The continued stalemate in Libya is not good news for Samantha Power widely seen as one of the architects of the Libyan intervention.

Power, who works with the National Security Council, has been touted as the next secretary of State if Obama is re-elected but if Libya continues to be a stalemate it will not help her case.

The Irish-born Power who moved to America when she was ten, has been an outspoken advocate of tackling potential genocide before it happens.

She can justifiably point to the fact that Benghazi in the west of Libya was about to be reduced to rubble and raped and pillaged by Ghadafi troops until the US and NATO stepped in.

But the original script went wrong from there with rebels advancing, then retreating like a bad Charlie Chaplin scene before the current stalemate.

Stalemate is not good in that corner of the world, and a leaderless state, like Somalia can soon become a breeding ground for all kinds of radicals.

That is why Power and the US government are surely pushing had right now for a negotiated solution given the clear lack of hope that the rebels can outfight Ghadaffi any time soon.

Back in America Power’s higher profile after she was singled out for pushing the Libyan intervention policy has brought problems too.

She is consistently hounded, unfairly in my opinion, as Anti-Israeli and the commotion from the right wing press is all about ensuring she never gets to take Hillary Clintons’ job as some have posited she will.

So she needs a Libya breakthrough and soon if she is to remain the point person on the issue and continue her work in combating genocide.

But Ghadaffi did not survive for over 40 years by lying down easily and he may prove willing and able to outlast even the best international efforts to oust him.

That would be bad news for Power who had reckoned the tyrant would fall before this.