Washington Week: Student Voices (O)

Rice plans return to Stanford to write, teach
By Theo Milonopoulos
The Stanford Daily Stanford
May 23, 2008

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice suggested Thursday that she would likely be returning to Stanford after she completes her service in the Bush administration, saying she looked forward to writing about her public service experience and returning to the classroom.

Speaking at a news conference with British Foreign Secretary David Miliband at the Google campus in Mountain View, Rice said she views the Silicon Valley as her “natural habitat.”

“I have been at Stanford since 1981,” said Rice, who is currently on leave from the University. “I had a life long before being national security advisor and being secretary of state. I expect to have a life after.”

Rice said she hopes she will have an opportunity to pursue writing and reflect on her experience serving in the Bush administration.

“This has been a fundamentally different period in American history and a period of great consequence,” Rice said. “And it’s not something you can reflect on from within.”

Rice said she also hopes to resume her previous practice of coordinating policy simulations that allow students to adopt roles as high-level decision-makers in the executive branch and craft policies that respond to mock events that mirror real-world security challenges. Rice said she hopes students will “get a little taste of how it’s actually not so easy to make those decisions.”

“I look forward to having an opportunity in the classroom again to discuss the dilemmas that we’ve faced, particularly since September 11,” Rice said.

If Rice were to come back to the Farm immediately after her service as secretary of state, her return would closely follow the controversial appointment of former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld as a distinguished visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution. The appointment of the former Bush administration official sparked considerable uproar among many students, faculty and staff members who objected to some of the decisions he made during his tenure, particularly those related to the conduct of the Iraq War.

“Universities aught to be places in which all points of view are both represented and welcomed,” Rice said. “If universities are not open to views, no matter how controversial, I don’t know where the practices of the freedom of ideas will be carried out.”

“I was provost at Stanford,” Rice added. “And if there’s one thing I defended, and defended unconditionally, it was the right of the faculty to hold whatever view they have and to express it freely.”

Rice said she does not anticipate a large public outcry against her return.

“We’ll see if people want me back,” Rice said. “I think so.”

Rice’s remarks came during a two-day trip with Miliband through Silicon Valley, where the officials toured high-tech firms and received briefings on renewable energy development.

During her remarks at Google’s headquarters, Rice defended the interrogation tactics against terrorist suspects approved by the Bush administration in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks. Although she refused to discuss internal deliberations within the administration, Rice acknowledged that “a lot has happened, and a lot has evolved in these years” since the attacks.

“As the United States did before, it’s going to continue to live up to its laws domestically as well as to its international obligations,” Rice said. “And I think Americans expect the president to do whatever he can within the law to protect Americans.”

Rice also discussed the efforts of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and an international coalition of industrialized countries to persuade Iran to halt its enrichment and reprocessing activities.

“One of the strongest parts of our policy has been to require Iran to be fully transparent with the IAEA, which should have the right to the full array of inspections in Iran,” Rice said. “If Iran has peaceful intent, as they say, then they should have no problem with the International Atomic Energy Agency having complete, absolute and total access, and the word that is coming out is that that is not being provided to the IAEA.”

Putting politics aside, Rice said she was inspired by the spirit of creativity and innovation that encapsulates Silicon Valley.

“I look forward to the date when I can be here on a more regular basis,” she said.

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