Amen Joanne:

What a perfect metaphor for the utter contempt this Administration has shown for American working men and women. It really makes you cringe when you think that this is the crew that will never hesitate to put its spin on what it means to be a loyal and patriotic citizen in this country. Heaven forbid that respect for our brothers and sisters in the workplace should not be a fundamental component of real and genuine patriotism.

I really don't think people even realize how far to the right this Administration has taken us relative to even prior GOP administrations, including Reagan's, when it comes to workplace issues.

Bruce

Wow. Sounds like a scene from Comedy Central's "Lil' Bush." I haven't found that show funny. Maybe because these guys are impossible to parody.

thosethingswesay.blogspot.com

Why she is GW's wife, or didn't you catch that Freudian slip by Miss Condi, and as a conjoined compassionate Conservative would never dole out anything but cake.

What do you base THAT on?  That is an assumption with absolutely nothing to back it up!  Condosleeza's words speak for themselves.  If the Secretary of State can't be diplomatic to a saleslady who has absolutely NO relative power, I guess we can see why our status in the world is so abysmal.

Jan

I'm gonna defend the writer. There is always a possibility that the clerk was condescending. We cannot deny that could have occurred.

Nevertheless it does not excuse Condi's behavior.

I think the alternative explanation carries more weight - but still, the writer has a point.

Seems like they picked women like this. Think of goodling and others. Ready to put others down. Call them on the carpet.

Seems like they had one mold for men, another for women.

(meant to reply to Jemand von Niemand - but it didn't happen that way.... not that I'm gonna complain about it and put anyone down here....)

I can only surmise that Prof. Coit Blacker is hard-up for friends. Any acquaintance that acted as described would not qualify for the status of best friend.

I doubt this story very much. It is hard for me to imagine her gratuitously insulting anybody. I don't like the Bush policies or Rice's role in them either, but ...

Of course, the liberal retelling of the story is a complete lie, like most Democratic Party fabrications about Dr. Rice.

Rice was shopping near Palo Alto back in her Stanford Days when a white salesperson insisted on showing Dr. Rice the costume jewelry instead of the real thing. When Dr. Rice insisted on being shown the real jewelry, the salesperson remarked that Dr. Rice was "black trash" under her breath.

Rice wouldn't let that pass for one instant. She immediately upbraided the salesperson by suggesting that :

"Let's get one thing straight. You're behind the counter because you have to work for the minimum wage. I'm on this side because I make considerably more."

She then said. "Now I suggest you do your job. Show me the real jewelry".

This was a white sales attendant assuming that a woman could only afford the costume jewelry because of the color of her skin. You intellectual car battery thieves are buying the Marie Antoionette version of the story because you are too effing lazy to do basic research, and because it follows a Narrative that you don't want to question.

Sander Vinocur once wrote that the Internet is in need of Editing. This blog post is living proof.

Jo Ann Mort deserves a good hiding. Or at least deserves to sit down and write a letter of apology to Condi Rice and racist store clerks everywhere for misrepresenting them as martyrs.

What a bunch of Clydes you people are! You people hate Condi Rice so much you're reduced to endorsing petty racism from a jewelry store attendant. What the hell's going to happen when Giuliani brings home the Electoral College on Election Night next year?

Here's a hanky in advance for your good cry....

"History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it."-Winston S. Churchill

thanks for the clarification, but you still get a 0 for being an asshat.

Whether you doubt it or not, look at the source -- and this, from someone at least a close 'friend'. Try to imagine what people who know her and *don't* much care for her would say.

But, do your own research. Let us know what you find.

Trust me, I'm being both truthful and accurate. The story is well known around Stanford and among people who know Dr. Rice's history, which you apparently do not. Sheesh, it was published in an article about her back in 2001, before the attacks.

You just don't want to believe anything but your own narrative, which doesn't surprise me at all.

Typical of the partisan hackery that passes for analysis around here. Things could be worse. This could be Democratic Underground. You're just angry that your narrative isn't what it was cracked up to be. That's okay. Imagine my disappointment when Bill Clinton kicked our asses in 1996. Of course, he only beat Bob Dole, so that softened the blow a bit.

"History will be kind to me, for I intend to write it."-Winston S. Churchill

Race wasn't an issue in this discussion, until davcb brought it up -- in an honest way; I think it's really being used as a red herring by commenters who would grasp at any excuse to, well ... defend the indefensible, meaning the crew which Rice is an integral part of.

You can't paint Rice as someone who has been engaged in a principled, disciplined struggle against racism on the one hand, and excuse her behavior because of it on the other.

