Condoleezza Rice: Warrior Princess, Diplomat, and a Class Act
Posted By Vicki McClure Davidson on May 8, 2009
By Vicki McClure Davidson * Frugal Café Blog Zone
Condoleezza Rice has been, and still is, a class act.
Sec. of State Condoleezza Rice arriving in Kabul, Afghanistan, 2006 | Photo credit: White House
With a résumé that makes most politicians’ pale by comparison and makes Barack Obama’s look a bit anemic (except for his position as US president, which trumps everything else), her list of accomplishments is impressive.
Professional Background & Education
Rice, born in Birmingham, Alabama in 1954, was a gifted student; by age 19, she received her first degree in Political Science from the University of Denver. She earned her Master’s degree from the University of Notre Dame in 1975 and her Doctor’s degree in 1981 from the University of Denver. She also has a doctorate in International Studies, which involved language training.
Rice served as the 66th US Secretary of State, and was the second in Pres. George W. Bush’s administration to hold the office. Rice was the first black woman, the second African American (after Colin Powell), and the second woman (after Madeleine Albright) to serve as Secretary of State. Rice was Pres. Bush’s National Security Advisor during his first term. In 1977, Rice worked in the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs under the Carter administration.
Prior to her move to politics, she was a political science professor at Stanford University where she served as Provost from 1993 to 1999. There, she won two of the highest teaching honors and was a member of the Center for International Security and Arms Control and a Senior Fellow of the Institute for International Studies. Her published works include the books Germany Unified and Europe Transformed (1995) with Philip Zelikow, The Gorbachev Era (1986) with Alexander Dallin, and Uncertain Allegiance: The Soviet Union and the Czechoslovak Army (1984), and numerous articles on Soviet and East European foreign and defense policy. From 1991 through 2001, she was director of the Chevron Corporation, one of the world’s largest and most powerful oil companies.
Condoleezza Rice meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov at a dinner in Moscow, 2006 | Photo credit: White House
Rice is an articulate diplomat, speaking fluent Russian, French, and Spanish, and she is also an accomplished concert-level pianist, mastering a handful of pieces and giving her first piano recital at age 4. She accompanied cellist Yo-yo Ma, playing a duet at Constitution Hall in April 2002 for the National Medal of Arts Awards.
Nicknames
Rice has been given a variety of nicknames. It’s believed that she earned her nickname “Warrior Princess” from her strength, oratory skills, and refined manners. It’s unclear who first gave her that nickname; Rice recalled in an interview that it was members of the press, but other associates have said it was someone on her staff. Personally, I think the nickname was originally spun-off from that late 1990s adventure TV show, Xena: Warrior Princess starring Lucy Lawless. G. W. Bush gave her the nickname “Guru.” Other nicknames include “Condi” and “The Steel Magnolia.”
Her unique birth name, Condoleezza, is a variation on the Italian musical term “con dolcezza”: to play “with sweetness.” Rice’s mother was also a pianist and a music and science teacher; her father, a Presbyterian minister and university administrator.
Condoleezza’s Childhood
She grew up during a volatile period of American history, during the civil rights movement and the race riots of the 1960s. Her parents, and millions of other blacks, were discriminated against in all areas of life, including voting. Rice has told the story that when her father tried to register as a Democrat in 1952, the registrar told him he had to guess the number of beans in a jar correctly before he could do so. His reaction to that was to join the Republican party.
From Times Online:
Rice’s mother refused to play by the Jim Crow rules. She stood her ground. One confrontation took place at a department store, where Angelena and Condi were browsing through dresses. Condi picked one she wanted to try on, and they walked towards a “whites only” dressing room. A saleswoman blocked their path and took the dress out of Condi’s hand. “She’ll have to try it on in there,” she said, pointing to a storage room.
Coolly, Angelena replied that her daughter would be allowed to try on her dress in a real dressing room or she would spend her money elsewhere. Angelena was composed, firm and resolved. Aware that this elegantly dressed black woman would not back down, the shop assistant decided that her commission was worth more than a public incident and ushered them into a dressing room as far from view as possible. “I remember the woman standing there guarding the door, worried to death she was going to lose her job,” said Rice.
