NEWS: Condi Rice Finally Gets A Nickname: Useless

POLITICS: Condi Rice Finally Gets A Nickname: Useless

I think anyone with a brain can agree that Condoleezza Rice has been about as useless and ineffective as any previous Secretary of State. Feel free to tell me one important thing she has accomplished. I’ll wait. Be right over there.

Well, she did manage to help start a disastrous war. That was pretty impressive, I guess. Recently Fred Kaplan of Slate called Rice out as the worst National Security Advisor in the history of the White House – and that includes Walt Rostow! (I don’t know anything about Walt, but I disagree with his name)

And you didn’t think anyone could possibly ever be worse than Walt. You were wrong. Anybody ever think of Rice's great work during the build up to the war? Not so much. It was all Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld when it came to the planning, or lack there of. Condi was invisible. I don’t know what the fuck she did, except occasionally whisper in George’s ear what a Shiite was, which didn't take anyway.

Then she moved to the State Department and took over as Secretary of State. I thought, “What the fuck?” Besides being totally useless at her previous job, what had she ever done to deserve such an important position? Fortunately, our president does not worry about who is deserving of official positions.

Well, she has had the job now for three years and, uh, I don’t know what she is trying to accomplish. I read the news everyday, lots and lots of it. I see Condi making trips to different countries, but I really don’t know what she is trying to accomplish on these trips, other than to tell foreign leaders that the war is going great and to describe the awesomeness of Democracy. Meanwhile, everything she touches turns to shit.

And Israel went to war with an Arab nation for the first time in 24 years. Hezbollah emerged from the war as the big winner. These are all great signs of Rice’s incredible understanding of the world.

Now she is trying to pull off one last score to salvage a terrible legacy. America is sponsoring a Middle East peace conference, which is fucking idiotic considering we have started two preemptive wars in the past six years. Actually, the conference has been “downgraded” to a “meeting.” It is embarrassing that Rice would think that she has any credibility at all.

Condi has been taking many trips to the region, but achieving little. She has even had a new Hebrew word created because of her actions.

Case closed. That is so fucking pathetic it is amazing. The woman is so lame that she has a verb named after her that basically means, “Getting nothing done.” Now that is a legacy.

A long setup, but I have to admit I do like the punchline.

Lecondel sounds like a perfectly cromulent word.

Hmm. I'd always kind of hoped she'd just fade off into obscurity. Unfortunately, this is by far the worst administration EVER and will probably be in future history books as a "This is not what a government should be run like".

Sounds like most "Corporate America" meetings in general. Still amusing.

+1
Much as I'd like to say the administration is putting more emphasis on diplomacy, and give Dr. Rice credit for that, it seems the change is mostly cosmetic - which means that instead of making Rice or the administration look good, all it does is underscore how far out of the loop Colin Powell was when he had the job.

Rice hasn't performed nearly as poorly as I expected her to (back when I withdrew from the State Department hiring process), but just because State is one of the best-run departments in this administration doesn't mean it's run well (as the current Blackwater controversy demonstrates rather amply). And the emphasis on diplomacy is, I suspect, more a matter of our newly-acquired military impotence than reflective of any philosophical shift in the Cabinet.

Still, Rice managed to outmaneuver the Cheney-Rumsfeld Axis better than Powell did, but again, I think that was at least partially because she was more conciliatory. Her strategy seems to have been just to give them enough rope to hang themselves with. If that is the case, it's worked - but what makes for a successful turf war in the White House hasn't made for a successful foreign policy.

I still get the feeling that she and (to a greater extent) Powell got roped into the position by promises that they would have more influence with the administration than they ended up having. Powell essentially left in disgust even being made a fool of at the UN and having his name attached to some of the worst diplomacy in the history of the US. Rice has, as you point out, been more or less completely ineffectual - even letting bride-of-Satan Karen Hughes take the lead on face to face interaction with Middle Eastern governments while Rice did..... who knows what? Maybe I'm just biased because she's an academic with some fairly impressive credentials, but I don't necessarily believe that she's drank the Kool-aid along with the rest of the gang, just that she's either done nothing to stop them or tried and failed.

I'm in agreement with legionnaire. That's the impression I've gotten anyway.

When Hamas attacks civilians as a means to advance their agenda it's called "terrorism." When Israel and the US do it, it's called "foreign policy." The only difference I can see is the scale and the fact that Israel and the US are governments.

The line in the sand between the two definitions is when you get F-16s.

Some rag called the NY Times. Check the link.

I think that's a fair assessment - though one change in the Cabinet that may have helped Rice's turf war was the departure of Rumsfeld. Bob Gates is more adminstrator than policy-maker, and like Rice is a protege of Brent Scowcroft, so he seems to defer to her rather than Cheney.
(My understanding is that Gates is far more popular with the troops, too, but that's off topic.)
Rice may (or may not) have considerable talents, but they're either wasted or hidden in this administration.

and so you try to kill the people who are responsible, and you take out their innocent men, women and children too so they come back at you and do the same so you do the same to them then they come back again and it turns out Kungfoo is right, because in the end the only difference is that you're killing them with more effective weaponry.

but what does it mean when that's what both sides were doing?

What ever happened to sugar tits?

Leaving aside the rest of this discussion, didn't you just contradict your first sentence in this quote with your very next sentence?

'lecondel' is awesome.

you know, i don't think it's really reasonable to expect you to be able to look at that particular situation objectively. so sure: their side is evil, your side is good. i'm sure the righteous will triumph and the dudes in the white hats will win.

a marley= a big fat joint, named after bob marley
pulling a Houdini= making a great exit, name after Houdini.
getting ramseyed =getting severe bullocking from your boss, named after gordon ramsey
lecondel=useless jerk, name after condi rice

couldn't seem more apt.

I went down to see my dealer and hook up a marley, the dick wad pulled a houdini on me and next time i see him i am gonna ramsey him, the dude is a useless lecondel.

Is anyone taking odds on when she abandons ship?