Inappropriate Content: Madame Secretary

Condolezza Rice is the new Secretary of State.

I am simply ignoring the political chatter on this.

Bush is not nominating Rice because she's a woman, or because she's black; he's not nominating her to clear out the mess at Foggy Bottom; he's not nominating her because he's thinking of her chances in 2008.

He trusts her. She has been his one of his closest foreign policy advisers for his entire administration. He respects how smart and capable he is and he considers her part of his inner circle. The Chicago Tribune:

When the younger Bush ran for president in 2000, [Rice] schooled him on international affairs. He named a rise on his Texas ranch "Balkan Hill" because Rice once explained Balkan history in the middle of a 4-mile hike.

Think for a moment about Dick Cheney, Kathy Hughes, Andy Card, Alberto Gonzales (to a lesser extent) and Ms. Rice. They are all smart, capable people who have consistently demonstrated absolute personal loyalty to the President of the United States.

Bush is surrounding himself with this circle even more now than he did before. And to his credit he has chosen these people without much consideration of their political viability. To his dis-credit (if I may abuse the English language) Bush has not shown much interest in inviting people who disagree with him inside.

The Sec State thing illustrates this. Colin Powell has been the perfect "loyal opposition." He has been willing to lay it on the line for Bush (the UN speech) while—as far as we can tell—never hesitating to speak up in cabinet meetings and share a differing opinion.

Rice is far more like Cheney: shaping his policy when the President is still making up his mind; but never questioning a decision once it's been made. Unfortunately, the result of that sort of governance is seldom as good as the Tom Clancy books would make it seem.

So we can ignore all the political crap about appointing a black woman. President Bush certainly will. The good news is that the President will continue to appoint people he trusts to follow him without thinking too much about the political considerations.

That's the bad news, too.