This one's so funny, I don't know where to begin. Condi is reassuring the Europeans (did I fall asleep and miss her anointment as Secretary of State?):

The United States is no global bully, and disagreement between President Bush and U.S. allies doesn't mean their opinions aren't valued, his top foreign policy adviser says.

"We need allies and need them badly," national security adviser Condoleezza Rice said in a July 31 interview with ZDF German television.

....Rice said differences of opinion are bound to happen, and that too much should not be read into them when they occur.

"Occasionally, we'll have differences," she said in the interview. "But that does not mean that the United States does not value its allies, does not value the opinions of its allies. And it, most especially, does not mean that we don't need allies."

Rice also rejected the interviewer's comparison of the United States to the Roman Empire, which sought to acquire foreign countries.

"The United States has no imperial ambitions," she said.

If a historical analogy is to be made, Rice points to the post-World War II period, when the United States helped create institutions such as NATO, spearheaded the Marshall Plan and helped rebuild Germany.

....Rice acknowledged disagreement between the United States and other countries over how to handle Iraq, but said there was no disputing the fact that Saddam Hussein was a threat to the world.

"But that Iraq was a threat, that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction, that Iraq had used those weapons of mass destruction on its neighbors and its own people, that Iraq had ambitions in the volatile region of the Middle East and was therefore a danger to international security, these were shared premises of the entire international community," she said.

....."The case against Iraq was not just an issue of American intelligence," Rice said. "It was an issue, also, of intelligence services around the world -- of U.N. reports that there were large quantities of missing chemical and biological agents, of defectors, including Saddam Hussein's own brother-in-laws, who had left the country and revealed major weapons programs. No, there is no issue of credibility here."

Psst, Condi! The difference is, the Marshall Plan was an actual plan. As to credibility - well, should you be carrying the banner on that one?
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