In a sidebar on the Iraq War casualty predictions post, regular commenter Odograph observes, “I think ‘Bush was famously against nation-building’ is a retroactive political claim.”

Not at all.  While it’s hard to imagine in hindsight, Candidate Bush ran against nation building and promised a “more humble foreign policy.”

Remember, Realist Condi Rice was his chief foreign policy advisor during the campaign and he appointed Realist Colin Powell as his first Secretary of State.  The events of 9/11 changed his mindset considerably and his policy was shaped by Neoconservatives for a few years before quietly shifting back to a more conventional Realist policy agenda toward the end of his administration.

A website called zFacts rounded up several relevant Candidate Bush quotes.  I’ve reformatted them in cleaner fashion below:

• “Let me tell you what else I’m worried about: I’m worried about an opponent who uses nation building and the military in the same sentence. See, our view of the military is for our military to be properly prepared to fight and win war and, therefore, prevent war from happening in the first place.” – Nov 6, 2000

• “Somalia. It started off as a humanitarian mission then changed into a nation-building mission and that’s where the mission went wrong. The mission was changed. And as a result, our nation paid a price, and so I don’t think our troops ought to be used for what’s called nation building. I think our troops ought to be used to fight and win war. I think our troops ought to be used to help overthrow a dictator when it’s in our best interests. But in this case, it was a nation-building exercise. And same with Haiti. I wouldn’t have supported either.” – Oct. 11, 2000

• “I think what we need to do is convince people who live in the lands they live in to build the nations. Maybe I’m missing something here. I mean we’re going to have kind of a nation-building corps from America. Absolutely not. Our military is meant to fight and win war. That’s what it’s meant to do and when it gets overextended, morale drops.”  – Oct. 11, 2000

• “I think we’ve got to be very careful when we commit our troops. The vice president and I have a disagreement about the use of troops. He believes in national building. I would be very careful about using our troops as nation builders.” Oct. 4, 2000

The above video, obviously redacted, is amusing in hindsight.  But that’s who Candidate Bush was.  I believe that this was his honest and sincere intention for conducting foreign policy.  But, like most presidents — including the current one — things look a little different from the Oval Office.

Bruce Ackerman thinks the vice presidency is an anachronism from the political era of the Framers and ought be abolished.

For two centuries, presidential nominees have used the office to balance the ticket by naming a running mate from a different region, or one who speaks with a different ideological accent to a specific constituency. This means that a president’s death generates a double shock: The nation not only mourns a fallen leader, it must deal with a replacement who may push politics in a new direction.

[...]

Mexico and France see no need for a vice president. We should designate the secretary of State to be in charge until a special election can be held to replace a president.

That’s rather like saying that football teams don’t need a backup quarterback because, after all, the other guy is likely to have a different style and we’d therefore be better off having the kicker fill in.

The death of a sitting president is, as Ackerman points out, a national shock.  If it comes as a result of assassination or other unnatural cause, it’s a genuine national crisis.  That’s not a great time to be fumbling around for a successor, let alone scrambling to hold a special election.

With due deference to France and Mexico, the United States simply occupies a different position in the world and there needs to be an immediate and clear line of succession to its presidency.   Further, while France lacks a vice president, it does have a second political executive, the prime minister, which is appointed by the president.   Mexico, on the other hand, simply puts together an electoral college consisting of the legislature and supreme court and votes in a new guy when they get around to it.

It’s hard to think of a modern example when the Secretary of State was both more prepared for executive leadership and hued closer to the president’s ideology than his vice president. Indeed, the only recent case that comes to mind where Ackerman’s plan would have been better was when James Baker was George H.W. Bush’s chief diplomat and Dan Quayle was his vice president.

We chose secretaries of state by an entirely different process than presidents, emphasizing different skill sets.    Surely, Dick Cheney would have represented a better continuity in 2003 than Colin Powell.  Ditto Cheney vice Condi Rice today or Al Gore vice Warren Christopher or Madeline Albright.

To the extent that people are geniunely afraid of John McCain dying and Sarah Palin being given the launch codes, they’re less likely to vote for McCain.

Clark Hoyt, the NYT public editor, has an interesting column explaining the paper’s inconsistent use of courtesy titles, middle names, and the like.   He insists, with strong credibility, that there is no political malice in referring to Sarah Palin as “Ms. Palin” vice “Mrs. Palin” or Condi Rice as “Ms. Rice” vice “Dr. Rice.”  Similarly, there’s no hidden subtext in referring to “Barack Hussein Obama” in the lede of a particularly portentious piece.

