re: #149 Belafon

This paragraph is annoying:

The way it’s always been done.

US Ambassadors are well-known around the world as the diplomatic equivalent of Walmart greeters, rolled out for grip-and-grin photo opportunities and hosting Embassy dinners but not to be otherwise engaged in serious business without a minder standing by. The real work of representing US interests in each nation is carried out by by the permanent State Department people at each Embassy plus the NOC CIA station head aka assistant trade envoy.

President Trump appointed someone who owns a sportsball franchise to be US ambassador to the UK and he’s now been replaced by the Charge d’Affaires State Dept. head honcho pro tempore until President Biden gets around to nominating a Democrat fundraiser or close family friend for the role. President Obama did the same, appointing two major fundraisers for his electoral campaigns to the position of Ambassador to the Court of St. James during his eight years in the Oval Office.

Just for contrast, the UK ambassador to the United States is currently Dame Karen Pierce, a forty-year veteran of the British diplomatic corps, having been the British rep to the UN in Geneva for six years as well as holding down a lot of other important positions in her career.