My internet news informed me this morning that 32 former ambassadors had endorsed Hillary Clinton. Intrigued I googled the article for more info and got the names of 32 individuals who has signed the “ambassadorial endorsement.’ Curious and waiting for stock to simmer on my stove, I searched the individuals mentioned. Since the Clinton Administration was known (like the Bush Administration) for putting more political supporters into Ambassadorial positions than career foreign service officers. I was not surprised to learn that very few of those who had endorsed Hillary were career diplomats.
I found that among those who had signed the letter there were at least 13 Lawyers (Babbitt, Bagley, Blanchard, Bondurant, Eizenstat, Ginsberg, Harrington, Jones, Lauredo, McDonald, McGowen, Manatt and Shumaker). There were also a variety of political appointees, career politicians and public relations people. Interestingly, there were only five who appeared to have legitimate career Foreign Service credentials (Brynn, Guerra-Mondragon, Holbrooke, Kornblum, Romero, Wilson). Of these five only Holbrooke and Kornblum were well known as effective diplomats. Wilson is well known but his career path was that of an administrative, general services officer rather than a career diplomat and of course his wife was the object of attention from Dick Cheney and Scooter Libby. I would venture to guess that Holbrooke would likely be a Secretary of State were Hillary to be elected.
Sadly, I concluded that this is more Washington insider politics and influence peddling at work. We don’t need more of the same. We need a President who will act independently and who is not afraid to think outside of the box. Barack Obama is the right person at the right time.
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