What’s particularly interesting to me, though, as someone working to maintain editorial consistency on an institutional web site, is how inconsistent even the vaunted New York Times is.  By Hoyt’s own admission, the paper has longstanding traditions and protocols for how it handles these matters but is very haphazard in actually following them.  For example, they referred to “Barack Hussein Obama” for a big “Man in the News” piece out of custom: “The Times has long been partial to using the full names of important people — American presidents and presidential candidates, for instance — in the lead paragraphs of articles at significant moments in the news. Call it a drumroll or a bit of filigree.”   Yet, they forgot about that custom the following week and merely referred to “John McCain” vice “John Sidney McCain III.”

In two stints as an editor for online journals, I’ve used the NYT as an informal style guide, especially for the spelling of foreign names.  I thus endeavor to use “al Qaeda” in all cases rather than other variants, such as “al-Qaeda,” “al Qaida,” or “el-Qaida.”  Similarly, I spell the first name of Russia’s new president as “Dmitri” rather than “Dmitry” and the first name of Georgia’s president as “Mikheil” while spelling the first name of the former Soviet premier as “Mikhail.”

Yet, the NYT doesn’t necessarily follow its own style guide on these matters, either.  For example, a Google search turns up about 22,000 instances of Dmitri Medvedev and 22,500 for Dmitry Medvedev when doing a search limited to nytimes.com.

The news over the past 48 hours or so about movement in solving the nuclear arms standoff with North Korean has been stunning. Not only is President Bush taking the DPRK off the “state sponsors of terrorism” list but the Kim government has taken major steps to dismantle their program and provide with stringent verification regimes.

The administration fully admits that it is well short of achieving all its goals and that much more work needs to be done. Still, the world is a bit safer today and, more significantly, this shows the way for similar rapprochement with Iran.

The White House — which emphasized that the agreement could not have been reached without the help of its allies in the talks — said American officials would verify the North’s declaration over the next 45 days, a process that could eventually remove North Korea from the terrorism list and make the North eligible for American aid and for loans from international institutions like the World Bank, a goal long sought by the cash-starved country.

[...]

Thursday’s developments reflected the change in the Bush administration’s policy towards the North. After years of confronting the North — Mr. Bush famously said he “loathed” the North’s leader, Kim Jong-il, and described him as a “pygmy” — Mr. Bush allowed Christopher R. Hill, an assistant secretary of state, to start engaging in full-fledged negotiations with Pyongyang in early 2007, under the guidance of Ms. Rice.

So, what happened? Phil Carter has an interesting thesis:

What I’m hearing through the grapevine is that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan required so much attention from senior decision makers that it allowed career diplomats and junior political appointees to do their work in East Asia. In essence, the six-party talks needed less attention to work well, so that diplomats and national leaders could get down to business without all of the posturing that goes along with highly public diplomacy. This may or may not be true, but it’s an interesting view of how diplomacy can work.

Steve Clemons agrees that Chris Hill deserves the lion’s share of the credit.

There are still a lot of questions ranging from the interesting issue of North Korea cooperation with Syria’s alleged nuclear facility that was destroyed by Israel and other issues — but when President Bush gave Colin Powell the positive nod in the first week of April 2003 to proceed with the Six Party Talks, Bush and Cheney ignored Iran’s offer of a structure for normalized US-Iran relations the very same week in 2003.

The contrast in circumstances between where America is today with North Korea and where we are with Iran is vital to note. We ‘engaged’ North Korea and blew it with Iran.

And, he notes, “for those who want to knock China around, they should know that this entire process was impossible without China’s impressive, collaborative diplomacy.” That’s certainly true. The key there is not Chinese altruism but rather the harnessing of common interests.

Clemons also asserts, “Barack Obama’s inclination towards engagement with problematic leaders around the world now is now buttressed by an experience of the George W. Bush administration.” But engagement with preconditions is what got us here. Bush steadfastly refused to relent to the DPRK’s demands for bilateral negotiations and insisted on a six-party process that included South Korea, China, Japan, and Russia.

But I agree that it looks as if we’ve blown it with Iran. My only caveat is that I am not privy to what’s happening behind the scenes. It may well be that the administration is much closer to a deal with Iran than we realize. Indeed, Condi Rice is currently overseeing a very similar process, involving China, Russia, the UK, and Germany in trying to simultaneously pressure Iran to give up its nuclear ambitions and allay its economic and security concerns. (See Richard Perle’s WaPo op-ed today and Rice’s statement from last month.)

