A German View Of Condoleeza Rice

[dtotire]

Can Condoleezza Rice Emancipate Herself from Bush?

By Marc Hujer

As the disastrous Bush administration drags down its members, only one of them, Condoleezza Rice, has what it takes to survive politically. Ironically, the president's close confidante, who bears part of the responsibility for all of the administration's crises, is the only one who stands a chance of scoring a comeback.

Condoleezza Rice has returned to Aspen, Colorado, more than three decades later. Apparently she is just as unsure, breathless and girlishly shy as she was the first time, when she was 17 and everything began. It was her first defeat.

Aspen, as it does every year at this time, is celebrating its annual music festival. More than 2,000 people have come to the concert tent on a mountain meadow, at $60 a ticket, to hear Rice give a piano recital and a talk -- about music, politics and herself.

Madeleine Albright, the secretary of state under former President Bill Clinton, is standing on the stage to introduce her. Rice, says Albright, "plays the piano better than any foreign minister" and is "a far better foreign minister than any pianist." Of course, this isn't saying much, since no other foreign minister has ever been a pianist and no other pianist has ever been a foreign minister. But Albright's words, as innocuous as they are, are kinder to Rice than the usual harsh words of criticism. After eight years at the side of US President George W. Bush, Rice can count herself lucky to be treated with such graciousness.

She became famous for her stern demeanor and the way she looks at people, which has gone down in history as "the look," and for the way she wrinkles her brow and her eyebrows gather darkly over her eyes. The look, feared among diplomats the world over, stood for her sharp and cold image, which enabled her to intimidate her counterparts and discouraged others from asking her any personal questions.

More:
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,587237,00.html

[ensho]

1. and the blood will never wash off her hands or spirit

nt

[roguevalley]

16. she's trash. the best she can hope for is to be the piano player in

satan's bordello. (If I believed in hell, that might be fun to consider.)

[Doctor_J]

2. Maybe she can play a historical piece, "Bin Laden determined to strike

within the United States". Wait, she always ignores that one

[file83]

8. I wish she would play, "I don't believe anyone could have anticipated the 9/11 attacks..."

It's a classic.

[stevenleser]

3. No way that she has a future in politics...

9/11 occurred during her watch as NSA, she ignored three warnings that something was going to happen, and then as SecState she has no major accomplishments to which to point. On top of that there is the baggage of being part of this administration.

She is finished. Spiegel, who I normally agree with, have this wrong.

[saltpoint]

4. The press in the United States rarely looked as closely at Condoleezza Rice

as this, preferring instead to give her a pass.

Thanks for posting this. The news-savvy and history-realized European (and others) have a different and often more insightful take on U.S. leaders.

IMO Condoleezza Rice was exceptional to a point in her life dating to this event in Colorado. It may not be accurate to say that her exceptionalism had not reached its full expression prior to this, but the piano was her chosen path and also the medium & message of that exceptionalism.

There were other young folks there whose talent demonstrably exceeded hers. At the point when someone else played a more lyrical nocturne or bedazzled the audience with a flashier polonaise, Condoleeza Rice found herself dead-ended. Her best wasn't competitive with these more-talented others. Last stop on the Exceptional Express.

Her studies were to master the Cold War era and learn Russian. This in a time when History was breaking camp on the Cold War. It was a regional and not global notch on her resume. A handsome enough butter churn, but a buttern churn just the same.

She got good jobs following that, and Der Spiegel may be right in its prediction for others, but as far as I can tell, Rice did not do anythng she's ever done well enough to be "exceptional." Other young people were more talented musicians and god knows, you certainly don't have to be exceptional to be in George W. Bush's cabinet.

Rice dresses with willful and almost surgical adherence to fashion and because she's in new shoes and elegant garb, she gets away with contemptuous scowling and deliriously unfocused public remarks. Her performance before the 9-11 Committee was a deceitful, reductionist, fart-in-a-whirlwind performance, designed to kill time and cover her own butt and her boss's. Ditto her testimony before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

If she could not be so exceptional as to be a world-profile concert pianist because other young women and men were better at it than she was, she could nevertheless have opened a Music Studio that generated top-drawer pianists. She was unable to set her ego aside ("But I am exceptional! But I am a star!"), unable to accept the terminus point of her exceptionalism.

