US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said her government was taking "bold action" to deal with the financial crisis and she believed other nations still had confidence in the United States. In a CNBC interview transcript released by the State Department on Wednesday, Rice said the Bush administration was moving to address the root cause of the problem via its bail-out plan.
"We recognise that this is something that needs to be addressed and addressed boldly and urgently," Rice told CNBC in an interview recorded late on Tuesday. "That, I believe, will reassure everyone," she said. Asked whether the US financial crisis had diminished her ability to do important diplomatic work at the UN General Assembly, Rice said US standing had not been affected.
"Everybody understands that this is a very specific, indeed once-in-a-lifetime - well, we certainly hope - circumstance. But people have confidence in the United States," said Rice. "As the president has said, this is a financial crisis, but the fundamentals of the US economy are strong. Everyone understands our great ability to innovate, the productivity of our workers, the ability of the country to move quickly."
A strong tenet of the Bush administration has been to tout the benefits of a free market and to promote democracy throughout the world. "Democratic capitalism is a tried and true system that has brought prosperity and it has brought a lot of good for much of the world," she said.