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Susan Rice Withdraws as Sec of State Candidate

Besides all of her other problems, Susan Rice doesn't want anybody asking her where she got 44 million dollars.

More to add on, from what I already have shown.....


She lives in Northwest Washington, with her husband, Ian Cameron, a television producer she met while attending Stanford University. Inheritances from Cameron’s and Rice’s families, as well as her own investments, are chiefly responsible for her $20 million-plus net worth, which has drawn attention this week because she holds stocks in Canadian oil companies that could benefit from construction of the Keystone Pipeline, a project that she might have some influence over if she were named secretary of state.

Rice was aware that some might look askance at her and her husband because Cameron is white and she is black. “But why the hell should I be constrained by prejudices with which I totally disagree?” she said in a 1998 interview with The Washington Post. “That doesn’t mean that I’m less of an African American.”.....snip~

She is the sharp-elbowed one, the brusque one, the one who flipped off the famed diplomat Richard Holbrooke, the one who likes to cuss.....snip~
 
Had to happen, but a shame nonetheless. I hope her career is fast-tracked in other ways.

It was and is.....but it's not being done by the Right. It is being done by the left. Many want her out altogether and that's Politics!

Just For the Record: The Left Took Out Susan Rice

Certainly, Republicans like John McCain and Susan Collins had issues with Rice, and made that clear (although McCain also "softened" his opposition). But is there any thinking person out there who believes the Obama administration would have accepted her withdrawal if opposition to her could have been portrayed as some kind of right wing "dog whistle"? Please.

What ultimately did Rice in was criticism from the likes of Maureen Dowd (twice -- here and here) and Dana Milbank and Lloyd Grove and in the Atlantic magazine(both here and here) and in Foreign Policy even in a piece on the hallowed (to liberals) op/ed page of the New York Times. Hillary Clinton let her opposition to Rice be known. Those are the kind of opponents that a Democrat nominee simply cannot overcome -- not a couple of Republican senators when the administation's customary M.O. is simply to attribute everything to race and gender.

Note also that the Republican opposition was based specifically on Rice's misleading statements in the wake of Benghazi. It was her critics on the left, in contrast, who highlighted gauzier, more personal issues, characterizing Rice as someone afflicted with a supposed "personality disorder" (Grove), who is "ill-equipped to be the nation's top diplomat" because of her "shoot-first tendency" and "pugilism" (Milbank), with a "bull-in-the-china-shop reputation" (Dowd).....snip~

Just For the Record: The Left Took Out Susan Rice - Carol Platt Liebau

Even Clinton Chooses Kerry over Rice.

Hillary Clinton 'doesn't want Susan Rice to take over as Secretary of State' | Mail Online
 
Yes lets look at those Merits outside of Benghazi that she was offering up...

Some of the points you raise should properly have been examined in confirmation hearings if she had been nominated. As I've noted elsewhere, I disagree with her position on certain matters e.g., humanitarian interventions. She advocates a lower threshold for such interventions e.g., she was a forceful proponent of U.S. military intervention in Libya. I believe the U.S. should refrain from such interventions unless there is a compelling national interest (there wasn't in Libya) or there is credible evidence of genocide (there wasn't in Libya).

Diplomats on the 15-nation U.N. Security Council privately complain of Rice's aggressive negotiating tactics, describing her with terms like "undiplomatic" and "sometimes rather rude." They attributed some blunt language to Rice - "this is crap," "let's kill this" or "this is bull****."

She is not the first diplomat to use sometimes blunt language. UN Ambassador John Bolton was blunt. The major question is whether she got things done at the UN and had the capacity to get things done at the State Department. That's a legitimate area that could have been addressed during confirmation hearings.

"She's got a sort of a cowboy-ish attitude," one Western diplomat said. "She has a tendency to treat other countries as mere (U.S.) subsidiaries."

