World awaits Rice in battle for Bush's ear

[emad]

Times
From Gerard Baker in Washington



WHEN she takes centre stage at her confirmation hearing today, Condoleezza Rice will start unravelling the puzzle that makes her nomination as Secretary of State one of the most intriguing indicators of Bush’s foreign policy in his second term.

To her critics she is a cipher, a conduit for the more powerful voices in the high-powered if somewhat under-lubricated Bush foreign policy machine. Despite her proximity to the President, they note that in the first Bush term her views, thought to have been forged in the multilateralist workshop that was the presidency of George Bush Sr a decade ear- lier, counted for nought when Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld threw their unilateralist thunderbolts towards the West Wing.

But to her allies, the past four years are an unreliable prologue during which she merely executed faithfully the specific task the President gave her — of co-ordinating and synthesising the views of the foreign policy titans around her, and merging them anonymously into the President’s own unfolding worldview.

They say that will now change as this prodigiously talented woman, who graduated from university at 19 and was provost of Stanford at 38, has been elevated to the front rank of the Bush foreign policy team.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,11069-1445561,00.html

AND to those who know her best, she is a criminal thug who should be sent to Guantanamo along with Poppy's and Junior's bagman FARISH....

[CollegeDNC]

1. Rice should be GRILLED for her pathetic performance as NSA

I truly hope that Rice faces the kind of tuff questionsshe deserves.
Quite frankly Rice has been a disgrace for the past four years. Rice witheld information about Abu Graib, she provided completely false info on Iraq's WMD program, and she was followed Bush around like a puppy in heat. Rice will probably be as big a failure during the next four years as she has been.

[emad]

2. All these career milestones are what gained her the promotion.

Expect more CV achievements to rival those of General Pinochet...

[Alpharetta]

3. She's always been a mediocre shill for her bosses

Her days as an oil company exec were marked by one thing: zero leadership and blind obedience to her bosses.

That approach has served her well. She even got an oil tanker named after her. (The name was removed to protect the White House, once she joined the administration.)

The approach is why she remains on the Bush team. She's not even a smooth voice for the White House. Give her a talking point and she'll repeat it five times in one press conference. It's sad, really, her inability to synthesize her own voice.

[emad]

4. Love of sports began rare bond for Bush, Rice

By Jim Puzzanghera

Mercury News Washington Bureau


WASHINGTON - President Bush and national security adviser Condoleezza Rice have formed one of the closest bonds in White House history, a relationship that soon will enter a new phase as the Senate formally begins consideration today of her nomination as secretary of state.

In a way, it all began because of Willie Mays.

The star center fielder for the San Francisco Giants was Bush's childhood idol. An avid fan, Bush decorated his office as governor of Texas with dozens of autographed baseballs. Rice stopped by the office one day in 1995, waiting to meet Bush's father, who had been her boss during her first White House stint.

``I noticed that he had this great collection of baseballs,'' Rice said in a 2000 interview with the Mercury News. A big sports fan herself, Rice told Bush that her mother had taught Mays in high school in Birmingham, Ala.

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/world/10670199.htm?1c

[emad]

5. Rice underlines need for dialogue : BBC

Rice underlines need for dialogue


Condoleezza Rice, President George W Bush's nominee as secretary of state, says she will use diplomacy to reach a balance of power in the world.

"Our interaction with the rest of the world must be a conversation, not a monologue," Ms Rice is to tell the Senate during her confirmation hearing.

Iraq is expected to be high on the agenda during the two-day session.

Ms Rice, 50, is close to President Bush - and is expected to be easily confirmed as Colin Powell's successor.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4183155.stm

[grumpy old fart]

6. Confirmation Hearings are easy work, just promise to be good...

That's what passes for "hearings" these days. Gonzalez gets off with promising to be against positions he clearly advocates, Condi spouts "conversation over monologue" crap, while enabling * to continue in the exact opposite direction. Say anything, what's it mean anyway? There is no objective truth for these people. It's all just faith based reality, created for their God the Chimp Fuhrer.

[leesa]

7. She will be a terrible SOS. She is stubborn as a mule and

the whole world knows she's a liar. From what I have read, she also has an explosive temper.