Impeachment Hearings: Ego and the Ambassador, and a Mistake by President Trump

I'll keep this short. I don't want to repeat unnecessarily the themes I laid out in my post of November 13 discussing the testimony of Kent and Taylor.

Many of you likely watched the Congressional impeachment testimony by former Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch.  Both the Diplowife and I kept shaking our heads while Yovanovitch spoke; at the end of it all, the Diplowife said to me, "This is why the Foreign Service has such a bad reputation." I agreed with the Diplowife; in sum, I found it an embarrassing spectacle.

Just a few notes.

I hate false bravado. The whole "we are the hostages of Tehran, the martyrs of Tripoli" shtick in defense of the Foreign Service was almost more than I could bear. I have never heard a military man or woman do something similar. Braggadocio is not a trait of the best of our military, and should not be a feature anywhere else in our bureaucracy. It was all rather embarrassing, particularly given that both the hostages in Tehran and the dead in Tripoli were abandoned to their fate by lefty Democrat policies and administrations--something I wish the Republicans had pointed out.

Even worse, however, was the whole "our foreign policy in Ukraine is in disarray" meme. When you hear somebody from State say that, remember what they generally mean is that the President has not done what the "experts" told him to do. It also means, more importantly, that he hasn't filled all the jobs at State that State says it needs to do the wasteful foolishness that State does much if not most of the time.

Yovanovitch, and before her Kent and Taylor, gave totally tone deaf but standard State Department talking point/memo-type speeches laying out the great importance of Ukraine to our national interests. Yawn. You know how many papers of that sort I have written? I am ashamed to tell you. Be it Guatemala, Sri Lanka, Central African Republic, Tuvalu, or San Marino, any career Department sort can turn out a paper in an instant as to why any country, no matter how insignificant in reality, is in the forefront of American interests. We must promote good governance in Togo to defend our vital core interests . . . . yeah, yeah, yeah.

Also please note the unvarnished arrogance of the Ambassador. She was named to the position under Obama about six months before the end of that execrable misadministration. A standard tour, if there is one, for an Ambassador is about two to three years. More important, however, please note that ALL AMBASSADORS, I repeat, ALL AMBASSADORS must submit their resignations when a new President comes in. That includes career Foreign Service Ambassadors, which is why I wrote ALL, a little something that much of the media reporting has "missed." The new President has the right to accept the resignation or not.

In hindsight, it would seem the President made a mistake keeping Yovanovitch at her post. She, for example, was clearly aware of the potential problem of having Hunter Biden on the board of the Ukranian Burisma Holdings company at the same time that Joe Biden served not only as Vice-President but as "point-man"for Obama on Ukraine policy. She said nothing. She was also aware of the involvement of senior Ukrainian officials interfering in our 2016 elections on behalf of Hillary Clinton. She said nothing.

She had the nerve to claim that Trump was undermining HER position as Ambassador, and, thus, of course, he was undermining US foreign policy! She breathlessly informed us that after about two-plus years at her post, Ukrainians were asking her if she was going to be replaced. Horrors! Ukrainians can do math. They knew that her usual tour likely would be coming to an end. The President does not need to undermine her; he can yank her out any time for any reason or even for no reason. Ambassadors, as well as FBI and CIA Directors, etc., serve at the pleasure of the President. Period. She must have thought she was King Louis XIV, you know, 'L'état, c'est moi'. But to be kind, let's just agree that she is just another in a long line of State officials who seem to have forgotten that the President sets and directs foreign policy, not State.

Ambassadors work for and represent the President not the State Department, a little fact that many career FSOs seem to forget.

Off to play with my dogs: they know who sets policy around here . . . I think . . .