Ambassador Hill, who has brilliantly overseen the negotiations with North Korea, spoke at the Atlantic Council three months ago and foreshadowed some of the recent news. In addition to emphasizing the work done by others, including his predecessor Nick Burns and the other partners in the six-party negotiations, he pointed out that there was a genuine spirit of reciprocity. One can’t expect a country to give up nuclear weapons, which confer all manner of advantages, without something substantial in return.

North Korea does not have a lot of fossil fuels at its command. Energy is a huge problem for North Korea, and we would be prepared, once they are out of the nuclear business and into the NPT and have established a record of no-proliferation, we would be prepared to talk to them about aspirations for a civil nuclear program. We are also prepared to work with them on retraining opportunities for their scientists. North Korea has many scientists who have been engaged in these nuclear programs over the years. We’d be prepared to sit down and see what can be done in terms of getting them out of these fields and into other scientific fields.

Finally, and this goes back to the first point I started with, we’re prepared to create a Northeast Asia peace and security mechanism, whether it looks like the OSCE, whether it looks like some other institution from some other part of the world, will depend on the participants, I would say. We at this point cannot say with any precision what it would look like, but North Korea could be one of the founding members of this Northeast Asia peace and security mechanism. So all of these elements would go on the table. And what North Korea needs to decide is does it want to keep its aspirations for nuclear weapons in lieu of all these other elements.

This, again, strikes me as the way ahead with Iran. We need to engage regional actors (who have an even greater interest than we do in wanting to forestall a nuclear Iran) on the basis of common interests and understand that Iran is a formidable regional actor with legitimate concerns and aspirations of its own. As Dave Schuler and I discussed on last evening’s episode of OTB Radio, finding the right combination of carrots and sticks will be difficult. One presumes, though, that security guarantees and a solution to Iran’s civil energy needs are a major part of the former.

In the long months between now and the conventions, one recurring theme we’ll see in the press and the punditocracy is speculation of who Barack Obama and John McCain will chose as running mates. None of us have any idea, of course, other than that Dick Cheney is not on anybody’s list. But it’s still fun to speculate.

For Obama, the most prominent names I’ve seen, aside from Hillary Clinton of course, are former North Carolina Senator John Edwards (Motto: He did so well in 2004), Kansas governor Kathleen Sebelius (a white woman who’s much less annoying than Hillary), former NATO commander and Marine Commandant Jim Jones (my boss’ boss at the Atlantic Council), former NATO commander and 2004 also-ran Wesley Clark and, now, former Georgia Senator Sam Nunn. Former Reagan SECNAV and current Virginia Senator Jim Webb, widely touted by myself and others, seems to have fallen out of favor. Also, since Jim Johnson has been ousted, we’re pretty sure that Obama won’t pull a Dick Cheney and pick his selection committee chairman.

Clinton, Edwards, and Sebelius would be traditional choices made for standard political reasons. Jones, Clark, or Nunn would be an admission that national security is a huge issue and that Obama needs help there. Frankly, unless he puts Jeremiah Wright on the ticket, I’m not sure it much matters.

The conventional wisdom is probably right that McCain’s VP choice matters more than Obama’s simply because of McCain’s age. At 72, it’s hard to see him running for a second term and, let’s face it, he’s more likely than his 45-year-old opponent to die in office.

Speculation centers on former 2008 challengers Mitt Romney (less conservative than McCain but more favored among conservatives), Mike Huckabee (reducing the Republican Party to its essential element), Louisiana governor and boy wonder Bobby Jindal (half McCain’s age and “of color”), Florida Governor Charlie Crist (who’s from Florida), Texas Senator Kay Bailey Hutchinson (who’s a woman), and Alaska Governor Sarah Palin (who’s not only a woman but good looking by VP candidate standards). Nobody’s much talking about Condi Rice anymore, given that distancing himself from President Bush is a key McCain priority. Former Democrat Joe Lieberman is a Hail Mary dark horse, creating a possible RINO-DINO* ticket.

Frankly, I’m not particularly enthusiastic with any of the above options. Palin and Jindal are interesting choices but make no sense for a candidate betting the ranch on national security expertise. Huckabee is simply a non-starter, since he alienates pretty much everyone who isn’t a die hard Evangelical. Hutchinson and Crist are safe but boring. Lieberman is the boldest choice, simultaneously doubling down on the Iraq bet and appealing to moderates, but he also energizes a large part of the Democratic base and irritates McCain’s conservative critics on domestic issues.

