OK, it's now on NYT most e-mailed; I'll post it: Condoleeza Rice on Piano

[DeepModem Mom]

Condoleezza Rice on Piano


(Stephen Crowley/The New York Times)

By ANTHONY TOMMASINI
Published: April 9, 2006

WASHINGTON — Two weeks ago on Sunday, Condoleezza Rice got up at 4 a.m. so she could fit in her daily exercise regimen — weights and the treadmill — and still have time to prepare for interviews on three morning news programs. Just a few hours later, on "Meet the Press," Tim Russert confronted her with recent reports that shortly after the invasion of Iraq, the Russians had given intelligence on American troop movements to the Iraqis. Even on the normally sympathetic "Fox News Sunday," Chris Wallace asked her why Americans should not be outraged that United States troops continue to fight and die while Iraqi politicians haggle over jobs.

Toward the end of the program, questions about her future plans predictably arose. Just as predictably, she stated that despite urgings from highly placed Republicans, thank you, no, she would not pursue the presidency.

For most people, let alone a secretary of state grappling with an increasingly unpopular war, this would have been enough exertion for the traditional day of rest.

But late that afternoon, Ms. Rice was back home in her comfortable apartment in the Watergate complex for one of her frequent sessions of chamber music with four friends, lawyers by profession and dedicated amateur string players.

Ms. Rice is an accomplished pianist. At 15 she performed Mozart's Piano Concerto in D minor with the Denver Symphony Orchestra, her prize for winning a student competition. Until college she intended to pursue music professionally. Now 51, she plays as often as every other week with this group, which convened three years ago. Until now it was a realm of her very public life that she kept private....

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/09/arts/music/09tomm.html?ei=5087&en=dd3a3aa49bfd9528&ex=1144641600&pagewanted=all

[rodeodance]

1. What IS the facination with her anyway???????????

[C_U_L8R]

4. It's her fascination with herself

and the bevy of paid flaks who pester and coerce
every editor in the nation to run "feel good" stories
on their patron. Vanity. It's a vice... and so is having
too many shoes.

[Botany]

2. And in her oh so busy days she might have read ......

..... "bin Laden wants to attack in the United States." 8/6/01.

She is like the musicians (but they were there by force) who played great music
as the prisoners were taken off for their "showers" at the concentration camps.
But, condi gets to keep her distance from the blood and death that is Iraq.

[Ilsa]

3. I for one, wish her tons of luck with a musical career because

she totally sucks as Sec of State and she totally sucked as NSA. I wish playing chamber music was all she did.

[0007]

6. Maybe she'll get a lot time playing for the prison symphony.

[Jane Austin]

7. That's how I see it, too.

PLEASE, pursue a career in music, Ms. Rice!

PLEEEEEEEEASE!

[niyad]

5. trying to make her appear human?

Until now it was a realm of her very public life that she kept private.... but now we have to do everything in our power to make people feel warm and fuzzy about her.

[Botany]

11. Seems warm to me

[Olney Blue]

8. Condi's favorite opera....

Her favorite opera is Mussorgsky's epic "Khovanshchina," not surprising, given her expertise in Russian culture, language and history. It may have special resonance today: it tells of bloody factional strife at the time of the ascension of Peter the Great, made worse by the intransigence of the Old Believers, a fundamentalist Orthodox group opposed to reform.

[DeepModem Mom]

10. Thanks for this info, Olney Blue -- interesting! nt

[Botany]

12. Did I ever tell you that you are my Fav EDV?

Please don't tell the others.

Isn't it great having a Russian Scholar in charge of the mid east now?

[Olney Blue]

14. Yes, it's working out really well with Putin.....

[Imagevision]

9. Condi should stick with music - As NSA leader she sucked!

[oasis]

21. C'mon now, "traditonal hijackings" happen all the time. Who knew the

evil doers would use planes as missles? Just about every competent administrator in the field of intelligence and law enforcement. That's who.

The corporate media continues to give Condi a big pass for her 9/11 "miscue".

[cantstandbush]

13. So, Condi is gifted. We don't have to smear her because of her talent.

Let's save our angst against her for her polocies and her politics. We don't have to act like Freepers to get our points across.

[Fla Dem]

15. What has she freakin done that has been a success ??

She has masterminded the foreign policy, National security all of which ARE IN SHAMBLES!!!!!

[saltpoint]

16. In a much earlier post on DU I wrote that Rice was a woman who has

abandoned the goddess. By that I mean she has surrendered -- or abandoned -- the creative source of her evidently good mind, abandoned the contemplative and thoughtful and reflective life of Brahms' Intermezzo in A -- abandoned this realm for the crude, temporal plain of Power.

I felt that this reflected a cavernous wound in her self-confidence, that she would let mere political power buoy her and abandon Brahms and the reverential realm of something permanently beautiful. (She is a Brahms expert on the keyboard.)

Her ride to the dance was with Dubya and his oil-slick powermad family tree and scurrilous connections. A case of the piano player selling out and moving west to play bad music in the bars and bordellos of the old frontier.

How wounded would she had to have been to trade Brahms for Bush?

Shame on Condoleeza Rice.

[DeepModem Mom]

18. I had similar thoughts -- but could not have expressed them...

nearly as well as you have.

[saltpoint]

20. DeepModem Mom, you can do anything you want. People like

your posts on DU, and for damn good reason. Don't you dare sell yourself short.

It could be that we came to a similar conclusion about Condoleeza Rice because we didn't want our country and the people who live in it to be represented by a pack of bloodthirsty jackals. From Bush's point of view, it's about being able to get away with anything you want because there aren't any other superpowers out there anymore. Like a prepubescent bully on the playground, shoving everybody else around.

But it could be that you and I and others here on DU are ashamed to be represented like that, because we do not have a personal quarrel with the people of Iraq, or of France, or of Venezuela, and so on.

That's what has been so damaging about this presidency -- the perception on the part of other nations that Americans are a bunch of thugs and bullies who don't know or care to know about how other people live.

And the point where we come to similar conclusions is the point where we get to acknowledge each other, and I say, hat's off to you and to anybody else on DU who is resisting the America-as-bully policies of George W. Bush. He's a worthy political enemy for us, but we're even better friends to each other in opposing him.

All good wishes, DeepModem Mom, and I will continue to look forward to your posts on these boards.



:thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :hi:

[DeepModem Mom]

22. Back atcha, Old Crusoe!

:loveya:

[Greybnk48]

17. Nero played a fiddle, BFD

same shit, different instrument.

[Imagevision]

19. Condi; "I believe it said, Bin Laden determined to strike buildings

in the United states (PDB August2001)