And so years later we have scowling Condi at National Security, scowling Condi at the State Dpt., the Stanford gig, the oil exec, etc.

In the trajectory from her early goals to her present path, she comes off as a power whore.

[indepat]

9. And what a magnificent RW power whore. History will record her proper

place. :P

[saltpoint]

11. I'm guessing you are exactly right -- she will be the juicy subject

of authors who are likely tapping way at first drafts right now.

There is a high threshold interest in Condi. Unfortunately for her, the things that make her so interesting are hypocracy and deceit.

[indepat]

15. Like with all 'pukes, hypocrisy and deceit; sanctimony and reichousness; disingenuousness and

duplicity; outright lies, distortions, and hyperbole; avarice, greed, and lust for total power and control; corporatists and fascist; and a lust for aggressive war(s), the whole self-serving lot of them. Other than those, they would generally make decent citizens in a republic such as this. :P

[fortyfeetunder]

5. This article pulls back no punches....re: Katrina

"She never felt like an outsider, and she never felt African-American. When Hurricane Katrina hit the coast of Louisiana in August 2005, she was in New York, where she worked on her backhand with tennis star Monica Seles, met her former boyfriend, former football star Gene Washington, went shopping for shoes at Ferragamo on Fifth Avenue and went to see the musical "Spamelot." It was not until the next day that she realized what a terrible impression she had made. While black Americans were dying and losing their houses in New Orleans, she went shopping -- she, of all people, a black cabinet secretary.

Rice did not feel responsible for blacks."

This, unfortunately, is her legacy. She had the leverage and the influence to make this right. But she didn't.

[saltpoint]

6. It really does. It just smacks her in the face, and pretty h ard, too.

And the points raised against Rice are fact-based. There's no real cheap shots.

Katrina. Struggling New Orleans people. Condi out shopping and hanging with tennis celebs.

Jesus.

[struggle4progress]

7. "If. anyone . ought to be held accountable for . the current administration, it is Rice"

[goclark]

10. I didn't realize Condi was such a good friend of

Madeleine Albright's.

Interesting.

[kskiska]

18. Madeline Albright's father was Condi's mentor

Josef Korbel may be one of the most influential Americans you've never heard of. He died in 1977, but his legacy lives on in his two most famous students: his daughter, Madeleine Albright, and his star pupil at the University of Denver, Condoleezza Rice.

Korbel was an up-and-coming Czech diplomat in 1948 when the communists staged a coup in his country. He fled Europe and ended up at the University of Denver, where he went on to found the school's Graduate School of International Studies.

Both women say Korbel inspired them to pursue public service, and echoes of his abiding belief in the merits of American-style freedom are clear in their public statements.

more…
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5516648

[tomp]

12. the democrats embrace another criminal bush, inc member....

excuse me while i :puke:

still waiting for change.

[Raster]

13. Rice is vicious and opportunistic. I find it absolutely appalling that anyone could even suggest

that Rice has "emancipated herself from bush*" and now "can count herself lucky to be treated with such graciousness." The woman is a war criminal, plain and simple. She deserves no doting, coddling or cuddling. She deserves a prison cell, just like the rest of the bush*/cheney* criminals. So what if she's Madeleine Albright's friend? That just demonstrates Albright's bad personal judgment.

[Deny and Shred]

14. She'll take a cushy high-paying job, or hit the lecture circuit. EOM

[elleng]

17. Writer failed

to mention the Rumsfeld + Cheney iron curtain against her; she COULD NOT do her job, I think.

[Daveparts]

19. How about

Titanic Overture?

[KoKo]

20. Interesting Article....as much as it pumped Condi..made me dislike her

even more after reading. She "used" her influence with Chimp..."helping him with his crossword puzzles, and fishing with him and talking sports.......

:puke:

He was using her for more than filling out "crossword puzzles" IMHO...and there have been "many rumors" about their relationship from the get go.

Condi is one of those "Charmed Lives" that seem to get plucked out and pushed forward to their time in history. Would that many others who have more credentials than she did could RISE like MzCondi did.