A Spork in the Drawer

Artificial Timeline

Who's Neville Chamberlain now?

Just you wait, appeasers: Iraq will be blitzing Poland any day now.

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No One Could Have Predicted...

...that Condi Rice would refuse to interrupt her vacation to deal with the Russia-Georgia crisis.

Or that George rather play grab-ass in China than, I don't know, be a president.

Or that BushCo™ point to everyone but themselves for the Clusterfuck in the Caucasus.

Meanwhile, Newsweek's John Barry says we should send in the 82nd. Airborne to help Georgia. And yes, he fills his column with references to Neville Chamberlain and Hitler.

Apparently the thought of thermonuclear war never crossed his mind.

I won't even get started with the usual neocon suspects.

In short, a normal few days for life during the BushCheney regime.

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Nice Country You Have Here...

...be a shame if something happened to it:

"If Iran will not make the right choice, then it will face consequences," Rice said, without offering any details.

Now we have the putative Secretary of State talking like a cheap extortionist.

My, how far we've fallen.

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Condiliar

New from Robert Greenwald:

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Hillary's Turn

There's something rotten at the State Department:

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has told Sen. Hillary Clinton, a Democratic candidate for president, that her passport file was breached in 2007, the senator's office said in a statement on Friday.

I'm sure Condi will launch a full investigation soon.

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Spreading Democracy

How's tht going, George?

Police wielding assault rifles rounded up opposition leaders and rights activists Sunday after Pakistan's military ruler suspended the constitution, ousted the top justice and deployed troops to fight what he called rising Islamic extremism.

[...]

Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz said the extraordinary measures would remain in place "as long as it is necessary." He also said parliamentary elections could be postponed up to a year, but no such decision had been made.

Aziz also said that up to 500 opposition activists had been arrested in the last 24 hours.

Meanwhile, Condi bleats helplessly:

Rice, who called Musharraf on Friday and warned him against taking this step, said yesterday that Musharraf's actions are "highly regrettable," telling reporters traveling with her that "the United States has made clear it does not support extra-constitutional measures, because those measures would take Pakistan away from the path of democracy and civilian rule.""

Important note: Pakistan has nukes. Iran doesn't.

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The Roll Out Continues

Condi:

The Bush administration announced sweeping new sanctions against Iran Thursday — the harshest since the takeover of the U.S. Embassy in 1979 — charging anew that Tehran supports terrorism in the Middle East, exports missiles and is engaging in a nuclear build up.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, joined at a State Department news conference by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, said the steps the Bush administration is taking against the Revolutionary Guard Corps and a number of banks are designed, among other things, to punish Tehran for its support of terrorist organizations in Iraq and the Middle East.

Springtime in Tehran, anyone?

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Oh Little Town Of Bethlehem

I don't think this is what the song means:

"Being here, at the birthplace of my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, has been a very special and moving experience," Rice [.]

Our Secretary of State, ladies and gentlemen, our Secretary of State.

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"I looked the man in the eye...

...I found him to be very straight forward and trustworthy and we had a very good dialogue. I was able to get a sense of his soul."

Whoops!

The Bush administration's failure to win Russia's consent to install U.S. missile defenses in its European backyard and a growing list of other disputes suggest that President Bush and his aides have misread the man whose "soul" Bush thought he'd divined when they first met six years ago.

[...]

Instead, fueled by record oil and natural gas prices and resentment of what he lambasted in February as Bush's "almost uncontained hyper use of force," Putin has led global opposition to the U.S. war in Iraq, hosted Palestinians on the U.S. list of terrorist groups, sold anti-aircraft missiles and other arms to Iran and stymied Bush's drive to tighten U.N. sanctions on the Islamic republic for refusing to suspend uranium enrichment.

The Kremlin has steadily increased spending on defense modernization and revived symbolic long-range aerial reconnaissance patrols toward U.S. and European airspace.

[...]

Bush and his aides "grossly misjudged Putin," considering him "a good guy and one of us," said Michael McFaul of Stanford University's Hoover Institution.

The former KGB officer created that illusion partly by appearing to share Bush's political and religious convictions, standard tradecraft employed by intelligence officers to recruit spies, he said.

