The elephant in the Presidential scandal

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Is there a racial element to the attacks/challenges being put forward against Condeleeza Rice?

― Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:04 (twenty-two years ago)

Probably more likely a gender element.

― The Huckle-Buck (Horace Mann), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:05 (twenty-two years ago)

How so? Please elaborate? I'd say, could definitely be.

― Skottie, Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:06 (twenty-two years ago)

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:06 (twenty-two years ago)

Only if it helps the Repubs' cause, apparently...

― Baked Bean Teeth (Baked Bean Teeth), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:06 (twenty-two years ago)

More to the point, is there an elephant?

― N. (nickdastoor), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:07 (twenty-two years ago)

Or, yes

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:08 (twenty-two years ago)

Would she have been badgered into waiving executive privilege if she was man? Would people automatically assume her spin was less valid than Clarke's to the degree that the assumption is being made if they were both of the same race?

(This entire question might be a rhetorical trap.)

― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:09 (twenty-two years ago)

also

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:13 (twenty-two years ago)

Hmmmmm, maybe, but I don't think it's that specific in this case. I think Condi Rice gets a lot of weird negative reaction for being a conservative republican and an African Am. woman. In the direction of her being a sell-out or something. Rather than saying, look if everyone's equally integrated (in a general sense) into the society, it follows that there will be a range of diversity in opinion within people of a given ethnic group/gender/sexual orientation. So I think she's often suspect from the beginning for many. vis a vis Clarke? Not so sure. I think he'll come off as less credible ultimately. More of a bitter opportunist. (I can't wait, by the way, to become a bitter opportunist myself. I've got half of it covered already.)

― Skottie, Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:14 (twenty-two years ago)

Would people automatically assume her spin was less valid than Clarke's to the degree that the assumption is being made if they were both of the same race?

I think people automatically assume her spin is less valid than Clarke's because his is entirely consistent with her worldview (the belief that state-sponsored terrorism is the only kind to worry about), while hers is not. It's like the Bush-Gore Supreme Court decision - Rice is taking a position exactly the opposite of the one she has taken throughout her career.

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:16 (twenty-two years ago)

Clarence Thomas gets a lot of this kind of treatment. The difference there is that no one's ever accused Condi Rice of being an idiot.

― Skottie, Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:17 (twenty-two years ago)

Would she have been badgered into waiving executive privilege if she was man?

I really don't understand the idea that there's a separation of powers issue here; the 9/11 Commission is not a Congressional committee.

The difference there is that no one's ever accused Condi Rice of being an idiot.

ummmm

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:18 (twenty-two years ago)

I don't trust Condi's spin for the simple reason that I don't trust pretty much anyone in the Bush Administration on pretty much any matter under the sun.

― Baked Bean Teeth (Baked Bean Teeth), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:18 (twenty-two years ago)

This entire saga could actually be a case study in What Happens When You Can't Let Go Of High School.

― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:19 (twenty-two years ago)

There is absolutely no racial or gender component to the attacks or challenges. It's mostly political.

― don carville weiner, Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:19 (twenty-two years ago)

Do people shy away from talking about the severity of her manner because of her race? What separates her from Katherine Harris, if you want to take a partisan, hating-everything-Bush-related perspective, or, say, Hillary Clinton, if you're on the other side. Obviously, there's a gender issue there

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:20 (twenty-two years ago)

Zbigniew Brzezinski, Carter's NSA, a foreign born man, was badgered into testifying to Congress - about Billy Carter's Libya connections! There are no substative racial or gender issues here. Plus, today the White House has caved in, allowing her to testify.

― Michael White (Hereward), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:25 (twenty-two years ago)

i think shes a crook, and i think that she is a liar...she goes in front of 60 minutes and wont take an oath for the country she was supposed to protect.

i dont think it is a race/gender thing (although this is a thot: liberals have agitated for a more diverese world, and they have african americans, women and hispanics in the most powerful postions in the most powerful country in the world, and they end up being the ideological enemy, the irony is delicious---the same thing could be said for the papal curate, we might end up w. an african pope it would be a pope that no one really wants to deal with.

