Both Democratic and Republican senators alike absolutely hammered Condoleezza Rice at today's Armed Services Committee hearing. Senators Hagel & Feingold were especially rough and you could hear the disgust in their voices.

Yahoo News: (h/t JR)

"You're going to have to do a much better job" explaining the rationale for the war, "and so is the president," Sen. George Voinovich, R-Ohio, told her. He said Bush could no longer count on his support.

"I've gone along with the president on this and I've bought into his dream and at this stage of the game I just don't think its going to happen," Voinovich said.

[..]Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., the committee chairman, told her, "Secretary Rice, to be very blunt, I cannot in good conscience support the president's approach."

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Robert Novak at WaPo says there's trouble brewing at the State Department, all centered around the failures of Rice.

Republicans in Congress who do not want to be quoted tell me that the State Department under Condoleezza Rice is a mess. This comes at a time when the U.S. global position is precarious. While attention is focused on Iraq, American diplomacy is being tested worldwide -- in Afghanistan, Iran, Israel, Korea and Sudan. The judgment by thoughtful Republicans is that Rice has failed to manage that endeavor.

Condi also gave birth to a new talking point. Since the media has all but abandoned the "surge" rhetoric and the White House knows the American people don't want to hear about escalation, the new buzzword is "augmentation."

As the LA Times said in an article today quoting our very own Nicole Belle:

"After six years of this, I think we all know that he who frames the debate and chooses the vocabulary wins from the beginning. Let's be sure to not accept the White House framing, no matter how wimped out the MSM is."

I think both the White House and the MSM got the message.

The entire hearing is archived at C-Span.