What Bush means by "diplomacy."

Condi Rice is going to the Mideast, and before she goes, she wants to make one thing clear:

She doesn't want a cease-fire.

God, how I wish I was kidding.

WASHINGTON - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice rejected the "false promise" of an immediate cease-fire in the spreading war between Israel and Hezbollah on Friday and said she would seek long-term peace during a trip to the Mideast beginning Sunday.

The top U.S. diplomat defended her decision not to meet with Hezbollah leaders or their Syrian backers during her visit.

"Syria knows what it needs to do, and Hezbollah is the source of the problem," Rice said as she previewed her trip, which begins with a stop in Israel.

Rice said the United States is committed to ending the bloodshed, but not before certain conditions are met. The Bush administration has said that Hezbollah must first turn over the two Israeli soldiers whose capture set off the 10-day-old violence, and stop firing missiles into Israel.

"We do seek an end to the current violence, we seek it urgently. We also seek to address the root causes of that violence," Rice said. "A cease-fire would be a false promise if it simply returns us to the status quo."

Understand now? A cease-fire wouldn't solve all the problems, so they might as well keep shooting.

"A cease-fire would be a false promise"? It would ALSO be a lot fewer DEAD people. If a truce is an uneasy one, we shouldn't have a truce at all?

And she is going to "negotiate" by refusing to meet with one of the parties, and demanding concessions from only one side.

If you want to know why everything is just spiralling out of control with these clowns in charge, that pretty much explains it, doesn't it?