The post-9/11 U.S. posture has often seen the U.S. discount the concerns of allies, especially early on when the myth of a unipolar world was in vogue in some foreign policy circles (namely the neoconservative school). For example, in the run-up to the Iraq war, concerns raised by France and Germany were dismissed with cavalier references that France and Germany were "old Europe." Many of Ambassador Rice's critics took a completely different stance when France and Germany were dismissed and "freedom fries" were a fad. Quite frankly, even as such attitudes represent power disparities, they are unhelpful. Asking about Ambassador Rice's recognition that the role of Secretary of State required a different approach, one more akin to a partnership, would have been fair game for a confirmation hearing.

More immediately at the United Nations, she faces criticism from human rights activists and some diplomats because of U.S. opposition to public criticism of Rwanda for its role in the worsening conflict in the Congo.

The issue in the Democractic Republic of Congo is complex. The country has been a longstanding failed state. It has experienced chronic civil strife/tribal conflict. It is overly simplistic to assume that Rwanda is the reason for the DRC's issues. The absence of civil society, lack of credible political institutions, and recent history of bitter conflict in which often zero-sum views have been held have shaped that country's situation. It is naive to assume that were Rwanda to take a different approach, DRC would be a stable, free, and democratic society. Rwanda, which experienced genocide, is sensitive to developments that could threaten its stability. Like any sovereign state, it looks out for its interests and it does not believe that its interests are served the failed state next door. That's the reality of the situation.

Her involvement with the East African nation began in the 1990s, when she was a National Security Council official responsible for international organizations and peacekeeping.

Still reeling from its 1993 failure in Somalia, the United States under Clinton did virtually nothing to stop the Rwanda genocide in 1994.[/quote]

First, given the lack of critical national interests, I don't believe the U.S. should have been involved in Somalia under Presidents Bush and Clinton. Second, that Rice had a portfolio that included international organizations and peacekeeping does not mean that she had control over the UN's efforts. The UN has a poor record in such areas and no single state can restructure the UN's peacekeeping activities. World organization, as a means of maintaining peace, has a poor record and the multiplicity of interests of Member States makes it an ineffectual vehicle for such a role. Having said this, it would have been fair game for Rice to be questioned about the nature of her responsibilities at the time.

Nearly two decades later, council diplomats and rights groups accuse Rice of protecting Rwanda and President Paul Kagame, a charge that Rice's defenders say is baseless

I agree with Rice's defenders on this. The situation is complex and it is naive to assume that President Kagame is responsible for the Congo's history of strife and violence that predates his government.

That doesn't wash with some human rights activists. "Despite its influence on Rwanda, in public the U.S. government has been inexplicably silent," said Philippe Bolopion, U.N. director for Human Rights Watch

Given that DRC's history of tribal strife and civil conflict predate Rwanda, it's not clear that a more aggressive U.S. posture directed against Rwanda would lead to a materially better outcome.

In the end, there are issues that could legitimately have been addressed during confirmation hearings were she nominated. The results of those hearings should have determined whether Ambassador Rice would/would not become Secretary of State. None of those issues will be addressed, as she withdrew her name from consideration on account of the politicization of her reliance on the Intelligence Community's assessment of the events in Benghazi.
 
I hope whoever he nominates is as competent and effective as Hillary. she has done a great job.

Tell that to the four dead in Benghazi then list her accomplishments then add why she is leaving this post.
 
In the end, there are issues that could legitimately have been addressed during confirmation hearings were she nominated. The results of those hearings should have determined whether Ambassador Rice would/would not become Secretary of State. None of those issues will be addressed, as she withdrew her name from consideration on account of the politicization of her reliance on the Intelligence Community's assessment of the events in Benghazi.[/QUOTE]


Moreover despite you disagreeing with the Sentiments of the UN Human Rights groups and Activists, and those several writers from the left. I would have thought her track record from the 90's would be enough to have maybe.....just maybe shed a little light on her failures back then.
]
Perhaps then we wouldn't be stuck in the situation we are in.

Let alone being out-witted, out-maneuvered, and out-played by the French. Yet she backed the French's play with the Ivory Coast and the ousting of Gbagbo. Yes and the Congo is just as diverse and inflicted with just as many problems. But this changes nothing about her ineffectiveness.

But in all actuality she should have never been chosen for the UN Ambassador. In truth not even worth a Consideration in even looking at.

