Things We'd Really Like To Ask Condoleezza Rice

I don't know about you, but I found Condoleezza Rice's recent comments to administrators of Historically Black Colleges curiously inconsistent with her normal, arms-length approach to black issues. I also found them a day late and several dollars short.

In case you didn't hear it, Ms. Rice, who served as National Security Advisor for George W. Bush, from 2001 through January, 2005, and as U.S. Secretary of State, from 2005 to the present, has just realized – all of a sudden – that black folks are significantly underrepresented in the U.S. State Department.

In fact, Condi, (as the President and her other close friends call her), recently took a break from her ongoing, high-intensity schedule of "shuttle diplomacy" to places such as Russia, Iraq, Afghanistan, Kenya, and Israel, to speak to the black college leaders, and here's what she said: "I want to see a Foreign Service that looks as if black Americans are part of this great country. I can go into a whole day of meetings at the State Department and rarely see anybody who looks like me."

Huh?

Madam Secretary, we really do need to talk...you mean to tell us that you were raised as an African-American female in "Jim Crow" Alabama, that one of your grade-school classmates was killed in the cowardly and unforgettable bombing at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, in 1963, that you hold degrees from the University of Denver, and from Notre Dame University, and that you served as the first African-American and first female Provost at Stanford University, but you didn't realize until two weeks ago – three months before the end of the Bush administration – that black folks are grossly underrepresented in the U.S. State Department, of which you are in charge?

It's not just a few of us, this time, Madam Secretary. On this one, I think virtually every thinking black person in America – and a substantial percentage of the rest of the entire country – are totally dumbfounded.

Let me see, it's September 2008, and you're scheduled to officially leave office in January of the coming year, and NOW you say that a more diverse diplomatic corps is absolutely necessary "if America is going to stand for the belief that multi-ethnic democracies can work."

I'd like to know when this news flash finally hit you, especially given the lofty circles in which you travel, especially given the fact that you have generally been seen, over the past eight years, as President Bush's closest friend and advisor. And here's one that really escapes me... if you happen to be the incumbent Secretary of State and you do happen to notice, finally, that your department seems not to have enough black officers, can't you just go out and hire some?

Madam Secretary, why didn't you think of all of this while George W. Bush was busy converting the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, over the past eight years, from an organization committed to fighting against racial discrimination to the government's leading critic of school desegregation and affirmative action? Did it ever come up in your personal conversations, perhaps while the two of you were just "kicking back," watching a football game?

Did you get even a little suspicious in 2004 when the President took steps to create a conservative majority on the eight-member Civil Rights Commission? Didn't it "send up a red flag" when he took two former Republicans, who had conveniently switched their party affiliations to "Independent," and added them to the four Republican conservatives who were already seated on the Commission?

Did it ever occur to you, while on one of those State Department missions to places such as Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, or to any other nation in the world with a significant black population, that, perhaps, having a few other senior U.S.officials of African descent as part of your team might be seen as progressive and a bit more culturally sensitive to the people on the other side of the negotiating table?

If you really ever were concerned about having appropriate levels of black inclusion in the State Department, and in other senior-level federal positions, didn't it make you nervous when the Civil Rights Commission, following its conservative make-over, cancelled its plans to investigate whether the White House was allocating sufficient budget dollars for civil rights enforcement? Didn't you get even a little apprehensive when the new, conservative-dominated Commission decided that it really didn't want to pursue the previous Commission's plans to investigate whether there was adequate funding in place for financial aid for minority college students? Didn't it bother you when the new Commission decided not to investigate whether the U.S. Census Bureau really does engage in a pattern of undercounting blacks and other minorities, thereby depriving them of fair levels of political representation and federal spending?

Didn't you get even a bit suspicious when the new, Bush-appointed Civil Rights Commission failed to investigate--at all--the claims that black voters in Ohio were provided inadequate numbers of voting machines during the 2004 presidential elections?

In an attempt, during your speech, to provide a bit of hope to the HBCU leaders, Secretary Rice, I noticed that you did promise that 400 new Foreign Service officers would be hired next year. That's "next year," as in the year AFTER you're out of office. And, even then, it was clear that you didn't specifically pledge that the plan would ensure expanded black inclusion in the State Department.

How could any of this have been a surprise to you, Madam Secretary, when you also had access to a very public 2004 report from the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission that pointed out that, in the federal government, whites, who represent 66.4 percent of the national population, hold 86.08 percent of senior pay-level positions (the top 1.5% of federal salary grades), while blacks, who constitute 12.8 percent of all Americans, hold just 6.5 percent of those top level positions (not even a half of a percentage point improvement over a nine-year period)?

Based on available information, the Administration's track record for providing contract opportunities to black businesses is even worse.

My last question to you, Secretary Rice, is "now what?"

Do you continue to make the point you just discovered in future public speaking engagements -- even when you're not talking to black audiences?

Do you stroll, casually, now, into your "best friend's" office over in the West Wing and encourage him, as a friend, to finally develop a plan for diversifying federal employment and federal contracting opportunities that will significantly include African Americans?

Are the two of you that tight?

Madam Secretary, most of us were initially very proud when you were named National Security Advisor, and, then, Secretary of State. We thought it was historically important when you became, in effect, the highest ranking black person in the U.S. government. By all accounts, you've has done a commendable job as Secretary of State, under very trying conditions -- essentially not much better or not much worse than those who held the job before you. Of that, no doubt, we can still be proud.

But if we expected any of the authority of your position to filter down to enhance opportunities for African Americans, then we were all sadly mistaken and a bit confused by your all-too-late recognition that you've been virtually the only significant black player in the State Department during your entire tenure.

Regrettably, you didn't think that such things came with your overall responsibility ---until about two weeks ago.


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