The attached link will take you to the transcript and commentary from a dinner session with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice’s lawyer, John Bellinger. It was a fascinating and important session. I have provided all that was considered “on the record”. I can’t provide what was discussed off the record — but I think that whether Bellinger’s efforts in the arena of “international law” are more “framing” or are genuinely substantive, the fact that these efforts are being presented as a “Rice initiative” makes them quite important, and perhaps even the punctuation point in a new foreign policy direction for the Bush administration.

I hope you find this material useful.

All the best,

Steve Clemons

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Steven Clemons
Sr. Fellow & Director, American Strategy Program, New America Foundation
and
Publisher, www.TheWashingtonNote.com
202-986-0342 phone 202-986-3696 fax
clemons@newamerica.net Email

http://www.thewashingtonnote.com/archives/001353.php

The Washington Note — 18 April 2006

Transcript from Session with Legal Adviser to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice:
JOHN BELLINGER Argues Case for International Law