Rice is studying previous Mid-East peace efforts
Saturday, October 27th, 2007According to a story out of Washington from the Associated Press’ Matthew Lee today, “Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is looking to the past for lessons on how to make next month’s Mideast peace conference a success”.
Very good.
A few days ago, Rice said something that should have made our ears perk up, in testimony to U.S. Congressmen at a hearing of the House Foreign Affairs Committee [See the post "Rice tells US Congress — ???" on our sister log, UN-Truth, here.]
What Rice said was: “For more than six decades, over the course of many administrations, American leaders of both parties have worked for peace and security in the region, not always perfectly, but consistently”.
Not always perfectly???
Today’s story, it is apparent, emerged from Friday’s daily briefing at the U.S. State Department by spokesman Sean McCormack — and from a journalist’s question, probably from the AP writer Matthew Lee, about why Rice spoke with former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, an appointment that would have been listed on her daily schedule, or mentioned around the State Department press office.
The full unvarnished excerpt of the exchange at yesterday’s State Department briefing is reproduced here — it shows, at least, that this is one story that was not spoon-fed to the press:
“QUESTION: The Secretary this week also apparently met with President Carter.
MR. MCCORMACK: She did.
QUESTION: What can you tell us about that meeting?
MR. MCCORMACK: Again, I wasn’t in on that one. And they had a fairly good discussion about a variety of different issues. They talked about our efforts in the Middle East. It was a good cordial meeting. She was talking to President Carter about what we were doing.
QUESTION: Compared to what he did?
MR. MCCORMACK: No. This isn’t a game of one-upsmanship.