― anthony, Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:27 (twenty-two years ago)

Most (all?) of the prior Congressional testimony by NSAs has not been on matters of policy, so the administration does have a real distinction there (if this were actually Congressional testimony, which it's not, mooting the issue). Of course, the fact that they're caving now indicates that they never really cared about the constitutional issue. As Don says of Clarke, it's political. (though he greeted Condi's initial refusal with no such dismissiveness, only puzzlement)

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:31 (twenty-two years ago)

(The hidden question is, "Does it matter whether there is a racial component to the attacks/challenges on Rice or not?")

― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:35 (twenty-two years ago)

The hidden question is a better question, I think.

― Markelby (Mark C), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:45 (twenty-two years ago)

though he greeted Condi's initial refusal with no such dismissiveness, only puzzlement

My initial dismissiveness had absolutely nothing to do with race or gender. Only a puzzlement over the obvious lack of political gamesmanship by the White House. With the firestorm brewing, only an idiot would think that she was not going to testify in some manner.

That's because like everything else they do, the Bush team has no idea how to communicate with any sort of gameplan. I was honestly curious if there were any legitimate legal issues or precedents that would make a good case for not putting her under oath or in public. I was giving her a slight benefit of the doubt, even though my initial reaction was that not going before the committee was a bunch of political bullshit.

Finally, while there might be some truth to the treatment of Rice because of her gender, I don't see it as significant at all. And that's probably because I'm a male.

― don carville weiner, Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:46 (twenty-two years ago)

My initial dismissiveness had absolutely nothing to do with race or gender.

oh, I wasn't suggesting that; sorry for any implication

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:47 (twenty-two years ago)

I didn't think you were, it was more of a jerky clarification on my part (and only because it was in this thread.)

But I'm still puzzled (though not surprised) at the lack of prowess on the Administration's PR team.

― don carville weiner, Tuesday, 30 March 2004 15:51 (twenty-two years ago)

In trying to find an answer to the question of this thread, can one draw any correlations between the situation that Condi Rice is in compared to the railroading of Jocelyn Elders?

― Pleasant Plains (Pleasant Plains), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 16:06 (twenty-two years ago)

Just expanding on what Skottie said.

The Dems in the US have a problem with Condi being the highest ranking black woman ever in US political history and she's a republican. There seems to be a rather patronising view that if you are black you have to be a Democrat.

― Ed (dali), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 16:58 (twenty-two years ago)

Was there a racial element to the appointment of Condeleeza Rice?

― dean! (deangulberry), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 16:59 (twenty-two years ago)

Was there a racial element to the appointment of Condeleeza Rice?

Does the Pope sh....ahfergetit.

― Baked Bean Teeth (Baked Bean Teeth), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 17:02 (twenty-two years ago)

Was there a racial element to the appointment of Condeleeza Rice?

Is there a political element (i.e. race/gender/etc.) to any appointment of a non-white male?

― don carville weiner, Tuesday, 30 March 2004 17:08 (twenty-two years ago)

The Dems in the US have a problem with Condi being the highest ranking black woman ever in US political history and she's a republican.

Really? I don't, though I do have a problem with someone so ideologically-driven being in her position. Maybe many of the Dems who have this problem are black themselves?

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 17:12 (twenty-two years ago)

yeah, i'm wondering if ed could provide one quote from a democrat backing that statement up

― cinniblount (James Blount), Tuesday, 30 March 2004 23:47 (twenty-two years ago)

Stop being so empirical!

― Skottie, Wednesday, 31 March 2004 00:11 (twenty-two years ago)

Empiricist!

― Skottie, Wednesday, 31 March 2004 00:12 (twenty-two years ago)

There certainly is a racial element to the defenses of Rice, as Gabbneb pointed out. As Jon Stewart said, who knew Robert Novak even had a race card?

