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US diplomats cry foul as Obama donors take over top embassy jobs
invite response
2013 Jul 10, 1:44pm 3,071 views 13 comments
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Read the article. Perhaps the kid in the photo should get a starring role in Animal House 3. Certainly with the influence that Obama has in Hollywood - this should be feasible. Perhaps even film it in his Royal Gardens........
Ceffer
2013 Jul 10, 4:03pm
I think Obama should appoint Paris Hilton as ambassador to Lesbia. Whether or not she raised money, she certainly raised her skirts supporting his Presidency!
In her first speech, she can declare "Ich bin ein Lesbian!" as a tribute to the late President Kennedy (whose historic statement that "ich bin ein berliner" basically stated he was a jelly donut).
Paris can continue the American tradition of foreign language gaffes to add to her already stellar resume.
zzyzzx
2013 Jul 11, 12:28am
APOCALYPSEFUCK is Shostakovich says
If I give just a little can I get an ambassadorial gig in a shitty country like Kyrgyzstan?
Probably.
finehoe
2013 Jul 11, 12:46am
Barack Obama has rewarded some of his most active campaign donors with plum jobs in foreign embassies
Does anyone seriously think this is a new development under Obama?
lostand confused
2013 Jul 11, 1:00am
Barack Obama has rewarded some of his most active campaign donors with plum jobs in foreign embassies
Does anyone seriously think this is a new development under Obama?
No, but this is a President who campaigned on, "Change you can believe in." This is a President who campaigned on Openess and TRansparency. This is a President who campaigned against NSA and when caught red handed as the guy who not only embraced it, but expanded it, has the gall to say the NSA is very transparent.
He is a lying hypocrite, who will stoop to any level. If one were voting for business as usual, you can just vote for the usual.
zzyzzx
2013 Jul 11, 1:05am
Does anyone seriously think this is a new development under Obama?
No. But Obama seems to take things to new lows.
HydroCabron
2013 Jul 11, 1:20am
Barack Obama has rewarded some of his most active campaign donors with plum jobs in foreign embassies
Does anyone seriously think this is a new development under Obama?
No, but this is a President who campaigned on, "Change you can believe in." This is a President who campaigned on Openess and TRansparency.
The last one campaigned in 2000 to "restore honor and dignity to the White House," and attacked his opponent in the debates for "nation building."
As much as I regret voting for Obama, if you had asked me in 2008 whether I was expecting ambassadorships to be sold to contributors, I would have said "You bet - they all do it."
This smells like the Lincoln Bedroom bullshit of the 90s: "Steven Spielberg had coffee in the White House - can you imagine!"
I'm more exercised about the lack of single payer health care, detention without trial, and the unrestrained growth of the national security state - Hi NSA! - as well as the coddling of the banksters.
HydroCabron
2013 Jul 11, 1:28am
APOCALYPSEFUCK is Shostakovich says
It gets worse.
I paid for a blow job in the oval office and the secret service drew down on me for taking a grip on Michelle's ears.
What is this shit!?
You too?
I was with Michelle in a closet in the East Wing, and I saw a black man in my peripheral vision. So I ran him down, tackled him, and was just about to give him the Glock tattoo - as the Founding Fathers intended - when the Secret Service abrogated my castle doctrine and 2nd Amendment rights.
These bureaucrats just wipe their ass with the Constitution. I bet if I tried to lynch Obama, they'd stop me.
Mole on labia!
Does anyone seriously think this is a new development under Obama?
You get the answer in the article itself.
>>
The practice is hardly a new feature of US politics, but career diplomats in Washington are increasingly alarmed at how it has grown. One former ambassador described it as the selling of public office.
>
Johnson estimates the percentage of ambassador posts given to political appointees rather than career diplomats has remained roughly steady under Obama at around 30%, but most of these are in parts of the world unattractive to wealthy donors. The share taken by political appointees in western Europe and wealthier Asian capitals has reached between 70% and 85%, the AFSA estimates.
finehoe
2013 Jul 11, 1:54am
President Obama's ambassadorial appointments have followed the same 70 percent career/30 percent political split as that of President George W. Bush. Since the 1970s, the appointment ratio has ranged between Gerald Ford's 62 percent career record and Jimmy Carter's high-water mark of 73 percent.
So you are saying Obama has been following Bush's footsteps. I agree :).
Thanks for confirming.
From http://gu.com/p/3h848
Barack Obama has rewarded some of his most active campaign donors with plum jobs in foreign embassies, with the average amount raised by recent or imminent appointees soaring to $1.8m per post, according to a Guardian analysis.
...
On Tuesday, Obama's chief money-raiser Matthew Barzun became the latest major donor to be nominated as an ambassador, when the White House put him forward as the next representative to the Court of St James's, a sought-after posting whose plush residence comes with a garden second only in size to that of Buckingham Palace.
As campaign finance chairman, Barzun helped raise $700m to fund President Obama's 2012 re-election campaign. More than $2.3m of this was raised personally by Barzun, pictured, according to party records leaked to the New York Times, even though he had only just finished a posting as ambassador to Sweden after contributing to Obama's first campaign.
...official report into the Obama campaign donor appointed to Luxembourg, Cynthia Stroum, found she had been "aggressive, bullying, hostile and intimidating" and left her embassy in a "state of dysfunction". Stroum resigned after the report.
....
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