Rice brings star power to education
She is immaculately dressed, as always. And she is relaxed, which is a change from her usual demeanor, as her thoughts turn to life after Jan. 20.
Condoleezza Rice may be the most disciplined person in this town of workaholics. Her mother Angelena advised her, "Always remember, if you're overdressed, it reflects badly on (other people); if you're underdressed, it reflects badly on you," according to a 2001 interview by The Washington Post. She operates with the steely control she learned as an ice skater and pianist.
But in a few weeks, Rice will have only herself to please, and that has had a liberating effect. She's leaving Washington and will return to Stanford University. If "Meet the Press" calls, she won't be in. "I have no desire to be shadow secretary of state," she told me.
This reminds me of Dean Rusk, another secretary of state who served during a divisive war. Rusk once described to me the immense relief he felt when he left office in 1969: The burdens of the world had come off his shoulders at last, and he could go home to Georgia.
Rice seems to take genuine pleasure in the arrival of Barack Obama as the first African-American president. She says of his election: "It is the strongest affirmation to date that America is what it says it is."
Rice has been thinking a lot about what her parents had to overcome to create the world in which she could dream such big dreams. They will be the subject of one of the two books she plans to write after she leaves, describing their role as "education evangelists" in the racially charged world of Birmingham, Ala.
"They believed in the transforming power of education," she says. And on this subject, of education and the American dream, the sometimes maddeningly optimistic Rice voices concern. "If we aren't capable of equipping students for the 21st century, we will turn inward," she says.
Talking about Obama, and what she calls "the continuum of the African-American experience," a smile comes over her face. She remembers how her father befriended the radical activist Stokely Carmichael, invited him to their home - and how people might have attacked her, as they did Obama, for her acquaintance with a communist agitator.
She's a superstar now and plans to apply her star power to education. "I'm an educator who took a detour," she says.
Rice's other book will be about foreign policy and may take more time. "It's the kind of period that needs a little distance," she says.
Update on Iran: The Bush administration had planned to announce the opening of an interest section in Tehran this month. That won't happen now. The story illustrates the broken connection that is the U.S.-Iranian relationship. An announcement set for September was delayed because of the Russian invasion of Georgia. But the proposal was back on track until a few weeks ago, when the administration became concerned about Iranian interference in negotiations with Iraq. It seemed the wrong time for an opening to Tehran that Sunni Arab allies warned would be seen as a concession. So now the issue of U.S.-Iranian relations will be handed over to the Obama administration. "We ran out of time," says one administration official. It's the most dangerous bit of unfinished business the new administration will inherit.
© 2008, Washington Post Writers Group