She is the answer for GOP plans to continue the Bush White House legacy. More importantly, she's the conservative woman to put a stop to Hillary Clinton.

Rice brushes off such speculation, saying she has no plans to run.

But as the nation's top diplomat stops in Salt Lake City today to speak to the American Legion convention, making the case for the Bush administration's foreign policy and wars, the political prognosticating inevitably follows.

Clinton nemesis and pundit Dick Morris has written a book and several columns promoting the idea. A dozen Web sites are dedicated to persuading Rice to run for president - including one managed by a supporter in Magna. Her favorable ratings are better than those for Bush, Vice President Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. And a nationwide poll of Republicans by the Pew Research Center earlier this month put Rice third - behind Arizona Sen. John McCain and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani - in a head-to-head race for the White House.

"Rice repeatedly denies any interest in running for president but may have to spend the next two years facing a boom in the demand for her to run," Morris wrote in a column last year for The Hill, making comparisons to Gen. Dwight Eisenhower, the last president to win without holding any other elected office.

In an earlier column, Morris called Rice a "rock star."

A veteran of both Bush administrations, 51-year-old Rice was first an academic, teaching political science at Stanford University. She worked for the first President Bush, advising on Soviet and Eastern European issues. She returned to Stanford in 1993, taking a job as provost, in charge of the university's budgets and academic programs. President Bush named her his National Security Adviser when he took office in 2001, promoting her to secretary of state for his second term.

In her time at the State Department, Rice has tried to become the face of American diplomacy, smoothing the Bush administration's international reputation as a hegemonic aggressor.

At home, her clothing and haircuts are dissected as a political makeover, a deliberate strategy to soften her image.

In March, she deflected NBC commentator Tim Russert's repeated questions about a presidential bid.

"I don't want to run for president of the United States," she said then. "I have no intention of doing so. I don't think I will be president of the United States ever."

Her protests haven't discouraged supporters - they call themselves "Condistas" - who still hold out hope. On RunRice2008.com, you can sign a petition asking Rice to run. At 4condi.com, state coordinators are listed in a dozen states.

Despite that hype, Utah Sen. Bob Bennett says the chances that Rice would run for president are slim - if only because she has never held elected office before. Other secretaries of state who went on to the White House, including Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, had previous political experience. Bennett says comparing a Rice campaign with that of Eisenhower, a war hero who stepped down as president of Columbia University to run, is wrong.

"There's nothing more political than the U.S. military," Bennett said. "She would have to run for something else first. You don't do on-the-job training running for president. And for Condie to try to do it would be a mistake."

Kelly Patterson, director of Brigham Young University's Center for the Study of Elections and Democracy, said there are more practical obstacles to Rice's candidacy - including timing. Rice technically has a few more months to make up her mind.

But entering the race less than a year before the 2008 primaries is self-defeating, Patterson said.

"You never say never in politics. But the cycle now almost determines for you whether you run," Patterson said. "She hasn't missed it yet. But it's quickly approaching."

Secretary of State

Name: Condoleezza Rice

Age: 51

Education: Bachelor's Degree in Political Science, University of Denver. Master's Degree, University of Notre Dame. Ph.D. from University of Denver.

Professional experience: Stanford University professor, 1981-1989. Stanford University Provost, 1993 -1999.

Political experience: National Security Council Director of Soviet and East European Affairs, 1989-1991. National Security Advisor, 2001-2004. Secretary of State, 2005 to present.