The Clipboard: Steady on, toward disaster

From an article¹:

The two-day dialogue between Condoleezza Rice and members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee at times resembled material from "Catch-22" and at other times seemed to reflect "Dr. Strangelove." Other than a few hard questions from Democrats Joe Biden and Barbara Boxer, at no time did it remotely resemble reality.

You'd have thought from the way committee members treated Rice that she'd just arrived in Washington and had no part to play in, and no real knowledge of, the foreign-policy disaster that was President Bush's first term.

What alternate reality do these senators inhabit? Rice is a principal architect of the Bush foreign policy. She was an ardent supporter of going to war in Iraq. Her statements in the run-up to war about "mushroom clouds" and aluminum tubes were preposterous. And yet in a hearing on whether she has the stuff to be secretary of state, she had the temerity to lecture Boxer, asking her to "refrain from impugning my integrity." Well if not now, when?

Even in front of the committee, Rice couldn't refrain from telling what would generously be called fibs. Biden caught her out in one when she said 120,000 Iraqi military personnel had been trained to date. A more reliable figure from a more reliable source, he said, is 4,000.

Iraq is a quagmire killing Americans troops every day and costing American taxpayers billions each month. America's standing with allies, friendly nations and not-so-friendly ones has been badly damaged. We are seen abroad as bullying, arrogant and frequently just plain stupid. Rice was at the center of decisions which created that not-so-rosy scenario, and yet, as Biden said, played her confirmation hearings as a version of "Don't Worry, Be Happy." (link)

The disconnect from reality grows and grows.

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Complete text of the article, Steady on, toward disaster, by the Editors of the Star-Tribune

The two-day dialogue between Condoleezza Rice and members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee at times resembled material from "Catch-22" and at other times seemed to reflect "Dr. Strangelove." Other than a few hard questions from Democrats Joe Biden and Barbara Boxer, at no time did it remotely resemble reality.

You'd have thought from the way committee members treated Rice that she'd just arrived in Washington and had no part to play in, and no real knowledge of, the foreign-policy disaster that was President Bush's first term.

What alternate reality do these senators inhabit? Rice is a principal architect of the Bush foreign policy. She was an ardent supporter of going to war in Iraq. Her statements in the run-up to war about "mushroom clouds" and aluminum tubes were preposterous. And yet in a hearing on whether she has the stuff to be secretary of state, she had the temerity to lecture Boxer, asking her to "refrain from impugning my integrity." Well if not now, when?

Even in front of the committee, Rice couldn't refrain from telling what would generously be called fibs. Biden caught her out in one when she said 120,000 Iraqi military personnel had been trained to date. A more reliable figure from a more reliable source, he said, is 4,000.

Iraq is a quagmire killing Americans troops every day and costing American taxpayers billions each month. America's standing with allies, friendly nations and not-so-friendly ones has been badly damaged. We are seen abroad as bullying, arrogant and frequently just plain stupid. Rice was at the center of decisions which created that not-so-rosy scenario, and yet, as Biden said, played her confirmation hearings as a version of "Don't Worry, Be Happy."

Rice promised to repair relations with the world and to seek multilateral solutions to some of the most vexing problems the United States will confront in the next four years. But how is she going to do that? Repackage the Bush mood music and try to do a better sales job than outgoing Secretary of State Colin Powell?

It won't work; Rice doesn't enjoy Powell's respect in the world, and no one is going to be fooled by mood music. They want new American policies, and there is no indication there will be any from a second Bush administration. So long as Rice tries to sell the same spoiled fruit Powell was forced to peddle, no one is going to buy.

Diplomatically and militarily, everything the United States tried in Bush's first term went rotten. Yet the same unapologetic team, admitting to no mistakes, will be at the helm during the second four years, minus Powell and a few others.

Even many of the Republican members of the committee have been critics of the Bush foreign policy that Rice helped design, especially of its approach to Iraq. And yet they fawned all over her instead of holding her to account. More pathetic was Biden, who was biting in his criticisms but then voted to support her confirmation.

In the end, only Boxer and Sen. John Kerry did the principled thing and voted against Rice. Perhaps it was a symbolic vote, but it mattered. Kerry wasn't very pithy, but he was right when he said, "Dr. Rice is a principal architect, implementer, and defender of a series of administration policies that have not made our country as secure as we should be and have alienated much-needed allies in our common cause of winning the war against terrorism. Regrettably, I did not see in Dr. Rice's testimony any acknowledgment of the need to change course or of a new vision for America's role in the world."

With that the committee voted 16-2 to continue steady as she goes toward the next disaster.

reference=http://www.startribune.com/stories/1519/5195168.html