― Sym (shmuel), Wednesday, 31 March 2004 01:17 (twenty-two years ago)

(i guess when you're a douchebag [tm], you can hold lots of things up your sleeve, or in your bag, as it were)

― maura (maura), Wednesday, 31 March 2004 03:22 (twenty-two years ago)

(also republicans in only caring about race/gender oppression issues when it affects the ramrodding of their policy through every orifice imaginable shocker. i mean, i'm sure condoleeza does get some extra guff for being female -- although i've seen more pictures of the weird faces tenet's been making while under oath cited than those of condoleeza making her stern face -- but i can't help but think that a good chunk of that ire is the 'affirmative action is BAD, except when it helps us out' attitude that the GOP seems to be taking over and over again lately. see also: jack kelley)

― maura (maura), Wednesday, 31 March 2004 03:25 (twenty-two years ago)

ire is A REACTION TO the 'affirmative... etc.

― maura (maura), Wednesday, 31 March 2004 03:26 (twenty-two years ago)

haha - see also all the republicans who suddenly cared about sexual harrassment during the whole paula jones showdown (or hell, cared about 'the rule of law' during the impeachment).

― cinniblount (James Blount), Wednesday, 31 March 2004 11:55 (twenty-two years ago)

"If the Democrats want to slap around an African American woman, let them try."

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Sunday, 4 April 2004 19:18 (twenty-two years ago)

Did you know that compassion means hanging out with black people?

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Wednesday, 7 April 2004 21:48 (twenty-two years ago)

two weeks pass...

"Do you have blacks too?"

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Wednesday, 21 April 2004 22:24 (twenty-one years ago)

OH WOW

GWB is like a sheltered kindergartener!

― VengaDan Perry (Dan Perry), Wednesday, 21 April 2004 22:30 (twenty-one years ago)

I remember reading this. Nothing will shock me about this president's ignorance.

― Michael White (Hereward), Wednesday, 21 April 2004 22:32 (twenty-one years ago)

During W's second year in office, he didn't send anyone to the annual meeting of the NAACP. When he was asked why not, he shook his head as if he were disgusted with the question, and responded that in a meeting that day, "there I was sitting around the table with foreign leaders, looking at Colin Powell and Condi Rice," and stopped there, as if it spoke for itself. Let that one sink in for a minute.

― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Wednesday, 21 April 2004 23:15 (twenty-one years ago)

why would a republican go to a naacp meeting? it's a shill for democrats. the black vote is monolithic, 90% went democratic in 2000, that's actually pretty scary but bush needs only to shave a few percentage points off of that and kerry is toast and he certainly is not going to convince anyone to change sides at a naacp meeting. if rice was a democrat and she was treated this shabbily there would have been endless cries of racism, look at the idiot in sf writing that william hung's success is racist. but since rice is republican she's, by current definition, racist and bigoted so she is exempt from the public defense offered up for outstanding citizens like jayson williams. i don't think her treatment has been racist but it would be nice if everyone defending the criticism of her as idealogically based, as it is, would offer the same leniency to republican critics of democrats.

― keith m (keithmcl), Wednesday, 21 April 2004 23:30 (twenty-one years ago)

and besides her testimony was simply an opportunity for members of the panel to preen and showboat, they certainly didn't ask any thought-provoking questions.

― keith m (keithmcl), Wednesday, 21 April 2004 23:32 (twenty-one years ago)

william hung's a democrat?

― Sym (shmuel), Thursday, 22 April 2004 01:55 (twenty-one years ago)

excellent

― gabbneb (gabbneb), Thursday, 22 April 2004 01:57 (twenty-one years ago)

keith you don't get it, Bush was saying that he didn't need to talk with black leaders because he had a couple of black people on his cabinet!! WHAT THE FLYING FUCK.

― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Thursday, 22 April 2004 08:03 (twenty-one years ago)

I mean, maybe Bush thought Condi and Colin could sort of funnel the thoughts of black people everywhere directly to him, using special black ESP.

― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Thursday, 22 April 2004 08:07 (twenty-one years ago)

I could see Colin Powell telling him they could do that, just to see the monkey-confusion.

― suzy (suzy), Thursday, 22 April 2004 08:25 (twenty-one years ago)

http://www.artistdirect.com/Images/Sources/AMGCOVERS/music/cover200/drd200/d238/d2389446422.jpg

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Thursday, 22 April 2004 08:30 (twenty-one years ago)

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