"Putin . . . is a brilliant case officer," said Carlos Pasqual, a former senior State Department official now at The Brookings Institution, a center-left policy organization in Washington.

In other words, George got rolled by a spy.

This, of course, begs the question: What was that great Russia expert Condi Rice doing all that time? Perhaps Rice's credential are a bit, shall we say, overstated?

I spent two years as a history major in college - barely any training at all - but my entire life I've read history both broadly and deeply. One of my main areas of interest has always been Russia/Soviet Union. No one has ever described me as "brilliant" - and rightfully so - nor has anyone sung praises to my knowledge of Russia. And yet I knew that the administration was being played for a patsy by the Russian leader.

It's one of those things you tend to pick up when you study the history of this particular country.

I recall that when Rice was an obscure NSC staffer back during the Bush 41 administration and being praised as a great Sovietologist there were plenty of historians and political scientists who thought that she was a joke who achieved high positions by dint of making the right connections.

It looks like they were right.

And now the joke's on us.

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ADDED: Condi speaks!

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told Russian human rights activists on Saturday she wanted to help them build institutions to protect people from the 'arbitrary power of the state'.

[...]

"I am quite confident that your goal is to build institutions that are indigenous to Russia -- that are Russian institutions -- but that are also respectful of what we all know to be universal values," said Rice.

She said these were: "The rights of individuals to liberty and freedom, the right to worship as you please, and the right to assembly, the right to not have to deal with the arbitrary power of the state."

The proverbial inmates are running the proverbial asylum.

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So Much For That

Since Congress and the punditocracy has vested everything - but everything - on September's report by Jesus Gen. David Petraeus this must be a disappointment:

Senior congressional aides said yesterday that the White House has proposed limiting the much-anticipated appearance on Capitol Hill next month of Gen. David H. Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan C. Crocker to a private congressional briefing, suggesting instead that the Bush administration's progress report on the Iraq war should be delivered to Congress by the secretaries of state and defense.

Instead, everyone will have to listen to spinning from Condi and Bob Gates.

This latest, combined with yesterday's revelation that the report will be written by the White House, should inform everybody that it will be a whitewash. However, it will be likely that these inconvenient truths will be elided and we'll hear nothing but "stay the course!"

Unless the "news" media do their jobs.

Sorry, I made myself laugh with that last sentence.

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Lovely

Here we go again:

Cheney, who's long been skeptical of diplomacy with Iran, argued for military action if hard new evidence emerges of Iran's complicity in supporting anti-American forces in Iraq; for example, catching a truckload of fighters or weapons crossing into Iraq from Iran, one official said.

[...]

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice opposes this idea, the officials said. Defense Secretary Robert Gates has stated publicly that "we think we can handle this inside the borders of Iraq."

Should Dick win this internal debate (if there is indeed a debate) then you can be certain that "evidence" will magically appear.

Lea Anne McBride, a Cheney spokeswoman, said only that "the vice president is right where the president is" on Iran policy.

Somehow I'm not comforted by this.

[Via Laura Rozen.]

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Our Secretary Of State

Jo-Ann Mort:

Washington Post reporter, Glenn Kessler, has just published a new biography of Condoleeza Rice. According to news reports, there is an anecdote in the book that perhaps best expresses the way the Bush Administration overall feels about workers--and about their own exhalted right to rule.

According to Rice's best friend, Stanford University's Prof. Coit Blacker, when our Secretary of State was on a shopping trip to purchase some jewelry and the saleswoman brought her earringt that she didn't deem worthy of her salary (paid for by us, the taxpayers), Rice snapped "Let's get one thing straight. You're behind the counter because you have to work for the minimum wage. I'm on this side because I make considerably more."

First shoe shopping while New Orleans drowns now this.

Let them eat Manolo Blahniks!

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Remember Iraq?

What the hell are we fighting for?

U.S. forces battled Iraqi police and gunmen Friday, killing six policemen, after an American raid captured a police lieutenant accused of leading an Iranian-backed militia cell, the military said. [Emphasis added.]

