Richard Grenell Susan Rice Ineffective at UN: Damning Review of Susan Rice - Wildly Ineffective

Richard Grenell, the Ambassador to the UN during the Bush Administration wrote a damning review of Obama's Ambassador, Susan Rice. Writing in the Huffington Post, he said Rice had been "wildly ineffective" this past year. Grenell was extraordinarily frank. The "wildly ineffective" comment is just the beginning.

 

Susan Rice

Grenell charged that Rice has been a social butterfly [my interpretation] and ignored her duties on the UN Security Council. Mr. Grenell, as experienced as he is, misses the point. Rice and Obama have no intention of stirring up the Security Council. How uncomfortable would that be? The trouble-makers are all Islamic Countries, with the exception of North Korea, and the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) runs the place. The Council will not take action on Iran or North Korea so, why bother, unless showing up if you aren't sanctioning Iran?

Here's some snippets from The Hill:

Richard Grenell, who served eight years in the Bush administration as spokesman for four U.S. ambassadors at the U.N., wrote Monday on the Huffington Post that Rice has been more active "in the social scene of Washington and the White House" than at the U.N., as suggested by a Security Council Report study that notes a marked decrease in activity at the Security Council over the past year.

That study in the Report, which is affiliated with Columbia University, said Council decisions dropped by 26 percent in the Obama administration's first year to the lowest level since 1991.
"For an Administration that promised to utilize the UN and improve our reputation around the world, its dinner-party circuit strategy isn't making America more secure," Grenell wrote.

Grenell mentioned Rice's "larger than normal DC-based staff," plus her 200-person NY based staff, which he says she spends little time with. He spoke of her Annie Leibovitz "glamour spread in Vogue Magazine, shot in an empty Security Council Chamber. She didn't show for the Council's Haiti crisis meeting to expand the UN's peacekeeping mission, and failed to call an emergency meeting to put request more help for the devasted country

...it was UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon that came to the Security Council to request more troops - the American Ambassador hadn't bothered."

Nevertheless, Rice said she has had a very productive year.