Is there someone out there that can simultaneously 1) help McCain carry a swing state, 2) bolster his conservative credentials, 3) complement the “Ready on Day One” message?

Image via HuffPo

___________

*Technically, Lieberman’s no longer a Democrat in name but there’s no cute acronym for “Caucusing With the Democrats But Poking them in the Eye with a Sharp Stick Whenever Possible” — much less one which rhymes with RINO.

“Condi Rice enlists in Kiss Army” is a leading candidate for Headline of the Day honors. The ensuing story, about a chance meeting in a Stockholm hotel between the Secretary of State and the geezerly rock band, is less interesting.

I’ve just gotten this PR announcement from Denver University, with which I’m not affiliated:

DU’s Graduate School of International Studies will be renamed tomorrow, Wednesday, May 28. Renaming the school will honor one of the most notable and successful individuals in DU history, as well as mark an exciting time for the school.

Former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and other distinguished guests will gather to commemorate the renaming at a press conference held Wednesday, May 28, 2008 at 10 a.m. You can watch the announcement on a live streaming video found on the DU Web site.

The school’s most famous alumni are Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice and U.S. Army Chief of Staff George Casey. So, obviously, it’s going to be the Condi Rice school, no?

No. Apparently, it’s going to be the Josef Korbel School of International Studies, after Albright’s father and the school’s founding dean. Korbel’s been dead for 21 years but I guess siring one Secretary of State and training another is a pretty good reason to get honored in such a way. Then again, I’m not sure his name adds any prestige to the school.

I’m not sure why DU is trying to be cloak-and-dagger with the announcement. They published the news last week, after all.

John McCain is vetting potential vice presidential candidates over the holiday weekend, Adam Nagourney reports for the NYT.

Gov. Charlie Crist of Florida, Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana and Mitt Romney, the former governor of Massachusetts and a one-time rival for the Republican nomination, have all accepted invitations to visit with Mr. McCain at his ranch in Sedona, these Republicans said.

This is not going to sit well with Chris Matthews. It should be noted, too, that Black says this visit is purely social, asserting “It has nothing whatsoever to do with the vice presidential selection process,” and observing that it would be “pretty awkward” to have an open competition with the guys all in one room.

In addition to Mr. Crist, Mr. Jindal and Mr. Romney, Mr. McCain’s guest list includes some of top his political counselors, among them Charlie Black, a senior strategist, and Senator Lindsay Graham of South Carolina, his frequent traveling companion and probably his closest colleague in the Senate.

If the gathering does not involve actual interviews, as some of Mr. McCain’s associates said Wednesday, it will provide Mr. McCain with a chance to know some potential running mates in a social context. Mr. McCain is known as a social and gregarious candidate and senator, and his associates said personal chemistry would be a key consideration in his choice.

The candidates all have their strengths.

As governor of Florida, Mr. Crist, 51, would bring a number of obvious assets to a Republican ticket, beginning with his popularity in a state that is almost always an electoral battleground — and where Mr. Obama appears to be struggling. His relative youth could also be an asset for Mr. McCain. In Florida, Mr. Crist has long been known for his affability and a campaign skills. Instantly recognizable because of his perpetual tan and striking white hair, Mr. Crist, who served as Florida’s attorney general before being elected governor in 2006, has also acquired a reputation as something of a hard-liner on law and order issues. He supports the death penalty, largely opposes restrictions on the rights of gun owners, early on earned the nickname “Chain Gang Charlie” because he favored allowing convicts to be used in road work, and has described himself as a “pro-life and pro-family” candidate.

Mr. Romney, a former chief executive who ran unsuccessfully for the Republican nomination this year, has made no secret of his desire to join Mr. McCain’s presidential ticket. As a vice president, Mr. Romney’s business background — including running the 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics — could address concerns about Mr. McCain’s ability to manage the struggling economy. Mr. Romney has also proven himself to be a prolific fund-raiser, although he spent enormous sums of money during his campaign for the Republican presidential nomination and still could not beat Mr. McCain. And geographically, he brings little to the ticket, since he is unlikely to put Massachusetts in play for the Republicans.

Mr. Jindal, who was born in Baton Rouge, La., to a family that had just arrived there from the Punjab area of India, took office as Louisiana’s governor in January after serving three years in the House of Representatives. Mr. Jindal, who was born a Hindu but became a Roman Catholic as a teenager, campaigned for governor as a social conservative, opposing human embryonic stem cell research and abortion in any form and favoring teaching “intelligent design” in schools as an alternative to evolution. But Mr. Jindal also has a reputation as a policy wonk, like the Clintons, with a specialty in health care issues. After graduating in 1991 from Brown University, where he majored in biology and public policy, and attending Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar, Mr. Jindal worked for the management consulting firm McKinsey and Company and was executive director of the National Bipartisan Commission on the Future of Medicare. He later served as secretary of the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals and in the Bush administration as Assistant Secretary of Health and Human Services for planning and evaluation.

