Preaching to the choir

I was especially mean to Karen Hughes the other day. Hey, according to the tenor of today's upbeat news evaluations of her visit, maybe she didn't do so badly on her maiden foray "over there". She had the connections (after all, she "traveled aboard a plane belonging to the D.C. Air National Guard, which often takes congressional delegations abroad."). She "listened." She "did the best" job she could. And she promised to talk to George, just as soon as she got home from work.

A slight change in tone from a few days earlier, when reports seemed to implicate Ms. Hughes' unpreparedness and tendency to stay "on message". Hmmmmm. Which slant to believe?

I'd like to think that our latest "good will ambassador" actually might succeed on her mission. God knows, our image abroad could use a serious facelift. And if Karen were out there mixing it up with the common citizens of the region (the ones, by the way, that are so easily motivated to strap on explosive belts and come'a'callin'), that whole "working mom" thing could actually be a plus, and I'd have a little faith that she possibly "opened the door to a conversation."

Except for one small thing.

For the major part of her visit, Ms. Hughes wasn't mingling with the masses. Instead, she apparently was chillin' with the usual gang of government representatives, when a great deal of our present image problem stems from the Administration's current relationship with those very government representatives. CBS News says,

This week she attracted the kind of attention usually accorded a secretary of state, not someone who holds the rank of ambassador... Because the relationship between Hughes and the president is so well known, it wasn't surprising she met with many officials above her rank - in Egypt, the prime minister; in Saudi Arabia, the king; and in Turkey, with the foreign minister.

Excuse me, but isn't "Rollin' up to the palace in a motorcade" precisely the visual that's made us so unpopular in these countries? If that's the face Karen has been assigned to show to the world, well... why bother? Why waste the considerable expense to just reiterate the ol' Party line, a line that the majority of Americans aren't buying any more? Why add fuel to the fire?

Statements like,

She said she plans to brief the president and Congress about her trip... She dismissed, however, any notion that there was a lack of perspective on the part of the administration in the run-up to the Iraq war, arguing that the president routinely heard the viewpoints of other leaders...

...show that Hughes is not necessarily listening as much as she claims to be. She's repeating those tried and true talking points, an approach which statistically doesn't reflect the attitude of most American citizens toward our Middle Eastern policy. She's selling an image of the U.S. that's not, by popular consensus, the one we want sold. And, based on the titles and bank accounts of those in her appointment book, she's essentially preaching to the choir.

Oh, I'm trying not to be mean to Karen. I know she's just a patriotic working mom, out there spreading the Gospel of Saint George. But from Macbeth to The Manchurian Candidate to any case file in the Department of Family Services, I've also come to know that some moms aren't what they seem to be. Some moms lie. Some moms facilitate. Some moms scheme and manipulate and do the wrong thing.

Not that I'd ever say that about you, Karen. But you've gotta do better. And until you do, I just ain't buyin' it.