It comes down to this: Either the salesperson *was* simply a racist idiot -- or Rice's response was out of proportion and inappropriate no matter what her color was.

Rice reportedly is no bargain-huntress; she looks to very high-end shops for her merchandise -- the Ferragamo store in Midtown Manhattan at the height of the Katrina disaster an all-too-visible case in point, and which says something about her personality and character very similar to the central example in Jo-Ann's post.

It's possible -- but not probable -- that Rice went to 'Your Discount Diamond Center' on the day in question. And it is possible, but not probable that any higher-end or exclusive jeweler would employ any salesperson who would treat anyone of color in an insulting or offhanded manner.

Even if this occurred in her Stanford days -- again, Possible, but not Probable. I live in the Bay Area, and people who live and work here are fairly sensitive to cultural and racial issues; so are our employers -- and that's good.

If this incident occurred after 2003, then it is possible that the salesperson didn't like Rice's politics. This seems much more probable to me.

In which case, if they made Rice feel slighted, that wasn't appropriate -- but, Rice didn't handle it as a diplomat might. She might have simply said, 'I'd had in mind something a bit more -- expensive', or, 'Excuse me; may I speak to the manager, please?'

But -- no. She escalated -- and the way she did it was to say, effectively, "I am someone -- you're nothing." And to choose that response out of a range of options says something else about Rice as well.

Rice is an arrogant, ignorant tool. She deserves to be short-shrifted in service, anywhere, in my book.

I saw the same quote from Haaretz earlier, and nope, no mention of those special little details -- there or anywhere else.

I'm always amused at the lack of citations when trolls create their own realities -- possibly because fantasies have no footnotes.

Well, you know -- liars do prosper... for a while, anyway.

Charming to see the GOP playing "the race card" anyway, when it means a black person's point of view. The don't get the chance often.

John 

http://www.haberarts.com/

A lightweight teacher-pleaser. She won't leave a mark, her policies aren't any such thing, only vapid hand-waving.

OK, rant over. I like Winston Churchill on wealth, 1909:

The best way to make private property secure and respected is to bring the processes by which it is gained into harmony with the general interests of the public. We are often assured by sagacious persons that the civilization of modern States is largely based upon respect for the rights of private property. If that be true, it is also true to say that respect cannot be secured, and ought not, indeed, to be respected, unless property is associated in the minds of the great mass of the people with ideas of justice and of reason.

It is, therefore, of the first importance to the country -to any country -- that there should be vigilant and persistent efforts to prevent abuses, to distribute the public burdens fairly among all classes, and to establish good laws governing the methods by which wealth may be acquired.

What the heck is a "Clyde"?  Are you lashing out at the Scots?

What the hell's going to happen when Giuliani brings home the Electoral College on Election Night next year?

Well, when they arrive at his pad he'll offer them spumoni and Strega.  He might get a vote or two that way, but we'll put the bastards that caved-in in jail along with the rest.

Save your hanky, pardner...you'll need it. 

So just how do you know that the version you've posted here is accurate? Were there any witnesses to this exchange? Anyone ever go back and get the clerk's side of the story?

-Dave Adams-

I think it is safe to assume that this refers to the same Coit D. Blacker.

Both at Stanford, both Soviet specialists. I'm sure it is a very small world.

Trust me, I'm being both truthful and accurate.
Why would we not trust you when you provide so many reliable links and references? Let me guess: Bill O'Reilly? He never lies. Ann Coulter? Michael Savage? Drudge? Wait, don't tell me. Rush? Oh, I know. Scaife.

Oh, Good God, this is par for the course for liberals.

Says it all, doesn't it?  Hugh Hewitt couldn't have said it better.  :-)

aMike

And this is the point:

the defense offered does not exonerate Ms. Rice

It does do far more to explain why she would slip and let her prejudice show in public ... but to basically say, "look lady, we are not defined by the color of our skin, but by the size of our paychecks" is confirmation of the charge being made by those who use the story to attack her.

It is hard to see why those who offer it as a defense of Ms. Rice would see it as an effective rebuttal unless they share Ms. Rice's prejudice ... "we have money, so we are better than people working for minimum wage" ... that is, of course, unless they are simply intellectually lazy and did not bother to think it through.

I lived in the SF Bay Area for 30 years.
"Around Palo Alto" is meaningless...certainly she was not in East Palo Alto...which leaves upscale Palo Alto or across the bay in SF...but let's say she was at a mall in PA...she was a full prof at the Farm...your version is interesting...but doesn't pass the giggle test...why would Condi be at a store in a downscale mall? Why would she go to a store that sells costume jewlery?

