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Mzuri
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Mzuri
Post Number: 2933
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, January 12, 2007 - 02:46 pm: | 
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White House Spokesman Blasts Sen. Boxer's Exchange With Secretary Rice
Friday , January 12, 2007
WASHINGTON — The White House fired back Friday at Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer's verbal slap at Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, calling the California Democrat's caustic comments about Rice's family life "outrageous."
Boxer lit into Rice on Thursday with bitter diatribe during a heated line of questioning before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee looking into Iraq policies. At one point, Boxer turned to the broad question of who pays the ultimate price for war. Rice has never married and has no children.
"Who pays the price? I'm not going to pay a personal price. My kids are too old and my grandchild is too young," Boxer said. "You're not going to pay a particular price, as I understand it, with an immediate family. So who pays the price? The American military and their families."
Rice told FOX News' Jim Angle that she was confused by Boxer's comments at first.
"I guess that means I don't have kids. Was that the purpose?" Rice said. "At the time I just found it a bit confusing, frankly, in retrospect, I thought single women had come further than that. The only question is are you making good decisions because you have kids?"
White House spokesman Tony Snow on Friday called Boxer's comments "outrageous."
"I don't know if she was intentionally that tacky, but I do think it's outrageous. Here you got a professional woman, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and Barbara Boxer is sort of throwing little jabs because Condi doesn't have children, as if that means that she doesn't understand the concerns of parents. Great leap backward for feminism," Snow told FOX News Talk's Brian and The Judge.
Boxer released a statement Friday to FOXNews.com through her spokeswoman, Natalie Ravitz, saying:
"I spoke the truth at the committee hearing, which is that neither Secretary Rice nor I have family members that will pay the price for this escalation. My point was to focus attention on our military families who continue to sacrifice because this Administration has not developed a political solution to the situation in Iraq."
For her part during the hearing Thursday, Rice kept her cool, responding to Boxer's comments after her opening statement.
"And let me just say, I fully understand the sacrifice that the American people are making, and especially the sacrifice that our soldiers are making, men and women in uniform. I visit them. I know what they're going through. I talk to their families. I see it," Rice said.
Boxer shot back: "Madam Secretary, please, I know you feel terrible about it. "That's not the point. I was making the case as to who pays the price for your decisions."
Asked Friday if Rice or the department had any reaction to Boxer's comments, State Department spokeswoman Janelle Hironimus said, "We're not going to be beyond what she [Rice] said.
Boxer told Rice she didn't believe she was listening to outside perspectives on the war in Iraq.
"So from where I sit, Madam Secretary, you are not listening to the American people, you are not listening to the military, you are not listening to the bipartisan voices from the Senate, you are not listening to the Iraq Study Group," Boxer said.
Responding to questions about Boxer's comments in an e-mail conversation Friday with FOXNews.com, Ravitz said, "Sen. Boxer hoped that this argument might persuade Secretary Rice to see the devastating impact of this war on so many military families, and reverse course on this latest escalation of American involvement.”
Asked if Boxer meant to suggest that Rice could not fully understand the costs of war because Rice does not have a husband or children, or if Boxer regretted bringing up Rice's personal life in light of Snow's comments, Ravitz said that Boxer only was saying that the two are in the same position because neither will pay a personal price for the proposed escalation in Iraq.
Asked about Rice and Boxer's history of clashes — including during Rice's 2005 Senate confirmation hearing — Ravitz acknowledged, "Yes, the two have 'clashed' before, but no, it's not personal. They don't know each other personally. Sen. Boxer and Secretary Rice have serious disagreements over foreign policy and specifically this Administration's policy in Iraq," Ravitz wrote.
"I am not get into Mr. Snow's remarks. Senator Boxer spoke the truth at the Committee," Ravitz added.
In a 2005 Senate hearing for her confirmation to replace Colin Powell as secretary of state, Rice was put in the position of defending herself when Boxer suggested that the secretary's support for Bush and the war in Iraq "overwhelmed your respect for the truth."
"I have to say that I have never, ever lost respect for the truth in the service of anything," Rice said.
Rice heads to the Middle East on Friday to seek support for a new U.S. strategy in Iraq.