When the other side, as a figure of speech.....refuses to talk with you and will talk to anyone else but you. Pretty much tells you how things really are on that ground!

Especially with that so called appearance and what is thought of Americans.....by those overseas, huh?
 
Tell that to the four dead in Benghazi then list her accomplishments then add why she is leaving this post.

2002: U.S. Consulate In Karachi, Pakistan, Attacked; 10 Killed, 51 Injured. From a June 15, 2002, Chicago Tribune article:

Police cordoned off a large area around the U.S. Consulate late Friday and began combing through the carnage and debris for clues after a car explosion killed at least 10 people, injured 51 others and left Pakistan's largest city bleeding from yet another terrorist atrocity.

No Americans were among the dead, and only six of the injured were inside the consulate compound at the time of the blast Friday morning. One Pakistani police officer on guard outside the building was among the dead, but many of those killed were pedestrians or motorists in the area at the time of the explosion.

The U.S. Embassy in Islamabad reported that five Pakistani consular employees and a Marine guard were slightly wounded by flying debris.

Suspicion for the attack immediately fell on Islamic militants known to be active in Karachi. [Chicago Tribune, 6/15/02, via Nexis]



2004: U.S. Embassy Bombed In Uzbekistan. From a July 31, 2004, Los Angeles Times article:

Suicide bombers on Friday struck the U.S. and Israeli embassies in Uzbekistan, killing two local guards and injuring at least nine others in the second wave of attacks this year against a key U.S. ally during the war in Afghanistan.

The prosecutor general's office also was hit in the coordinated afternoon attacks in the capital city of Tashkent. It sustained more damage than either of the embassies, where guards prevented bombers from entering.

The attacks came as 15 Muslim militants linked to the Al Qaeda terrorist network went on trial in a series of bombings and other assaults in March that killed 47 people.

The explosions Friday caused relatively little physical damage but rattled a country in which the U.S. has maintained an air base crucial to the battle against Islamic militants in neighboring Afghanistan. [Los Angeles Times, 7/31/04, via Nexis]



2004: Gunmen Stormed U.S. Consulate In Saudi Arabia. From a December 6, 2004, New York Times article:

A group of attackers stormed the American Consulate in the Saudi Arabian city of Jidda today, using explosives at the gates to breach the outer wall and enter the compound, the Saudi Interior Ministry said in a statement. At least eight people were killed in the incident, in which guards and Saudi security forces confronted the group, according to the ministry and news agencies.

Three of the attackers were killed. Five non-American employees were killed, an American embassy spokesman, Carol Kalin, told Reuters. She declined to provide the nationality of those killed, but said they were members of the consulate staff.

Reuters reported that Saudi security officials said four of their men also died in the incident, which would bring the death toll to 12. [The New York Times, 12/6/04]



2006: Armed Men Attacked U.S. Embassy In Syria. From a September 13, 2006, Washington Post article:

Four armed men attacked the U.S. Embassy on Tuesday, killing one Syrian security guard and wounding several people in what authorities said was an attempt by Islamic guerrillas to storm the diplomatic compound.

Just after 10 a.m., gunmen yelling " Allahu akbar " -- "God is great" -- opened fire on the Syrian security officers who guard the outside of the embassy in Damascus's Rawda district, witnesses said. The attackers threw grenades at the compound, according to witnesses, and shot at the guards with assault rifles during the 15- to 20-minute clash, which left three of the gunmen dead and the fourth reportedly wounded. [The Washington Post, 9/13/06]



2007: Grenade Launched Into U.S. Embassy In Athens. From The New York Times:

An antitank grenade was fired into the heavily fortified American Embassy here just before dawn today. The building was empty, but the attack underscored deep anti-American sentiment here and revived fears of a new round of homegrown terror.

Greek officials said they doubted the attack was the work of foreign or Islamic terrorists, but rather that of regrouped extreme leftists aiming at a specific, symbolic target: a huge American seal, of a double-headed eagle against a blue background, affixed to the front of the boxy, modern embassy near downtown. [The New York Times, 1/12/07]



2008: Rioters Set Fire To U.S. Embassy In Serbia. From The New York Times:

Demonstrators attacked the U.S. Embassy here and set part of it ablaze Thursday as tens of thousands of angry Serbs took to the streets of Belgrade to protest Kosovo's declaration of independence.