Rice started learning French, music, figure skating, and ballet at age three. From an early age, she had trained for competitive ice skating, enjoying the structure of training, getting up at 4 am to practice before school. “I believe I may have learnt more from my failed figure-skating career than I did from anything else,” she once said. “Athletics gives you a kind of toughness and discipline that nothing else really does.”
Rice was raised to push herself academically and in all her endeavors, to never give up, to not let others’ opinions of her make her doubt herself. She was a gifted student and learned to read at an early age.
During the bloody civil unrest of Birmingham (she was friends with Denise McNair, a little girl who died in the tragic Birmingham church bombing) and other communities, she said that the strength and wisdom of her parents protected and guided her. “They explained to me carefully what was going on, and they did so without any bitterness. It was in the very air we breathed that education was the way out… Among all my friends, the kids I grew up with, there was… no doubt in our minds that we would grow up and go to colleges — integrated colleges — just like other Americans.”
Quotes from Interviews: Foreign Policy, Tyrants, Torture, Saddam Hussein
From a February 2003 interview: “Power matters. But there can be no absence of moral content in American foreign policy, and furthermore, the American people wouldn’t accept such an absence. Europeans giggle at this and say we’re naive and so on, but we’re not Europeans, we’re Americans—and we have different principles.”
Also from February 2003: “We do need to remind everybody that tyrants don’t respond to any kind of appeasement. Tyrants don’t respond to negotiation. Tyrants respond to toughness. And that was true in the 1930s and 1940s when we failed to respond to tyranny, and it is true today.”
At her Secretary of State confirmation hearing in January 2005: “The United States doesn’t and can’t condone torture. And I want to make very clear that that’s the view and the policy of the administration, the policy of the president, and that he’s made very clear to American personnel that we will not condone torture… under no circumstances should we or have we condoned torture.”
From a 2008 interview with Judy Woodruff of Bloomberg TV: “I am proud of the decision of this Administration to overthrow Saddam Hussein. I am proud of the liberation of 25 million Iraqis. And I’m proud to see an Iraq that is now emerging with a stronger government, a truly multiethnic, multi-sectarian government that’s about to have its second set of elections, that’s inviting private investment into Iraq, and that is making peace with its Arab neighbors.”
About Herself
Regarding her decision to leave the Democratic Party for the Republicans in 1980: “I found a party that sees me as an individual, not as part of a group. In America, with education and hard work, it really does not matter where you come from—it matters where you are going.”
Of herself, she has said, “I’m a really religious person, and I don’t believe that I was put on this earth to be sour, so I’m eternally optimistic about things.” She has also said, “I decided I’d rather be ignored than patronized.”
Pragmatic, intelligent, diplomatic, and conservative, she had many tough critics (and she still has many, particularly on her role in the Iraq War). She faced enormous challenges head-on with a level head, and received both praise and condemnation. Many liberals still hate her. But I believe she was an asset to the Bush administration, a champion for the American people.
Condoleezza Rice, no matter what anyone else says, I say you’re sorely missed these days. And, you’re still a class act.
Former Sec. of State Condoleezza Rice addresses misinformed student of the Bush Administration’s terrorist interrogation methods | Stanford University, April 2009
Sec. of State Condoleezza Rice Congratulates Obama on His Presidential Win | November 5, 2008
GayPatriot: “Do your homework, first:” Condi Confronts a Critic
Times Online: Condi: The girl who cracked the ice (includes passages extracted from Condi: The Condoleezza Rice Story by Antonia Felix published by Newmarket Press, New York.
*****
Balz, Dan (August 1, 2000). “The Republicans Showcase a Rising Star; Foreign Policy Fueled Rice’s Party Switch and Her Climb to Prominence”. Washington Post.
Robinson, James (1999-06-09). “Velvet-glove forcefulness: Six years of provostial challenges and achievements”. Stanford Report (Stanford University).
“Rice defends decision to go to war in Iraq”. CNN. Archived from the original on 2004-11-17.
About the author
Great post.
A truly amazing woman.
Condoleezza Rice on sports and her childhood: http://voice.paly.net/view_story.php?id=8464