One Vietnam War veteran — and recent American Legion national commander — who now has a son serving in Afghanistan said he was put off by Boxer's comments.
Thomas Bock, 59, of Aurora, Colo., said he heard about the exchange on local radio and thought, "Wow! What a terrible thing to say, that only those people that have family members in the military have a price to pay. This is our freedom, this is our county. And the sooner that we stand up and stand for our country, the sooner we'll be able to bring our troops home."
He said despite the fact that his son, helicopter pilot Army Capt. Adam Bock, is back in a combat zone, "I think she [Boxer] missed the whole point. ... You've got to focus on what the real issue is, and the real issue is the global war on terror, not a personal price or the personal sacrifice. This is a sacrifice for our country."
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,243359,00.html
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Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 6680
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, January 12, 2007 - 04:41 pm: |
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Boy, the committe she appeared before sure raked ol Condi over the coals. If she'd been pregnant, she would've had a miscarriage. (And Dubya would've breathed a sigh of relief. heh-heh) |
Tonya
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Tonya
Post Number: 3981
Registered: 07-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, January 12, 2007 - 05:28 pm: |
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Like Americans care about their kids...those who won't be getting any SS when they're eligible. Single women didn't put them in the position they are ALREADY IN; married white fucks worrying about noting but the cognac and Viagra did!
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Lola_ogunnaike
Regular Poster
Username: Lola_ogunnaike
Post Number: 500
Registered: 10-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Friday, January 12, 2007 - 06:14 pm: |
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Wow! I actually admire her - and Oprah - for deciding not to have kids. I think it's hard, even in this day and age, if you are a woman who is quite happy to live her life child-less. People judge you and criticize you. I've seen it with my older sister who has decided never to have children. |
Chrishayden
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 3381
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, January 13, 2007 - 10:45 am: |
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That ain't what Boxer said about her, everybody is twisting it.
I'm glad she didn't have anymore like her.
It makes me sick to look at her lying ass. |
Mzuri
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Mzuri
Post Number: 2947
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, January 13, 2007 - 11:14 am: |
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CH - The Fox news piece is inaccurate???? If so - please find something accurate and post it here (if you're so inclined). I had the TV on this hearing but I wasn't paying any attention to it, there were too many other things going on at the time. Thanks!
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Chrishayden
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 3388
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, January 13, 2007 - 11:20 am: |
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Mzuri:
I am glad you are down in Texas. If you were here I'd turn you over my knee and paddle your fat bottom for quoting Fox News--wait a minnit. You might like that.
I wouldn't believe nobody from Fox News if they told me my name was Chris Hayden.
Boxer told that dog that she didn't have any children in Iraq (and Boxer admitted she didn't either)
The Faux News boyz got a hissy fit because all of those pussies talk toough and have avoided military service like the plague.
I bet Dubya made Condi sleep on the couch afterward. |
Mzuri
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Mzuri
Post Number: 2949
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, January 13, 2007 - 11:23 am: |
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BOXER'S LOW BLOW
January 12, 2007 -- Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer, an appalling scold from California, wasted no time yesterday in dragging the debate over Iraq about as low as it can go - attacking Secre tary of State Condoleezza Rice for being a childless woman.
Boxer was wholly in character for her party - New York's own two Democratic senators, Chuck Schumer and Hillary Rodham Clinton, were predictably opportunistic - but the Golden State lawmaker earned special attention for the tasteless jibes she aimed at Rice.
Rice appeared before the Senate in defense of President Bush's tactical change in Iraq, and quickly encountered Boxer.
"Who pays the price? I'm not going to pay a personal price," Boxer said. "My kids are too old, and my grandchild is too young."
Then, to Rice: "You're not going to pay a particular price, as I understand it, with an immediate family."
Breathtaking.
Simply breathtaking.
We scarcely know where to begin.
The junior senator from California ap parently believes that an accom plished, seasoned diplomat, a renowned scholar and an adviser to two presidents like Condoleezza Rice is not fully qualified to make policy at the highest levels of the American government because she is a single, childless woman.
It's hard to imagine the firestorm that similar comments would have ignited, coming from a Republican to a Democrat, or from a man to a woman, in the United States Senate. (Surely the Associated Press would have put the observation a bit higher than the 18th paragraph of a routine dispatch from Washington.)
