Salon: Condoleezza Rice's bad week

[kskiska]

Bush's national security advisor dodged the 9/11 commission, but she can't evade its judgment.

It was a catastrophic Wednesday for Condoleezza Rice, the worst of her more than three years as national security advisor.

(snip)

Rice is, in fact, a classic example and beneficiary of the political mores of Bush's Washington. In the second Bush administration, to a degree unprecedented among any of its recent predecessors, Democratic or Republican, courtier skills matter far more in rising to and prospering in high political office than political skill, sagacity or knowledge of the issues. Being too attached to any principles or prudence will assuredly mar or destroy your career if they get in the way of key policy goals -- like blaming Iraq for 9/11, or backing the drive to conquer it. Rice has thrived in this environment.

Rice had neither academic background nor serious policy experience in dealing with the Middle East, terror groups or extreme Islam. She was the top national security official on watch for eight months before 9/11. As Clarke has made clear, that should have been ample time for her to ratchet up the national government's level of alert and efficiency against the well-documented threat about which she had been exhaustively and presciently warned. She did no such thing. Instead, she has used her first-rate forensic and diplomatic skills only to obfuscate, excuse and sidestep to protect Bush and maintain her own perfect record. In the year and a half since 9/11 Rice has compliantly served the personal obsession of the president and the neocon clique running the Pentagon to rush to war in Iraq.

Her unimpeded rise is especially remarkable because Rice's actual record as national security advisor has been, to say the least, spotty and controversial.

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http://salon.com/opinion/feature/2004/03/25/condi/index.html

[Lindsay]

1. And she's earned every bit of the bad.

Devastating article...thanks for posting it.

[KissMyAsscroft]

2. It's only gonna get worse.

We're just getting warmed up. 3 years of absolute, well-deserved rage is heading their way.

[Manix]

3. ..bad week?......How about bad 3 1/2 years.

[indepat]

4. May a bad hair-day add to her woes

[Sticky]

5. Do any of these people

even WANT 4 more years? Dr Rice's life must be an absolute nightmare working for this idiot president. When I see her stammering and grasping for words that will make her appear credible I can't help but feel sorry for her.

[enough]

6. Article also goes into other issues

Glad you posted this, kskiska.

snip>

Rice's role was especially egregious on the issue of the entirely false report that Saddam Hussein had sought "yellowcake" uranium in Niger. On Jan. 23, 2003, she published an Op-Ed piece in the New York Times titled "Why We Know Iraq was Lying," in which she claimed Iraq's then-recent declaration of weapons "fails to account for or explain Iraq's efforts to get uranium from abroad." Five days later, Bush included the bogus allegation in his State of the Union speech. On June 8, 2003, Rice admitted on ABC's "This Week," "Clearly that particular report, we learned subsequently, was not credible." On July 9, 2003, then White House press secretary Ari Fleischer admitted, "This information should not have risen to the level of a presidential speech."

snip>

Her confounding of Powell did not start after 9/11. It has been true from the day the Bush administration took office. And it was largely overlooked for a variety of reasons, all boiling down to the same root cause. Even more than Wolfowitz, who affects a moderate, low-key gentlemanly demeanor in public but whose memoranda and policy papers have been notorious over more than a decade for their wild and risky recommendations, Rice always appears ladylike, low key and genteel. Her demeanor and charm are always impeccable. And this belies the reckless overconfidence of the policies she has in fact supported.

Will any or all of this come back to haunt Rice? If the president wins reelection, it certainly will not. Her access to Bush and her standing in his eyes remain unparalleled. As James Mann noted in his excellent new book on the Bush foreign policy team, "The Rise of the Vulcans," Bush has always felt more comfortable with Rice than with Wolfowitz. Bush and his political strategist Karl Rove still love the idea of countering their almost universal rejection by black America by having a black secretary of state. Since Powell has made clear he does not wish to endure a second term of consistent isolation, backstabbing and undermining, that leaves the way potentially clear for Rice to fill his chair.

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