Jindal is the most exciting choice among the three but all would sit well with the base without being viewed as wild-eyed and dangerous by moderates. On the other hand, McCain plans to make this race about national security and none of these men (or Gov. Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota and Rob Portman, the former director of the Office of Management and Budget, also listed in the piece as possibilities) have any serious credentials in that arena.

For what it’s worth, former Newt Gingrich spokesman and Washington Times editorial director Tony Blankley is lukewarm on all three of these choices and thinks McCain should find someone who’s very experienced on the national scene in order to “play to his strength.” His suggestion? “[M]aybe go with someone like a Governor Ridge or even a Lieberman, rather than trying to do a sort of a classic carry-a-state deal.”

Phillip Klein agrees, arguing that Jindal is too young (he’s 36!) and that “If Romney had truly closed the deal with conservatives, he would have captured the nomination.” I would agree on both fronts. Rod Dreher, though, loves him some Jindal but wonders if it would be a mistake for him to take the slot on what looks like a losing ticket.

Jindal’s a rising star and had positions of enormous responsibility as a variable kid. But he’d be a strange choice to be the candidate for one heartbeat away from the presidency on a ticket arguing Barack Obama’s too inexperienced to be trusted with the keys.

When all’s said and done, I actually expect McCain to take Blankely’s advice and double down on experience and national security cred. A McCain-Lieberman ticket would be a bold choice, although a risky one. I’d think Ridge’s ship has sailed. There’s always Condi Rice, a favorite among conservatives, but there’s not much upside for a candidate trying to persuade people that he doesn’t represent a third term for George W. Bush.

The war against Jihadists and Islamo-Fascists has been won; each and every last one of these vermin has been eradicated courtesy of the United States Government. Unfortunately, the victory is quite literally in name only.

The Bush administration has launched a new front in the war on terrorism, this time targeting language. Federal agencies, including the State Department, the Department of Homeland Security and the National Counter Terrorism Center, are telling their people not to describe Islamic extremists as “jihadists” or “mujahedeen,” according to documents obtained by The Associated Press. Lingo like “Islamo-fascism” is out, too.

The reason: Such words may actually boost support for radicals among Arab and Muslim audiences by giving them a veneer of religious credibility or by causing offense to moderates.

For example, while Americans may understand “jihad” to mean “holy war,” it is in fact a broader Islamic concept of the struggle to do good, says the guidance prepared for diplomats and other officials tasked with explaining the war on terror to the public. Similarly, “mujahedeen,” which means those engaged in jihad, must be seen in its broader context. U.S. officials may be “unintentionally portraying terrorists, who lack moral and religious legitimacy, as brave fighters, legitimate soldiers or spokesmen for ordinary Muslims,” says a Homeland Security report. It’s entitled “Terminology to Define the Terrorists: Recommendations from American Muslims.” “Regarding ‘jihad,’ even if it is accurate to reference the term, it may not be strategic because it glamorizes terrorism, imbues terrorists with religious authority they do not have and damages relations with Muslims around the world,” the report says.

Language is critical in the war on terror, says another document, an internal “official use only” memorandum circulating through Washington entitled “Words that Work and Words that Don’t: A Guide for Counterterrorism Communication.”

The memo, originally prepared in March by the Extremist Messaging Branch at the National Counter Terrorism Center, was approved for diplomatic use this week by the State Department, which plans to distribute a version to all U.S. embassies, officials said. “It’s not what you say but what they hear,” the memo says in bold italic lettering, listing 14 points about how to better present the war on terrorism.

“Don’t take the bait,” it says, urging officials not to react when Osama bin Laden or al-Qaida affiliates speak. “We should offer only minimal, if any, response to their messages. When we respond loudly, we raise their prestige in the Muslim world.”

“Don’t compromise our credibility” by using words and phrases that may ascribe benign motives to terrorists.

Some other specifics:

_ “Never use the terms ‘jihadist’ or ‘mujahedeen’ in conversation to describe the terrorists. … Calling our enemies ‘jihadis’ and their movement a global ‘jihad’ unintentionally legitimizes their actions.”

