Can Condi Read?

Just asking. This is liberating, I can say whatever I want about Condi Rice without any fear of reprisal because she won’t read it. I don’t think she reads anything. So here goes: Condi Rice is fat! There I said it. Now let’s wait for the response ……. nope nothing.

Just a little fun at Condi’s expense. But why am I so certain she doesn’t read? Take a look at this:

“I don’t know anyone who wasn’t caught off guard by Hamas’ strong showing,” said Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, referring to the landslide victory of the Islamic Hamas party in the January 25 Palestinian elections. Hamas won 76 out of 132 seats in the Palestinian legislature, compared to 43 seats for the ruling Fatah party.

“I’ve asked why nobody saw it coming and I hope that we will take a hard look, because it does say something about perhaps not having had a good enough pulse on the Palestinian population,” she told reporters on January 29.

The problem is that her own State Department’s intelligence analysts predicted exactly that Hamas was so popular that it could win an election. Here is what they said in a January 2006 pre-election assessment:

“When the parties [Hamas and Fatah] are directly compared, likely voters tend to see Hamas as more qualified to clean up corruption, resist occupation, and uphold societal values”

That’s pretty clear. How about this:

“A lack of hope in the peace process may also contribute to support for Hamas. Likely voters who have little or no hope that there will be a peaceful resolution to the conflict clearly prefer Hamas (30%) to Fateh (12%).”

Or this:

“The likely success of Hamas at the polls reflects the long-term rise of public trust in the party. The proportion in the January survey who say they trust Hamas matches the historic high of 27%, first seen in spring 2005, and represents a 6 point increase since November.”

Now none of this actually predicts a Hamas win, but you’d have to be pretty thick not to get the idea that a Hamas win was possible. And our Condi’s not thick.

Clearly she just doesn’t read.

BTW: Thanks to Secrecy News at the Federation of American Scientists Project on Government Secrecy for the quotes given above!