Witnesses said that at least 300 rioters broke into the embassy and torched some of its rooms. One protester was able to rip the American flag from the facade of the building. An estimated 1,000 demonstrators cheered as the vandals, some wearing masks to conceal their faces, jumped onto the building's balcony waving a Serbian flag and chanting "Serbia, Serbia!" the witnesses said. A convoy of police officers firing tear gas was able to disperse the crowd. [The New York Times, 2/21/08]



2008: Ten People Killed In Bombings At U.S. Embassy In Yemen. From The New York Times:

Militants disguised as soldiers detonated two car bombs outside the United States Embassy compound in Sana, Yemen, on Wednesday morning, killing 16 people, including 6 of the attackers, Yemeni officials said.

No American officials or embassy employees were killed or wounded, embassy officials said. Six of the dead were Yemeni guards at the compound entrance, and the other four killed were civilians waiting to be allowed in.

It was the deadliest and most ambitious attack in years in Yemen, a poor south Arabian country of 23 million people where militants aligned with Al Qaeda have carried out a number of recent bombings. [The New York Times, 9/17/08]

i trust that you have similarly harsh criticism for Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice.
 
i trust that you have similarly harsh criticism for Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice.

It's all politics. I think this is the long sought after revenge for Robert Bork. :mrgreen:
 
Well, I was completely wrong in believing she would be nominated a rammed through. Had the image of old white guy bullies in my head . . . and the ratings? Cable news must be very sad.
 
So you are saying Palin was selected by the church lol.

Yes, that is exactly who suggested her to McCain. Do you really think the republican party had no one else better than her? McCain took her to shore up the evangelicals who she belongs to, and trusted their advice.
 
time to bring Colin Powell back to his old job


that appointment would help our nation and would also be a wise political move by Obama

Lol....you libs love Colin Powell now ?

Unbelievable.

Personally I'm pushing for Sheila Jackson Lee to step in for Clinton.

She's the personification of liberal ethos.
 
Incoming: Sen. Kerry...the safer bet.
 
Incoming: Sen. Kerry...the safer bet.

such an awful choice
average intellect
significantly below average charisma
dreadful speaker
no apparent ability to empathize
zero political accomplishments other than possess the wealth required to get elected
there is nothing about him which says this guy should be America's face to the diplomatic world
even worse, his appointment would open up a senate seat to be once again filled by a talented republican; the only one who could win an election in a democrat stronghold
 
such an awful choice
average intellect
significantly below average charisma
dreadful speaker
no apparent ability to empathize
zero political accomplishments other than possess the wealth required to get elected
there is nothing about him which says this guy should be America's face to the diplomatic world
even worse, his appointment would open up a senate seat to be once again filled by a talented republican; the only one who could win an election in a democrat stronghold

Many are debatable, but others seem to possess qualities you would like in a Presidential candidate. Not surprising, given that the man ran for President, already. Nevertheless, these are not needed in a Secretary of State, though they can be beneficial. Clinton did not deliver great speeches as Sec. of State, neither did Rice. Some folks have an "it" factor: Powell, Kissinger, etc etc, but it is not necessary.

There are some issues involved that I will think might come up, but on the whole, I have to conclude you are exaggerating the problems with Kerry.
 
Yes, that is exactly who suggested her to McCain. Do you really think the republican party had no one else better than her? McCain took her to shore up the evangelicals who she belongs to, and trusted their advice.

Proof please ?? That would help this is the first time I have heard this not disagreeing with you but highly concernd. I think if it is the Republican Party is in serious trouble if they are letting bible thumpers pick the running mates.
 
Proof please ?? That would help this is the first time I have heard this not disagreeing with you but highly concernd. I think if it is the Republican Party is in serious trouble if they are letting bible thumpers pick the running mates.

Then you need not worry yourself. As the Southern Cons have been moved to the back of the bus. Which is where they will remain. Whether they like it or not!
rolleyes.png
 
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