She said a lot of it before, but Secretary of State Condi Rice causing quite a stir over her thoughts on race, America, and birth defects. Rice was speaking about a plethora of issues when the subject of race came up.. Rice said, "Black Americans were a founding population. Africans and Europeans came here and founded this country together — Europeans by choice and Africans in chains. That's not a very pretty reality of our founding." She told the Washington TIMES that "descendants of slaves did not get much of a head start, and I think you continue to see some of the effects of that. That particular birth defect makes it hard for us to confront it, hard for us to talk about it, and hard for us to realize that it has continuing relevance for who we are today." The TIMES reported that she continued: "America doesn't have an easy time dealing with race. What I would like understood as a black American is that black Americans loved and had faith in this country even when this country didn't love and have faith in them — and that's our legacy."
(Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)