But put that aside.
The vapidity - the sheer mindlessness - of Sen. Boxer's assertion makes it clear that the next two years are going to be a time of bitterness and rancor, marked by pettiness of spirit and political self-indulgence of a sort not seen in America for a very long time.
In contrast to Boxer, Sen. Clinton seemed almost statesmanlike - until one considers that she was undercutting the president of the United States in time of war: "The president simply has not gotten the message sent loudly and clearly by the American people, that we desperately need a new course."
Schumer, meanwhile, dismissed the president's speech as "a new surge without a new strategy."
Frankly, we're not surprised by Hillary Clinton's rush to judgment. With both eyes firmly set on 2008, her Iraq position flits like a tumbleweed in the political wind. Who knows where she'll wind up?
Heck, she admitted as much by citing November's midterm elections to justify her newfound opposition to the war. (And who needs a commander-in-chief who tailors war-fighting strategy to public opinion?)
Clinton would do well to consider the words of GOP Sen. John McCain, another White House hopeful, who frankly admits that his strong support for a troop surge in Iraq has cost him votes. (Some Democrats, in fact, already are calling this "McCain's surge.")
Said McCain: "I'd rather lose a campaign than lose a war."
As for Schumer, we're profoundly disappointed by his remarks.
While he's always been a fiercely parti san Democrat (nothing to be ash amed of), time was when Schumer seemed to understand the existential threat posed by Islamic extremism.
Now he's been elevated to a top position in his party's Senate leadership - and he has bigger fish to fry.
Like electing Democrats.
And so, like Boxer, he cheers on Barack Obama, Chris Dodd, Joe Biden and John Edwards - with Clinton, presidential aspirants - as they trash Bush's plan.
To the extent that such behavior encourages America's enemies - and of course it does - he, like they, stands to have innocent blood on his hands.
Yes, the party's bloggers will be happy.
So will al Qaeda.
True enough, Democrats don't hold a monopoly on appalling behavior.
Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback, a Republican presidential candidate and favorite of some conservatives, has joined with Democrats in opposition to the troop surge - and he's not alone.
The president deserves better.
Indeed, the least these critics can do is suggest an alternative that leads to success in Iraq rather than simply criticize.
Or suggest that America simply wave the white flag.
As Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.) said: "Now that the president has outlined a change in strategy, we should give his proposals an opportunity to work." Instead, Kyl rightly noted, "some declared the president's proposals unworkable even before they were announced."
No such nay-saying, however, was to be heard from two Capitol Hill stalwarts: McCain and Sen. Joe Lieberman, the independent Democrat from Connecticut.
"I applaud the president for rejecting the fatalism of failure and pursuing a new course to achieve success in Iraq," said Lieberman, who alone in his party genuinely comprehends what a U.S. defeat in Iraq would mean.
As for McCain, his support is tempered by the fact that he argued correctly, from the start, that the war was being fought with too few troops. Had the administration listened four years ago, this tactical shift might not be necessary now.
It would take a truly hard heart not to be touched, deeply, by the sacrifices made by the young men and women now wearing their country's uniform.
And one can only imagine the pain felt by the families of those killed and cruelly wounded in service to America. Just as it was hard to imagine the agony of the loved ones left behind on 9/11.
But even to suggest that Condoleezza Rice is not fit to serve her country because she is childless is beyond bizarre.
It is perverse.
Sen. Boxer needs to apologize.
And she needs to do it today.
http://www.nypost.com/seven/01122007/postopinion/editorials/boxers_low_blow_edit orials_.htm?page=0
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Mzuri
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Mzuri
Post Number: 2950
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, January 13, 2007 - 11:26 am: |
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Exchange Turns Into Political Flashpoint
By HELENE COOPER and THOM SHANKER
January 12, 2007
WASHINGTON, Jan 12 — A passing exchange during a Senate hearing on Thursday turned into a political flashpoint overnight as Senator Barbara Boxer, the California Democrat, and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice accused one another of insensitivity in comments about motherhood and the war in Iraq.
