Katrina vanden Heuvel: Condoleeza Rice's Middle East Photo-Op

[marmar]

from The Nation:



BLOG | Posted 11/17/2007 @ 12:38am
Condoleeza Rice's Middle East Photo-Op


The American-sponsored Middle East peace conference (or meeting or get-together) expected to be held in Annapolis , Maryland later this month has more to do with providing Secretary of State Condoleezza a much-needed photo op to repair her tarnished legacy than creating the groundwork for a just and comprehensive settlement of the Israeli-Palestinian crisis. Besides the need to repair her legacy, Rice urgently needs to buy Arab support for the Administration's war in Iraq and its escalating threats against Iran. As a result, after years of scorning Arab-Israeli diplomacy, Rice has become such a freqent visitor to the region that she given birth to a new verb in Israeli government circles: 'lecondel." According to the New York Times, the verb --based on Ms. Rice's first name-- means " to come and go for meetings that produce few results."

But Rice has produced results. Disastrous ones. Responsibility for this war and occupation lies with her as much as anybody in the Bush Administration. She was perhaps the worst national security adviser in the office's history, as Slate's Fred Kaplan recently argued. (And she's had some tough competition.) And as a former security realist turned messianic "democratizer," Rice has squandered both democracy and realism in our engagement with the world. As Kaplan put it well, " Rice remains one of the architects of a fantasy foreign policy, and her record as secretary of state gives little hope that she'll be able to reverse that verdict in the administration's final months."

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/edcut?bid=7&pid=252497

[annabanana]

1. 'lecondel."

Now that's a legacy!

According to the New York Times, the verb --based on Ms. Rice's first name-- means " to come and go for meetings that produce few results.

[Toots]

2. Maybe we can use this new verb or maybe change it to an adjective

to apply to some in Congress. That might sting a little, that Leconde Senator never even asked a question.....or some such...

[onager]

3. Well, her Middle East conferences in the actual Middle East...

...have never accomplished anything. OK, except for the unintentional humor.

I've lived in Egypt for over 2 years now, and everytime Rice comes over here flapping her gums, she gets nothing but a royal red-assing in the Middle Eastern media. Most, if not all, media in this part of the world is government-controlled. So that gives us an idea of how well she's doing.

According to Informed Sources: the last time Rice came to Egypt, she appeared in a ghastly photo-op with President Hosni Mubarak. Probably in an attempt to influence/intimidate the Egyptians, she gave several interviews of the "with-us-or-against-us" type. On stage at a public photo-op, Mubarak announced in no uncertain terms that he would not be dictated to by G.W. Bush or his designated puppet.

The only American who makes Rice look good in the Middle East is Karen Hughes. Much like her boss, ol' Bigfoot has an absolutely uncanny tin-eared knack for hearing nothing and saying exactly the wrong thing.

When Rice tried to lecture a press conference of female Egyptian journalists about The War On Terriers and democracy, those women got right in her face.

You may remember that after her Middle East junket, Hughes stumbled back to the U.S., looking a bit shell-shocked, and said we still had a lot of work to do in "communicating our values to the region."

That Egyptian press conference was one reason why.

[tanyev]

4. No results?

Why just look how good her hair looked on Friday. C'mon!




Lots of good Condi coverage at Princess Sparkle Pony's Photo Blog.
http://sparklepony.blogspot.com/