And, no, don't take this to mean I'm jumping on the Obama bandwagon just yet. Hillary has one last shot next Tuesday, and there's a chance she'll pull it off. I put my vote and a relatively generous amount of hard-earned money into her quest, and so I'm sticking with her as long as Tina "Bitch is the new black!" Fey is ;)
But I thought it was about time someone pointed out succinctly, as Ms. Rice does here, how ridiculous this "we won't negotiate with these guys until we retroactively win the negotiations" policy has been.
from Tucker Carlson's show on MSNBC today
RICE: This notion of George Bush's -- and it's really unique to him -- that somehow we are rewarding our adversaries by sitting down and engaging in tough-minded, well-prepared negotiations is one of the many products of his failed presidency.
If John McCain wants to take his foreign policy advice from the most disastrous president in our lifetime, that's his prerogative, but Barack Obama is not going to do that.
CARLSON: But doesn't a meeting with the American head of state have value? It's a commodity. It's worth something.
RICE: No, it's a means to an end.
CARLSON: But isn't it also worth something?
RICE: It is a means to an end, Tucker.
First of all, these negotiations would be well-planned. But we're not going to take the view that the Bush administration has taken, that we're only going to negotiate with our adversaries after they do what it is we seek to accomplish in negotiations.
That's the position we've taken with Iran: we won't sit down and talk to you until you've ended and suspended your nuclear program, which is, of course, what we need them to do.
That's counterproductive. That ensures that we'll never have direct dialogue with Iran, whereas they're continuing their nuclear program unabated. We're having trouble getting sanctions, which we need to push forward on. And we are therefore losing, because time is on the Iranians' side.
2 comments:
No, genius. The difference between Condi Rice and this pretender is that Condi knows that without preparatory negotiations, your President will walk away from Tehran with a souvenier Persian Rug and his underwear, but nothing else.
This young lad, Barack, wants to give away the store before walking in to talk with the Iranians. So I already know, in advance, that Condi Rice is way ahead of him, and the talking head who represents him on TV.
See "Nixon/Kissinger/China" to actually see how it's done.
Thanks for your comment.
Susan Rice is more than just a talking head. She was the Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs under Clinton from '97 to 2001.
But I'm not saying that Condi is hopeless. She's done some positive things, although it seems that she's fought her boss tooth and nail for everyone of them, while he happily takes the credit whenever they work out and she stands by smiling modestly to herself.
As for Nixon/Kissinger/China, didn't Nixon actually go to China, in person?
I don't see that on Bush's agenda, nor in McCain's plans. I don't even see face-to-face negotiation in the plans -- perhaps a "secret negotiation." But if the latter has been going on, it doesn't seem to be working out very well yet.
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