Rice's Mission to Foggy Bottom ( a fluffy article) [View All]

[rodeodance]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/24/AR2005082401833.html?referrer=email

[e-mail]
Rice's Mission to Foggy Bottom

By Jim Hoagland

Thursday, August 25, 2005; Page A19

Using a mixture of moxie and charm, Condoleezza Rice has improved relations with some of President Bush's harshest critics overseas. The secretary of state will now try to work the same wonders with the battle-hardened policy warriors in her own bureaucracy.

"Running a very big organization is something that I always enjoyed," the former provost of Stanford University said in her State Department office the other day. "People are surprised that I go through budget reviews, but paying attention to detail is part of the challenge that comes with running an organization of 50,000 employees."
To change the world, Bush believes that he must change Washington. To save the world, many diplomats at the State Department believe that they must change the foreign policy visions conjured up in the White House. Rice now occupies the crucial middle ground in a clash of ideas and political cultures.

Despite her success in defusing tensions with allies abroad in her first seven months, Rice still invites skepticism from mid-level Foreign Service officers who bridle at the thought of their beloved State Department becoming "White House Annex 2."
...