Rice to visit Camp Pendleton today
"She wants to visit Camp Pendleton and thank the Marines because they are at the forefront of the global war on terror," said base spokesman 1st Lt. Lawton King.Australia's minister of foreign affairs, Alexander Downer, will join Rice for the afternoon event during which they also will greet Australian troops training at the base.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18812753/
By MARK WALKER - Staff Writer
NCTimes.net
May 24, 2007
"It's kind of a hometown type of visit so the secretary can talk with the Marines and she and Mr. Downer can visit with the Australian troops," said Kurtis Cooper, a State Department spokesman.
Rice and Downer are expected to be on the base for most of the afternoon. Before arriving, they are scheduled to visit the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Library in Simi Valley.
Rice will not speak directly with reporters, nor will she grant any interviews, according to an announcement from base officials. The media will be allowed to record the event under strict security measures.
Today's visit to the West Coast's largest Marine base is part of a two-day swing through California for the secretary. On Thursday, Rice heads to the northern part of the state for a visit to Hewlett-Packard in Palo Alto and a school in Menlo Park.
With the Bush administration in the final 19 months of its term, a grass-roots group of Republicans has been traveling the country and lobbying Rice to enter the race for the 2008 GOP presidential nomination.
In March, Rice told Fox News that she is flattered but resisting the draft movement, which has been dubbed "Think Condi." She has no desire to run for president or vice president, she told Fox.
Crystal Dueker, a spokeswoman for the group, said from her Ohio home Tuesday that the movement is "keeping the door open for her -- the same kind of philosophy as the Draft Fred Thompson or Draft Newt Gingrich" movements.
"We see Condi as having the right skills we need in the next administration," Dueker said during a telephone interview, citing Rice's experience in foreign policy and national security, as well as her support of the Second Amendment and its right to bear arms provision.
President George Bush named Rice as the nation's 66th secretary of state in January 2005, elevating the former Stanford professor from her role as national security adviser.
Before joining the administration, Rice served for six years as Stanford's chief budget and academic officer. She joined the university in 1981 as a political science professor.
The native of Birmingham, Ala., will travel to Berlin, Vienna, and Madrid from May 29 to June 1, during which she will attend a foreign minister's conference and take part in a round-table discussion on peace and security in the Middle East.