In an interview this afternoon with The New York Times, Ms. Rice suggested that the California Democrat had set back feminism by suggesting during the hearing that the childless Ms. Rice had paid no price in the Iraq war.
“I thought it was okay to be single,” Ms. Rice said. “I thought it was okay to not have children, and I thought you could still make good decisions on behalf of the country if you were single and didn’t have children.”
During the Thursday hearing, Ms. Boxer told Ms. Rice: “You’re not going to pay any particular price, as I understand it, with an immediate family.”
In a separate interview, Senator Boxer said her comments had been misunderstood and were now being turned against her by the White House and other Republicans. “What I was trying to do in this exchange was to find common ground with Condi Rice,” Ms. Boxer said, adding that “my whole point was to focus on the military families who pay the price.”
“They’re getting this off on a non-existent thing that I didn’t say,” Ms. Boxer said. “I’m saying, she’s like me, we do not have families who are in the military. What they are doing is a really tortured way to attack a United States Senator who voted against the war.”
The exchange between Ms. Boxer and Ms. Rice came during a hostile Senate hearing on Thursday in which Ms. Rice, seeking to sell President Bush’s new Iraq plan to a skeptical Congress, faced an almost solid wall of opposition from both Democrats and Republicans. Ms. Boxer several times repeated the question, “who pays the price?”
Senator Boxer read excerpts from a radio interview with an American family that lost a son in Iraq. “You can’t begin to imagine how you celebrate any holiday or birthday,” Ms. Boxer said. “There’s an absence. It’s not like the person’s never been there. They always were there and now they’re not and you’re looking at an empty hole.”
Ms. Rice replied, “I can never do anything to replace any of those lost men and women in uniform, or the diplomats, some of whom ...”
Ms. Boxer cut her off. “Madame Secretary, please, I know you feel terrible about it. That’s not the point. I was making the case as to who pays the price for your decisions.”
During the hearing itself, Ms. Rice did not appear to take issue with Ms. Boxer’s comments. During the interview, she addressed them only in response to a question. But the White House spokesman, Tony Snow, had suggested earlier today that Senator Boxer’s comments were anti-feminist.
In the interview, Ms. Rice said that at first, she didn’t understand what Ms. Boxer was saying. “It didn’t actually dawn on me that she was saying, ‘you don’t have children who can go to war,’ ” she said. “Which seems a rather strange comment, to be quite frank.”
A number of members of Congress have children in the military who are serving in Iraq or are likely to do so, including Senators John McCain of Arizona and Jim Webb of Virginia.
Ms. Boxer’s comments and the claims and counterclaims about what she meant have captivated the blogs and received extensive coverage on Fox News and other cable channels. One blog, Time magazine’s Swampland, labeled it the “Womb Wars.”
Conservative blogs and commentators in particular were quick to seize the issue. “One Great Leap (Backwards) for Womankind,” read one blog, Bikini Politics. “They will be known by their Fruits,” read another, Macsmind, which billed itself as “Conservative News, Commentary and Common Sense.”
“I am deeply appalled by Senator Barbara Boxer’s cruel and callous attack on Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice,” said Deneen Borelli, a fellow with an organization called Project 21, which describes itself as a “leading voice in the African-American community.”
“The debate should have been about the war in Iraq and not a platform to demean Secretary Rice,” Ms. Borelli said in a statement issued by the organization.
Some Democratic Senate staffers complained privately that Ms. Boxer’s exchange with Ms. Rice allowed the Bush administration to turn the tables on Iraq critics and sidestep the larger issue of the almost uniform opposition to the president’s new plan to send an additional 21,500 U.S. soldiers to Iraq.
During a wide-ranging interview with The Times before she was scheduled to take off for a week-long trip to the Middle East, Ms. Rice said she had expected the skepticism that she received from Congress the day before. “I’ve been through things like this before,” she said. “I know people want to express frustration; I know they wanted to express their skepticism.” But, she said, “Skepticism isn’t a policy.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/12/washington/12cnd-rice.html?ei=5065&en=08c1ef9c 52861b52&ex=1169269200&partner
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Chrishayden
AALBC .com Platinum Poster
Username: Chrishayden
Post Number: 3392
Registered: 03-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, January 13, 2007 - 11:34 am: |
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I don't care what you post on here you chocolate shmoo.