No, she would have gone to an upscale mall, to an upscale store, and she'd have been dressed in a manner appropirate for a full prof at Stanford...and the clerks would be well used to such people and would be on commission, with the minimum wage as a kind of "extra"...

and even if it were the weekend and she was, perhaps, wearing a "casual" outfit...I don't see Condi ever stepping out in torn hip-huggers, low-rise, flip-flops and having a cell glued to her ear or doing anything to suggest she can't afford the more expensive items...

No, the story makes too much sense...arrogant, authoritarrian...condescending...hyper-scenseative...crude...banal...a perfect republican grande dame...a regular aristo, circa 1788...unconcerned with the growing number of menacing looks along the parade route...

Is it me, or have we experienced an uptick in trolling of late?

Something's going on here... And it's not about the thread.

Seek Wisdom

The same thought occured to me, but god knows we've seen this woman condescend to reporters, citizens, other world leaders, Senators, congressmen. Behind the scenes accounts (Suskind, Clarke) indicate that this woman is as baselessly arrogant and full of herself as Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and all the other deluded, entitled incompetents in this administration when faced with a reality-based dissent from what they want to do.
I was just reading through an old profile of Brent Scowcroft, who was her mentor in gov't and nat'l security, and she was pretty condescending to him when he tried to explain that she (they) didn't know what the hell they were getting into in Iraq. The only people at that dinner meeting were Rice and Scowcroft, and one of them told people that she was dismissive of him.

I don't believe either account.

Rice was shopping near Palo Alto back in her Stanford Days when a white salesperson insisted on showing Dr. Rice the costume jewelry instead of the real thing. When Dr. Rice insisted on being shown the real jewelry, the salesperson remarked that Dr. Rice was "black trash" under her breath.

Section9: prison slang for convicted pedophiles kept in confinement for their own protection. Geez. Talk about a nickname choice.

Okay, that's the goofball version. Now what's the real story? Seriously, some halfbaked asshat comes in with his retardo crap, I'm supposed to take it seriously?

When did this incident take place. Who were the participants? Do we have the salesgirls side of it? Are we seriously supposed to expect that a salesgirl could get caught mumbling 'black trash' and not get busted out of her job?

This is from section 9? That says it all.

Val,

"retardo crap" heh heh heh :-)

I'm not looking to argue the veracity of the story, but frankly, it seems like too good a story to be real. I'm not saying it's not real, nor am I saying it is. It's just a little suspect.

That said, I believe Condi Rice has distinguished herself as hopelessly out of her depth as both National Security Advisor and as Secretary of State. That she is churlish, selfish, or unkind, is just a footnote to her failure in public service. Perhaps if I were as bad as she is in my job, I might snipe at innocent bystanders such as sales clerks.

In a way, that makes her a little sympathetic. Unfortunately, her chosen profession is too impactful for a clueless hack, which mitigates any sympathy I might have for her.

Back to my point: Condi needn't be rude, classist, self-important, or cruel to be deserving of our contempt. Her unimaginable incompetance is her defining feature.
/c

In the blogosphere every one is an expert, so no one is an expert.

Condi Rice has a favored anecdote of how her paternal granfather obtained his education based on faith, family and education but fails to realize that her Grandfather Rice succeeded because of a quota system. She is justly proud of him because of his intelligence, determination and character which were greater than that of most young men of his time, black or white. Nonetheless, if he had been required to compete for a seat at college on the basis of his then attainments he would have been shut out. Instead he applied to a segregated college which in effect has a 100% quota for blacks and went on to prove what he could accomplish. If he had had to compete on the basis of what he knew coming in against all the young me of his generaton, he would have failed to get into college. If he had been provided with access to education he would undoubtedly succeeded but he had been denied access and it is still the case in our society that blacks do not have the same access to education as do whites.

I'll agree with you on her stint as Sec State, but the whole "Bin Lauden Determined to Strike Within US," followed by not remembering her unscheduled July meeting with Tenent, well that can only be charitably called a royal f*ck up. I guess if you consider it the defining moment of the Bush presidency, then maybe she gets props for throwing her boss a bone.

/c

In the blogosphere every one is an expert, so no one is an expert.

Proctor's Department Store???(as in proctology)

But I've figured it out (ahem):  Rice spotted a piece of tinsel in the case, and asked to see it.  The salesperson told her it was cheap costume jewelery, so Rice puts the spin on to cover her embarassment. Grover Norquist just happened to be walking nearby on his way to purchase some tax-deductable boxer shorts, and he heard the whole exchange.  We know the rest of this sad story.

Neoboho