The Iraqi police are supposed to be on our side, yes?

A couple of days ago came this report:

A previously undisclosed Army investigation into an audacious January attack in Karbala that killed five U.S. soldiers concludes that Iraqi police working alongside American troops colluded with insurgents.

Condi Rice this morning:

Defending Baghdad's progress, Rice credited the government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki with reducing sectarian divisions within Iraq's problem-plagued security forces.

"We shouldn't dismiss as inconsequential what they've achieved in this period of time: bringing security forces to the fight -- yes, security forces that still need a lot of help -- but security forces beginning to turn the tide against sectarian violence because they're acting in a less sectarian way," she told ABC.

Yes, the Iraqi "security" forces have been brought to the fight - it's just that they're fighting us.

But I doubt that Condi has noticed.

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Don't Call Him Betty

Trouble in paradise Iraq:

Ryan C. Crocker, the new U.S. ambassador to Iraq, bluntly told Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in a cable dated May 31 that the embassy in Baghdad -- the largest and most expensive U.S. embassy -- lacks enough well-qualified staff members and that its security rules are too restrictive for Foreign Service officers to do their jobs.

"Simply put, we cannot do the nation's most important work if we do not have the Department's best people," Crocker said in the memo.

Looks like someone didn't get the memo: The best people are not wanted. The most loyal people however....

"In essence, the issue is whether we are a Department and a Service at war," Crocker wrote. "If we are, we need to organize and prioritize in a way that reflects this, something we have not done thus far." In the memo, Crocker drew upon the recommendations of a management review he requested for the embassy shortly after arriving in Baghdad two months ago.

How to explain this?

"He's panicking," said one government official who recently returned from Baghdad, adding that Crocker is carrying a heavy workload as the United States presses the Iraqi government to meet political benchmarks.

"You could use a well-managed political section of 50 people" who know what they are doing, the official said, but Crocker does not have it because many staffers assigned to the embassy are "too young for the job," or are not qualified and are "trying to save their careers" by taking an urgent assignment in Iraq.

"Too young" and "trying to save their careers." Sounds like they've been hiring from the Heritage Foundation again. Has anybody seen Simone Ledeen lately?

Crocker, in an interview, confirmed the authenticity of the cable. He insisted it was not intended as criticism of Rice or of the staff. He said the cable reflected the urgent nature of the tasks he has faced since becoming ambassador.

"The big issue for me, in my estimation, was simply not having enough people," Crocker said. "The people here are heroic. I need more people, and that's the thing, not that the people who are here shouldn't be here or couldn't do it." Crocker said he does not know why the changes he is pressing for had not taken place sooner. The embassy was established three years ago, when the Coalition Provisional Authority was dissolved.

Ambassador Crocker, you may be a fine enough fellow so I'm sorry to be the one to tell you this: Your bosses are idiots. No, it's true. My advice? Ignore them as much as is possible. They'll only hurt you.

So the upshot of all of this is that the most important issue facing us, Iraq, is not being taken seriously in the White House or in the BushCheney State Department.

That's no longer surprising but it is nonetheless telling.

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Diplomacy (Or Not)

Condi in Spain:

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrived in Spain for what is meant to be a fence-mending trip on Friday but her first words were of reproach for its policy of engaging Cuba.

“Democratic states have an obligation to act democratically, meaning to support opposition in Cuba, not to give the regime the idea that they can transition from one dictatorship to another,” she told reporters on her plane shortly before touching down in the Spanish capital.

WTF?

Oh, and:

“I would like to see all of the allies do more, and Spain is included in that list,” she said.

Well, then.

So insulting a sovereign nation now passes for diplomacy?

It must be the Bush years.

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Never Gonna Leave

So says Condi.

Like this comes as a surprise.

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More Obstruction

It appears that Condi may now be in the obstruction of justice game:

Waxman, the chairman of the House committee on oversight, wrote to Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice today to complain that State Department officials had attempted to prevent a nuclear weapons anaylst at the department from speaking with his staff. This comes after Waxman's committee issued a subpoena last week for Rice's testimony on how she dealt with claims before the war that Iraq had sought uranium from Niger. Rice has said that she won't comply with the subpoena.

