Letters: Mixed messages on Susan Rice

Re “The Rice choice ...,” Opinion, Nov. 29

Whether or not they won reelection or were even running, Republican senators who lined up to oppose U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice’s potential nomination as secretary of State look increasingly like lame ducks.

Regardless of their stated reasons — which run the gamut from describing Rice as insufficiently candid in her description of the attack in Benghazi, Libya, to the contradictory opinion that she was too blunt on other occasions — it all comes down to obstructive behavior.

These senators are clearly trying to get in a few last licks before their numbers decline as a result of the 2012 election — conduct that is all too reminiscent of an army in retreat. Having lost the battle, it destroys everything in its path on the way out of town.

Joan Walston

Santa Monica

I am tired of references to the “intelligence community” while all sides fight over who put Rice in front of all those cameras and had her spout misinformation.

She is merely the messenger, but the fact she agreed to say what she did and mislead the public does not bode well for her skills as a spokeswoman.

That aside, we need to know the actual person in the intelligence community who wrote these talking points, the actual person who edited them and the actual person who handed them to Rice. These people have names. They are not a community.

Colin Dangaard

Malibu

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