The president's administration has been widely criticized for ineptness, poor or ineffectual governance, and alleged corruption.
The need for compromise between north and south, between Pashtuns who have always ruled Afghanistan and the northern tribes who want more rights for their people and between the Pashtuns who largely supported the Taliban movement and those who fought it, has often made Mr. Karzai's interim administration ineffectual.
But even if their reasoning was legally sound, they also risked having the administration look ineffectual in the face of what Mr. Summers said was the worst financial abuse of the last 18 months, since the economy began turning down in earnest.
The talks have been seen as largely ineffectual, but the Bush administration, which refuses to meet bilaterally with Pyongyang, insists they are critical to curbing North Korea's nuclear program.
If the White House's cyber czar turns out to be an ineffectual office, the Obama administration could turn to the harsher tactics outlined in the Rockefeller-Snowe bill.
The need for compromise between north and south, between those who largely supported the Taliban movement and those who fought against it, and between Pashtuns who have always ruled Afghanistan and the northern tribes who want more recognition and more rights for their people, has made Mr. Karzai's previous interim administrations often ineffectual bargaining shops.
Mr. Gore had spent the week with his family on a North Carolina beach while the newly minted Republican ticket of Gov. George W. Bush and Dick Cheney used the stage in Philadelphia to portray the Clinton administration as timid, ineffectual and lacking vision.
The board was created by Congress in 2004, but has been ineffectual under both the Bush and Obama administrations, according to 9/11 commissioners.
Andy Grove, a former head of Intel, describes the administration's performance as "ineffectual".
Such ironies suggest that if the current strategy proves ineffectual, the alternative that the Obama administration falls back on won't be remotely antiwar.