Waxman's being awfully nice about the whole thing: (pdf)

I assume that your legislative staff was acting without your authorization in this matter. It would be a matter of great concern - as well as an obvious conflict of interest - if vou had directed your staff to impede a congressional investigation into matter that may implicate your conduct as National Security Advisor.

[...]

To ensure that the Committee obtains the information it seeks without further delay, I am
advising you that the Committee has sent a letter to Mr. Dodge notifying him that he must appear
for a deposition on May 9, 2007. I trust you will cooperate in this matter and instruct your staff
to cease further interference with the Committee's inquiry.

Time to add another cell to the Republican prison.

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Can We Put Her In Prison For Treason?

Rice to Meet With Syrian Foreign Minister

I mean, if Nancy Pelosi is a traitor for doing that...

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Stonewalling

Defying a subpoena:

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Thursday all but said she will not testify to Congress about a discredited justification for the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq but agreed to answer questions in writing.

And then Condi plays the imperial presidency unitary executive card:

"But there is a constitutional principle. This all took place in my role as national security adviser and there is a separation of powers and advisers to the president are -- under that constitutional principle -- not generally required to go and testify in Congress," she added. "So I think we have to observe and uphold constitutional principle."

It's time to start chucking these people into jail for contempt of Congress.

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Another Subpoena!

Condi this time.

Wheeee!

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Diplomacy!?

From BushCo™?

The United States agreed yesterday to join high-level talks with Iran and Syria on the future of Iraq, an abrupt shift in policy that opens the door to diplomatic dealings the White House had shunned in recent months despite mounting criticism.

[...]

The first meeting, at the ambassadorial level, will be held next month. Then Rice will sit down at the table with the foreign ministers from Damascus and Tehran at a second meeting in April elsewhere in the region, possibly in Istanbul.

Field Marshal von Rumsfeld, since tossed overboard, infamously said, "we don't do diplomacy." But that was then.

Robert Parry:

But one source told me that the resistance – from the Pentagon, Blair and even Democrats in Congress – appears to be having an effect on Bush’s decision-making. This source said he believed Bush had planned to launch an attack on Iran, possibly as early as this week, but was getting “weak knees.”

If this is true it's worth noting that Delusional Dick is overseas and thus not able to whisper into George's ear. Maybe he'll stay gone.

As Churchill said, to jaw-jaw is always better than to war-war.

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KO

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Rushing Into A New War

Newsweek's Michael Hirsh reports:

According to the document, a copy of which was obtained by NEWSWEEK, add hotlink to scanned doc here [sic] Tehran plainly laid out the two countries’ “aims” and proposed “steps” to resolve them “in mutual respect.” The document, believed to reflect the views of Iran’s president at the time, the moderate Mohammad Khatami, proposes negotiations on most of the main outstanding issues of interest to Washington—including Iran’s nuclear program, its support for Hizbullah and Hamas and terrorism in general, and stabilizing Iraq. Some officials who saw the proposal at the time, including Hillary Mann and her husband, Flynt Leverett, the former National Security Council (NSC) senior director for Mideast under Rice, have angrily criticized Rice and the administration for not taking it seriously.

And guess who makes and appearance in this story.

However, Powell’s former chief of staff, Larry Wilkerson, said in an e-mail that it was a significant proposal for beginning “meaningful talks” between the U.S. and Iran. Wilkerson added that it “was a non-starter so long as [Dick] Cheney was VP and the principal influence on Bush.” The hardline vice president has long been known as an opponent of diplomatic engagement. Mann and Leverett say it was a historic missed opportunity. “I don’t care if it originally came from Mars,” says Mann. “If the Iranians said it was fully vetted and cleared, then it could have been as important” as the two-page document that Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger received from Beijing in 1971, indicating Mao Zedong’s interest in talks.

Mann says Bush and other senior officials, including Cheney and former Defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld, were simply not interested in broad-based talks with Iran. "I think the president does believe the Iranian government is fundamentally illegitimate, and as long as Iran stays that way there will never be the freedom that needs to be brought to the Middle East,” Mann said. “I attended meeting after meeting on Iran for years. This was the tenor of the discussions, that the Iranian government was shakey, a ripe apple on the tree.… And I don’t think war fever has ever abated.”