_ “Use the terms ‘violent extremist’ or ‘terrorist.’ Both are widely understood terms that define our enemies appropriately and simultaneously deny them any level of legitimacy.”

_ On the other hand, avoid ill-defined and offensive terminology: “We are communicating with, not confronting, our audiences. Don’t insult or confuse them with pejorative terms such as ‘Islamo-fascism,’ which are considered offensive by many Muslims.”

Michael van der Galien initially thought this was “silly” but came around once he thought about it.

Because I’ve seen this argument unfolding for years, I mostly share the bemusement of Steve Benen, who points out, “it took the Bush administration more than six years to figure this out?” And he’s also right that, “if a President Clinton or President Obama had issued the identical directive to administration officials, what do you want to bet they’d be slammed as politically-correct terrorist coddlers?”

Interestingly, one of the more prominent voices pushing for this policy change was Dave Kilcullen, a key member of David Petraeus’ brain trust, who was touting the need for better language in Small Wars Journal and elsewhere last summer.

Jim Guirard took that message to heart and put out a dictionary of alternative words to use. Some examples:

irhab (eer-HAB) — Arabic for terrorism, thus enabling us to call the al Qaeda-style killers irhabis, irhabists and irhabiyoun rather than the so-called “jihadis” and “jihadists” and “mujahideen” and “shahids” (martyrs) they badly want to be called. (Author’s lament: Here we are, almost six years into a life-and-death War on Terrorism, and most of us do not even know this basic Arabic for terrorism.)

Hirabah (hee-RAH-bah) — Unholy War and forbidden “war against society” or what we would today call crimes against humanity. Among the many al Qaeda-style crimes and sins which constitute this most “unholy war” are such willful, and unrepented transgressions as those enumerated in the next section of this proposed glossary of terms.

mufsiduun (moof-see-DOON) — Islam’s word for evildoers, sinners and corrupters whose criminality and sinfulness, unless ended and sincerely repented, will incur Allah’s ultimate condemnation on Judgment Day; Islam’s optimum antonym for “mujahiddin.”

munafiquun (moon-ah-fee-KOON) — hypocrites to Islam who pretend to be faithful to the Qur’an but who willfully violate many of its basic rules, mandates and prohibitions.

Practically, I don’t see a shift in language this dramatic taking place. And the idea that people who think sawing off the heads of living hostages on video is fine will change their mind because Condi Rice starts calling it irhab and the perpetrators mufsiduun rather than jihadists and butchers strikes me as dubious. If it’s not obvious to you that such conduct is barbaric, I’m not sure that a new lexicon will do the trick.

Condi Rice will not be John McCain’s running mate.

Condoleezza Rice’s name on the Republican ticket is a dream to some, but not a reality she can see happening.

The secretary of State told reporters Friday she will not be a vice presidential candidate in the upcoming election. “I have always said that the one thing that I have not seen myself doing is running for elected office in the United States,” she said at a news conference to discuss her recent trip to Africa. “I didn’t even run for high school president. It’s sort of not in my genes.” Instead, Rice told reporters: “You can all come and visit me in California.”

Rice has said she plans to return to Stanford University, where she served as provost and taught as a professor.

She said she is looking forward to making her choice for president as a voter after being involved in President Bush’s 2000 campaign and having a strong interest in his 2004 re-election.

“I’m going to keep doing what I’m doing as secretary of State to see if we can use the last few months, as the president has put it, to sprint to the finish because there’s a lot of work to do,” Rice said.

Rice, like most Bush administration officials, is damaged goods at this point. Whatever excitement she might have engendered in 2000 or 2002, it’ll be a while before she’s an attractive political figure.

And it may well be that she’s more interested in being part of the team than the quarterback. Not everyone in public life wants to be president someday.

I was listening to a discussion on the Diane Rehm Show this morning on the Annapolis Mideast Peace Conference this morning, featuring Hisham Melhem, Washington bureau chief for Al-Arabiya TV, Glenn Kessler, diplomatic correspondent for the Washington Post, and Martin Indyk, former U.S. Ambassador to Israel and director of the Saban Center. It was, as would be expected, well informed and lively.

It was, however, plagued with the premise, so common to these discussions, that the United States and the American president are the most important factors in the negotiations. That’s simply nonsense.

The Bush administration took office with the belief that Bill Clinton’s foreign policy, in the Middle East and elsewhere, was wrongheaded and that a change of course was needed. On the Israeli-Palestinian dialog, particularly, they believed that the Clinton administration had been heavy-handed in pressuring Israel to make major concessions and thereby strengthened the hand of Palestinian hardliners. It wasn’t just the neo-cons, either, pushing this line; pragmatist Colin Powell was front and center.

