Politics & Power Quote by Ellen Tauscher

A neat little sentence with a lot of diplomatic work packed into it: credibility-building, moral positioning, and message discipline, all under the soft lighting of “I’ve enjoyed the opportunity.” Tauscher isn’t trying to sound grand; she’s trying to sound responsible. The “as co-chair” clause is a résumé line posed as context, signaling institutional authority and implying a sustained commitment rather than a one-off photo op. It’s Washington’s way of saying: I’m in the room where this is being managed.

The real payload is in the framing of Iraqi women as both symbols and actors. By emphasizing “Iraqi women elected to serve in the new National Assembly,” she validates the post-2003 political order by highlighting a democratic outcome that plays well to American audiences: representation, pluralism, modernization. “New” does heavy ideological lifting, hinting at rupture from Saddam-era repression and aligning the U.S. project with progress. That’s the subtext: the war and reconstruction have produced something defendable, something that can be pointed to when the larger enterprise looks unstable or morally compromised.

Notice what stays out. There’s no mention of violence, sectarian tensions, the occupation, or the fragility of those women’s safety and influence. The sentence substitutes proximity (“collaborate with and hear from”) for accountability. It’s also a careful inversion of the usual paternalism: the U.S. lawmaker is ostensibly listening. But the listening itself becomes proof of benevolence, and “Iraqi women” become a legitimizing chorus for an American narrative of democratic renewal.