Y'know, I've pretty much reached the conclusion that DeFib Dick assumes he won't live all that much longer and has decided to take the rest of us with him. He sure is intent on killing as many people as is possible.

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Webb Writes A Letter

From TPMmuckraker:

January 29, 2007

The Honorable Condoleezza Rice
Secretary of State
Department of State
2201 C Street, NW
Washington, DC 20520

Dear Secretary Rice:

During your appearance before a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on January 11, 2007, I asked you a question pertaining to the administration’s policy regarding possible military action against Iran. I asked, “Is it the position of this administration that it possesses the authority to take unilateral action against Iran, in the absence of a direct threat, without congressional approval?”

At that time you were loath to discuss questions of presidential authority, but you committed to provide a written answer. Since I have not yet received a reply, the purpose of this letter is to reiterate my interest in your response.

This is, basically, a “yes” or “no” question regarding an urgent matter affecting our nation’s foreign policy. Remarks made by members of this administration strongly suggest that the administration wrongly believes that the 2002 joint resolution authorizing use of force in Iraq can be applied in other instances, such as in the case of Iran. I, as well as the American people, would benefit by fully understanding the administration’s unequivocal response.

I would appreciate your expeditious reply and look forward to discussing this issue with you in the near future.

Sincerely,

James Webb
United States Senator

I can't wait to read Condi's candid response.

(Yes, yes, I'll be waiting a long time.)

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Incoherent

Another new policy:

Ms. Rice, who once lectured Egyptians on the need to respect the rule of law, did not address those domestic concerns. Instead, with Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit by her side, she talked about her appreciation for Egypt’s support in the region.

It was clear that the United States — facing chaos in Iraq, rising Iranian influence and the destabilizing Israeli-Palestinian conflict — had decided that stability, not democracy, was its priority, Egyptian political commentators, political aides and human rights advocates said.

Democracy is a noble goal to be sure but stability is more important. Indeed, democracy requires a measure of stability to succeed. So this policy change might be good thing - at least a more realistic thing.

That said, it's pretty clear the the Administration is - and has been all along - simply making it up as it goes along. That's about the worst thing one can do to promote stability let alone democracy. Since we've decided to run the world (thanks, Dick!) it might help to have a coherent policy.

Oh, and starting destabilizing wars isn't a very good idea either. "Creative destruction" doesn't cut it.

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Never Gonna Leave

Condi:

Aboard her plane, Rice also told reporters that the United States would not abandon Iraq even if Bush's latest plan fails.

"We're not pulling the plug on Iraq," she said. "I think we'll worry about making Plan A work for now. And obviously, if it doesn't, then you know, we're not going to say, oh my goodness, that didn't work, there's nothing that can be done."

There you have it.

[Via TPM.]

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Bears Watching

NYT:

A recent series of American raids against Iranians in Iraq was authorized under an order that President Bush decided to issue several months ago to undertake a broad military offensive against Iranian operatives in the country, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Friday.

[...]

The White House decision to authorize the aggressive steps against Iranians in Iraq appears to formalize the American effort to contain Iran’s ambitions as a new front in the Iraq war. Administration officials now describe Iran as the single greatest threat the United States faces in the Middle East, though some administration critics regard the talk about Iran as a diversion, one intended to shift attention away from the spiraling chaos in Iraq.

In adopting a more confrontational approach toward Iran, Mr. Bush has decisively rejected recommendations of the Iraq Study Group that he explore negotiations with Tehran as part of a new strategy to help quell the sectarian violence in Iraq.

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Odd

Condi has managed to convince John "Death Squads" Negroponte to leave his position as intelligence czar and become Deputy Secretary of State, a much less prestigious position. BooMan speculates that this was done because a) Condi has been judged incompetent or b) this is another coup by Daddy Bush.

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Does Anyone Speak The English Anymore?

Condi:

"Get ready. We are going to the Middle East a lot," Rice said.

Oy.

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