Whether this was ill advised in hindsight is, as with so many other things, an open question. Regardless, the arrogance behind the assumption that we’d have peace in the Middle East if only George W. Bush wanted it badly enough is infuriating.

First off, solving the Palestinian question has been a central focus of American foreign policy for a generation. Bill Clinton devoted eight years of his not inconsiderable skill to the problem. Despite some great photo-ops and a Nobel Prize for Yasir Arafat, it was all for naught.

Much more importantly, though, the regional actors themselves have some say in the matter. Tremendous domestic fluctuation took place in the domestic politics of both Israel and the Palestinian Authority during this time. Do these people really think that, if only Condi Rice were more engaged, Fatah would have been more competent and less thuggish and Hamas would have remained on the sidelines? Or that Israeli domestic sentiment would have remained in favor of major concessions to the Palestinians while terrorist attacks against Israeli citizens were a daily reality?

Yes, the American president has a major role to play in mediating international disputes. He’s got some sizable carrots and sticks at his disposal but he doesn’t operate in a vacuum. But he’s not possessed of a magic wand to wave away problems. Nor is he a benevolent dictator to whom all around the world bow.

Image: Steve Bell, The Guardian

Robin Givhan is at it again. She has a story on C1 of today’s WaPo about Hillary Clinton’s cleavage.

There was cleavage on display Wednesday afternoon on C-SPAN2. It belonged to Sen. Hillary Clinton.

She was talking on the Senate floor about the burdensome cost of higher education. She was wearing a rose-colored blazer over a black top. The neckline sat low on her chest and had a subtle V-shape. The cleavage registered after only a quick glance. No scrunch-faced scrutiny was necessary. There wasn’t an unseemly amount of cleavage showing, but there it was. Undeniable.

It was startling to see that small acknowledgment of sexuality and femininity peeking out of the conservative — aesthetically speaking — environment of Congress. After all, it wasn’t until the early ’90s that women were even allowed to wear pants on the Senate floor. It was even more surprising to note that it was coming from Clinton, someone who has been so publicly ambivalent about style, image and the burdens of both.

The last time Clinton wore anything that was remotely sexy in a public setting surely must have been more than a decade ago, during Bill Clinton’s first term in office when she was photographed wearing a black Donna Karan gown that revealed her shoulders. It was one of Karan’s “cold-shoulder” dresses, inspired, Karan once noted, because a woman’s shoulders remain sensuous and appealing regardless of her age.

I’m sure everyone here who came in via Google search for “Hillary Clinton Cleavage” want to see the photo. We aim to please, so I have placed it below the fold. Warning: This may not be safe for work.

Shocking in it’s brazen sexuality, no?

Uh . . . no. And not just because it’s Hillary Clinton, either. That’s not exactly a risquée outfit, is it? I’m no great fan of the junior senator from New York but, really, this is a non-story.

So, why is it on the front page of the style section? Apparently, Robin Givhan has some photos of Post editors in compromising positions, is related to the owner, or something. This is, after all, the woman who gave us Dick Cheney’s Auschwitz parka, Condi Rice’s commanding boots, John Roberts’ Stepford Children, John Bolton’s Senate-defying haircut, and other follies. The Post has been giving prominent placement to this nonsense for over two years, so clearly she’s got some kind of leverage.

Iran’s foreign minister abruptly left a dinner with Condi Rice because he was afraid of a violinist’s cleavage.

Iran’s foreign minister walked out of a dinner of diplomats where he was seated directly across from Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, on the pretext that the female violinist entertaining the gathering was dressed too revealingly.

“I don’t know which woman he was afraid of, the woman in the red dress or the secretary of state,” State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Friday, regarding the actions of Iran’s Manouchehr Mottaki.

Rice herself was questioned by reporters about the lack of a direct conversation with Mottaki, even though it appeared she was “chasing” him. “Uh, well, you could ask him why he didn’t make an effort,” she replied. Then she laughed. “Look, I’m not given to chasing anyone.”

You can’t make this stuff up. (And, no, photos of the violinist are not available.)

Alas, all was not lost.

So the face to face between Rice and Mottaki never happened, reports CBS News correspondent Charlie D’Agata. Instead, U.S. and Iranian delegations met at a lower, “expert” level, which while significant, is not a first. “Our officials did, as they did in Baghdad, have an opportunity to exchange views about the substance of this meeting,” Rice said.

