More on Rice

This from the Guardian:

She was treated like a movie star wherever she went. Her face launched a thousand front pages. Her every word was news. Europe's leaders fell over themselves to welcome her. Germany's chancellor, Gerhard Schröder, looked like a besotted stage door fan. Her speech in Paris was the hottest ticket in town and her fleeting appearances in capital after capital merely enhanced the perception of glamour and power.

This doesn't sound exactly as if, and The Progressive Put it, Ms. Rice is coming across to everyone as "grating and supercilious to most everyone during her European sojourn." 

And then there is this from the Arizona Republic:

Following his meeting with Rice, German Chancellor Gerhard Schroder was described as "ebullient." He and the U.S. secretary had "very much agreed" on cooperation regarding Iraq, the preceding two years of unpleasantness over that nation notwithstanding.

French Foreign Minister Michel Barnier - a refreshing replacement for the culturally oppressive Dominique de Villepin of pre-Iraq war infamy - declared the discovery of "a new spirit that prevails between" the United States and France. And, for what it's worth, he referred to his new spiritual cousin as "Condi."

Rice's most impressive foray into formerly hostile French terrain, however, occurred Tuesday. She spoke at the Institute of Political Studies in Paris, directly addressing 500 French intellectuals and political elite - those policy-framing members of French society who most detest her boss.

"Ms. Rice was convincing, the bearer of simple and strong ideas, the Americans' ideas," observed a French corporate executive afterward. "She really is Mr. Bush's spokesman."

In point of fact our new Secretary of State is doing very well.  She is obviously doing Europe at a very good moment.  The Iraqi election and the sudden thaw in Israel/Palestinian negotiations both make it seem like the Bush Administration knew what it was doing the last several years, whereas the Euroweenies did not.