What I learned about Condi

Character, not ideology, is the key to understanding this remarkable politician, says Anne Applebaum, who has seen the US Secretary of State’s cool charm up close

A long time ago, before George W. Bush was elected, and before ‘Condi’ was an internationally recognised nickname, someone who knew Condoleezza Rice in one of her previous incarnations told me that the thing to remember about her is that she is definitely not a token, but that because people assume she is a token, they always underestimate her. A black woman Republican! From Alabama! Who speaks Russian! Of course she’s overrated, they say — until they wake up one morning and discover she’s taken their job, or been promoted over their heads, or got the President’s ear first. It’s happened over and over again on Condi’s road to where she is today — which is to say, to one of the most important jobs in the world.

Because she’s a black woman Republican from Alabama who speaks Russian, Condi is also sometimes mischaracterised as an ideologue: surely she couldn’t have got where she is, braving all that male chauvinism and all that racism, without some fervent belief in neoconservatism, or neorealism, or whatever kind of ‘ism’ is currently in vogue. But that, too, misses the point about Condi, a woman who has never adhered to any ideology in particular. In fact, the key to understanding Condi is to forget about her sex or her race (although it’s hard to do, since lately, teasing those who suspect her of having presidential aspirations, she talks a lot about her childhood in segregated Birmingham), stop trying to work out what her geopolitical orientation might be on those grounds, and stop trying to pigeonhole her. She’s a classic pragmatist, and like all pragmatists her views are, well, pragmatic. And that means that they change over time.