With Rumsfeld gone, Rice now target of war anger

[rodeodance]

http://www.cnn.com/2007/POLITICS/02/09/rice/index.html?section=cnn_topstories&eref=yahoo

With Rumsfeld gone, Rice now target of war anger

POSTED: 9:47 p.m. EST, February 9, 2007
Story Highlights
• With Rumsfeld gone, Rice becomes a focus of frustration over war
• Secretary is grilled and criticized by both sides of aisle in Congress
• Former secretaries of state, security advisers also criticize Rice

By Elise Labott
CNN Washington Bureau

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Condoleezza Rice's appearance Wednesday before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee was downright tame compared with the reception she got last month, when she sat before the same committee to explain President Bush's "way forward" in Iraq.

On January 11, the secretary of state got an earful from both sides of the aisle. Sen. Chris Dodd of Connecticut, a Democrat who is running for president, called the Bush administration's Iraq policy "a fool's paradise," and Sen. Chuck Hagel, another possible White House hopeful, called Bush's plan "the most dangerous foreign policy blunder since Vietnam."

The tone this week was friendlier, but the criticism was much more pointed at Rice's diplomacy and her stewardship of the State Department. Committee Chairman Joe Biden, another Democratic contender for president, warned Rice that Iraq was sucking up the government's time, attention and resources and wondered aloud whether the secretary had the time to address the myriad other problems facing the United States. (Watch how Rice's star has dimmed Video)
.........

These are rough and uncharted waters for Rice, who sailed through the first six years of the Bush administration relatively unsullied as her colleagues -- particularly former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld -- took the heat for the quagmire in Iraq.

[Mika]

1. With Rumsfeld THOUGHT to be gone.

He's not gone. Just outta the limelight. MS press plays along. Rummy still has a desk and staff at the Pentagon.

[Solly Mack]

2. Rumsfeld's not gone - he's "transitioning"

My anger is directed at the entire Bush adminsitration...even those who have resigned..and down to the lowliest go-fer.

[ClintonTyree]

3. "Rice's diplomacy"?

"The tone this week was friendlier, but the criticism was much more pointed at Rice's diplomacy and her stewardship of the State Department".

:wtf: Has Rice even TRIED diplomatic means to the myriad problems facing the U.S.? The Bush/Rice diplomatic corps: "do what we want or we'll bomb you back into the stone-age". Diplomacy at it's finest. :sarcasm: