the image of a Black female in a leadership position will not be colored by those odd ball images of the past. It will be a norm.

"Yes she is a climber but so are most leaders. Yes she has sold herself to the idiots but she has also done it with finesse and has maintained her dignity so far"

Quoted for Truth.

Whatever one might think of her politics, just to have gotten as far as she already has, overcoming the twin inherent handicaps imposed by the culture of being African American and female, is far more accomplishment than 99% of the rest of the people in the world will ever achieve, period.

I admire her greatly.

Right.

If dignity is buying out the Ferragamo flagship store while other African Americans die in the flood waters on Louisiana because they did not have the money to get out of there, then you can take that dignity and stick it where the sun never shines.

The US media crucified Daniel Ortega because he bought a pair of ray ban sunglasses in New York during a visit for the opening of a UN sessioon.

I don't admire women--or men--who sell their souls for a plate of lentils--or for a breakfast of diamonds at Tiffany's.

You folks have very fucked up value systems.

Greetings, folks.

I absolutely do not believe Condi Rice fits any stereotype. However accomplished she may be, there are two things that bother me above all else.

1) She has failed to accomplish any of the objective for which she was hired. She was a failure as National Security Adviser. And is even more disastrous as our Secretary of State. She should be held to the same standards as Don Rumsfeld - and be afforded the opportunity to resign.

2) By encouraging reporters, like Kessler of the WaPo, to print her quotes on the "personal" or "intense" nature of her relationship with the President ---- Condi Rice has portrayed HERSELF in a completely undignified manner. It runs the clock back on women in positions of power. HEr behavious is unladylike, inappropriate and disrespectful of First Lady Laura Bush. I honestly do not care what is really happening behind closed doors, it is not my business. She should be avoiding any appearance that is inappropriate.

Finally, if you are looking for historical figures - Rice is more akin to Wallis Simpson than any other. Or perhaps Sally Hemmings. But in all honesty - there are no sterotypes or historical figures that have a one-to-one comparison. Because Condoleezza Rice's behavior is anything but remarkable, in fact - she has proven that she is common.

And for a true lady, nothing is more damaging.

But, if she were a lefty....

"I admire her greatly."
- Clavos

Well, she does have more integrity than another of your idols...Newt Gingrich.

If she were a lefty she would be the same War Whore Oil Tanker Leg Spreader she is now as a righty.

I like the Wallis Simpson angle, though. The You can never be too rich, or too thin would sure sit pretty with all those dead African Americans in Louisiana....

Media Lizzy,

I realize you problems with Rice. I have a few problems with her too, problems that tasty gravy will not solve.

Her long legs might impress, were it not for the nasty intent of her policies. For all of her seeming prettiness, the ugliness that stems from her intentions destroys the surface prettiness and makes her look to me like what she truly is, an enemy to my people. You may not agree with that assertion, but that is not germane to the issue here.

The questions you raise are far too little, far too late. If American democratic procedure holds, something that is not a certainty, she will be writing her memoirs in fifteen months.

Ruvy:

I have been an outspoken critic of Secretary Rice for a couple of years. But until recently - no one picked up on it.


All:

Thanks for the fiery debate - keep it coming!

ML - I think I disagree with this article, but there's a lot here to think about. You present your case thoroughly and well.

The position of National Security Advisor has grown to the point of being a parallel bureaucracy to State and Defense. A president should shut the Council down altogether. Bush has only made the situation worse, with Homeland Security and National Intelligence having additional bureaucracies. Anyway, I don't think you can assess Rice or anyone as national security paper-pusher. I don't know how that reflects on her performance at State.

an Article laying out some of the problems with the State department under Rice

far from a complete listing, but a place to start for a reality check, imo

remember, State has been covering for Blackwater and others, hiding their crimes and writing big checks

for what it's Worth...

Excelsior?

Apparently my previous post was blocked, about Condolences Rice whistling Dixie yesterday with blood on her hands.