So much of this Iraq summit has been about the U.S. and Iran, but with good reason, reports D’Agata. America blames Iran for violence in Iraq, Iran blames America, and the Iraqis have been urging both countries to put their differences aside and put Iraq first.

I’m unconvinced negotiations with a country whose foreign minister can’t handle looking at a woman in a formal wear will bear much fruit. Still, one has to try.

UPDATE: Photos of Ukrainian violinist Larissa Abramova during her performance last night:

And here’s her revealing cleavage:

Seriously?

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has announced that Iranian representatives will take part in a regional conference to discuss Iraqi security issues at Sharm el-Sheikh this week. Condi Rice would not rule out talking to the Iranians on yesterday’s This Week and said that, if she talked to her counterpart, she would ask him to “stop the flow of arms to foreign fighters” and to “stop the flow of foreign fighters across the borders.”

What’s interesting is that this winds up being a back door way of talking to Iran and Syria as per the Iraq Study Group recommendations.

Kingdaddy is right, too, that talks with the Iranians have to get beyond the security issues if they are to bear any fruit. “Any discussion that focuses purely on one or both of these issues omits other Iranian interests, such as its energy projects with India, Russia, and other countries. In other words, while security issues top the list, compartmentalizing them removes what little leverage the US government has with Iran.”

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Syria has sparked controversy, not just because it is in defiance of White House foreign policy but because of her decision to wear a head scarf and abaya while visiting a mosque.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi mingled with Syrians in a market and made the sign of the cross at a Christian tomb Tuesday during a visit to pursue dialogue with the country’s leader. President Bush denounced the trip, saying it sends mixed signals to Syria’s government.

Pelosi’s visit to Syria was the latest challenge to the White House by congressional Democrats, who are taking a more assertive role in influencing policy in the Middle East and the Iraq war. The Bush administration, which accuses President Bashar Assad’s government of supporting terrorism, has resisted calls for direct talks to help ease the crisis in Iraq and make progress in the Israel-Palestinian peace process.

Soon after Pelosi’s arrival in Damascus, Bush criticized her visit. “A lot of people have gone to see President Assad … and yet we haven’t seen action. He hasn’t responded,” he told reporters at a Rose Garden news conference. “Sending delegations doesn’t work. It’s simply been counterproductive.”

Wearing a flowered head scarf and a black abaya robe, Pelosi visited the 8th-century Omayyad Mosque, shaking hands with Syrian women inside and watching men in a religion class sitting cross-legged on the floor.

Glenn Reynolds, AllahPundit, Charles Johnson, and a host of others are in varying stages of outrage over the wear of the hajib. Steve Benen is right, though, that the wear of the head scarf as a deference to the host’s culture is a proper sign of respect for a guest, noting that Laura Bush, Condi Rice, and others have made the same gesture.

Much more problematic, however, is the Speaker of the House contravening American foreign policy by legitimating a hostile government. While the president does not have plenary power over foreign affairs, he both constitutionally and traditionally sets the agenda.

Congress’ role is one of oversight–setting budget parameters, holding executive officials accountable, considering treaties, and the like–not competition. Mark Kleiman rightly notes that, with the majority, that power is substantial.

Greg Djerejian may well be right that the Bush policy of not holding talks with the Assad regime amounts to “bungling amateurism and fake machismo.” At very least, my instincts are that one always talks with other countries, especially hostile ones; after all, we hold negotiations with our enemies during war. Still, that’s not Pelosi’s call to make. If she wants to direct American foreign policy, let her run for president.

UPDATE: Commenter Jeff B and others note a recent trip to Syria by Republican Members and wonder why that’s different.

My views are much closer to John Burgess‘ than Dave Schuler’s as to the legitimacy and desirability of Members going overseas per se. I have no problem with Nancy Pelosi or other Members taking junkets to inform their legislation, although I do share Shuler’s sense that they are usually taken for less noble purposes.

My specific qualm here is with Pelosi meeting with a foreign head of government despite the request of the nation’s Chief Diplomat not to do so. The United States withdrew its ambassador two years ago to protest the Assad government’s role in murdering former Lebanese Prime Rafik al-Hariri. Meeting with Assad under these circumstances, without the blessing of the president, weakens our negotiating stance and sends the message that the United States government does not speak with a single voice in foreign affairs. That is a dangerous signal.

UPDATE: Steven Taylor is similarly unconcerned about Pelosi’s sporting the hijab, has “never been a big fan of members of the legislative branch making big state visits outside of cooperation with the executive branch,” but concedes “members of Congress have every right to make such visits should they choose to.” That’s about right.