I heard the exchange and that ain't what Boxer said--and if it was so what? She better be glad nobody is kicking her in her flat butt for lying to the whole world like she continues to do. |
Mzuri
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Mzuri
Post Number: 2955
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, January 13, 2007 - 11:41 am: |
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And all this time I thought you liked chocolate shmoo 
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Abm
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Abm
Post Number: 7804
Registered: 04-2004
Rating: 
Votes: 1 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, January 13, 2007 - 12:00 pm: |
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The issue about whether or not Condi has children is a fallacious redherring.
The REAL issue is too FEW people who are making decisions about making war are RISKING their own BLOOD (theirs, their family or others they love) to EXECUTE that war.
And THAT'S the very REAL and VALID point Boxer is making here. |
Tropical_storm
Regular Poster
Username: Tropical_storm
Post Number: 80
Registered: 10-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, January 13, 2007 - 10:17 pm: |
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^^^Exactly Abm!
I for one am glad Boxer did NOT apologize and hope she never does.
But then again she is a Democrat so she probably will end up apologizing. |
Cynique
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Cynique
Post Number: 6702
Registered: 01-2004
Rating:
Votes: 1 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, January 13, 2007 - 10:49 pm: |
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A fallacious red herring! Is that anything like a redundant smoked salmon???? Or a foggy smoke screen?? My, my. |
Yukio
Veteran Poster
Username: Yukio
Post Number: 1572
Registered: 01-2004
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Saturday, January 13, 2007 - 10:58 pm: |
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cynique...you are funny! Red herring it is, abm! |
Ntfs_encryption
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Ntfs_encryption
Post Number: 1514
Registered: 10-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Monday, January 15, 2007 - 11:43 pm: |
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"The REAL issue is too FEW people who are making decisions about making war are RISKING their own BLOOD (theirs, their family or others they love) to EXECUTE that war."
This is so true. The cost of the needless deaths of so many young men and women in this bogus unwinnable war of choice, is being felt by average American families, not the politicians who sent them, the wealthy or the right wing spinmeister cheerleaders (e.g., Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, Bernie Goldberg, etc) for Bush. Playthel Benjamin was very correct when he stated, "Condoleezza Rice has a lot of blood on her hands". This eager duplicitous political prostitute for Bush, has no shame or reticence about the never ending lies that is the established protocol for the White House.
I'm currently watching Bill O'Reilly while writing this post and he is ranting and attacking Boxer (who I personally don't care for) for her comments to Rice. Personally, I have no problems with what Boxer said. Why? Because what she said was true. Simple as that.
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Mzuri
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Mzuri
Post Number: 2990
Registered: 01-2006
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, January 16, 2007 - 12:01 am: |
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NT - I agree. One can't possibly understand the sacrifice involved until their own husband, wife, child or someone else close to them is in the warzone. Condi is an inhuman stick person - she doesn't have a clue.
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Ntfs_encryption
"Cyniquian" Level Poster
Username: Ntfs_encryption
Post Number: 1517
Registered: 10-2005
Rating: N/A
Votes: 0 (Vote!) | | Posted on Tuesday, January 16, 2007 - 12:27 am: |
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"One can't possibly understand the sacrifice involved until their own husband, wife, child or someone else close to them is in the warzone. Condi is an inhuman stick person - she doesn't have a clue."
Ya got that right!!! When I go to the VA, there are small pictures that line a wall that is about 40 feet in length. Each picture is a photograph of the names of those killed in Vietnam from the beginning to the end. It is a very grim reminder. When I was a kid and lived in Ohio, there was a young white guy who lived up the block from me. His name was Patrick Haggerty. He was killed in Vietnam in 1969 or 1970 (I can't recall). I knew his entire family. His father was a combat veteran of WWII and he took it hard. Every time I go to the VA and look at those pictures of the names of those who died in another needless and unnecessary war, I always think of Patrick Haggerty. He was about 20 when he was killed. What does America have to show for his death along with 56,000 other young Americans? Can you name one accomplishment or one goal American achieved in Vietnam? I feel the same about Iraq. Unfortunately, Condoleezza Rice and Bush do not.
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