Britain deserves better tham Ambassador Winfrey
James Forsyth 7:20pm
Gideon Rachman floats, on his blog, the rumour that Obama might make Oprah Winfrey Ambassador to London, and no it is not April Fool’s Day. I doubt very much this will happen, there are other ambassadorships I’d expect she’d prefer, but it does illustrate a long-standing weakness in the way the United States appoints its ambassadors.
The plum jobs nearly always go to big campaign donors. This is a practise the United States cannot afford now that it is involved in a struggle for international support for its actions in a 24.7 media environment. It needs the best people for the job that it has regardless of whether they gave to the campaigns or not. Does anyone really believe that Oprah is the person best placed to explain to the British public why America felt it had to strike Iran's nuclear facilities.
It certainly didn’t help that during the Iraq war, the US Ambassador to London had been picked for his campaign contributions to Bush and his interest in horse-racing. A more effective ambassador might well have been able to make the US case for removing Saddam in a clear way and ensured that the British government had an easier time working in concert with Washington.
If Obama is serious about improving the way America presents itself to the world, then he should scrap this outdated spoils system. But then having opted out of public financing, Obama has a lot of donors to reward.
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David
October 20th, 2008 7:55pm Report this commentA step up from a car salesman, though.
Edward McLaughlin
October 20th, 2008 9:40pm Report this commentWe got off lightly. It could have been George 'not so much bad, just boring really' Benson.
Ray
October 20th, 2008 10:56pm Report this commentMaybe we should return the favour and appoint Jeremy Kyle as our man in Washington.
Austin Barry
October 20th, 2008 11:22pm Report this commentWell, I suppose Oprah is a marginal advance on Gerry Springer as the St. James' appointment, but here we sit, a negligible, semi-muslim offshore island whose importance to the USA is roughly equivalent to that of Taiwan. Chums, we're buggered, let's all meet at Heathrow or Southampton sing a chorus of 'Rule Britannia' and head off to Oz, or New Zealand or Canada and accept that England is dead.
Nick Kaplan
October 21st, 2008 12:03am Report this comment"If Obama is serious about improving the way America presents itself to the world, then he should scrap this outdated spoils system."
If Obama was serious about half the things he had advocated during his campaign he would not have done any of the things he has during his entire political career.
Matthew Blott
October 21st, 2008 12:27am Report this commentOh come on, I can't believe you're giving this story legs. Nobody really believes this do they?
Matthew Blott
October 21st, 2008 12:32am Report this commentI will say one thing though James in response to your following comment ....
"Does anyone really believe that Oprah is the person best placed to explain to the British public why America felt it had to strike Iran's nuclear facilities."
Substitute the words "Oprah" and "British" with "Palin" and "American" and the sentence makes even more sense.
Craig Strachan
October 21st, 2008 6:57am Report this commentBetter than Oprah? You don't get any better than Oprah.
John
October 21st, 2008 9:18am Report this commentThe ambassador's job in London is purely ceramonial. All the work is done by the First Minister who acts as the Ambassador in the sense we understand it. peace.
Oswald J
October 21st, 2008 9:36am Report this commentIts no more insulting than Tony Blair appointing Sir Nigel Sheinwald as Ambassador to the US.
Travis Bickle
October 21st, 2008 10:18am Report this commentGiven that we've had to restore a twice disgraced minister to give our government any semblance of stability and direction I think it rather inappropriate to get picky about what other countries give us.
biggestaspidistra
October 21st, 2008 1:50pm Report this comment"Given that we've had to restore a twice disgraced minister to give our government any semblance of stability"
and let us not forget the 'Lord' Malloch- Brown import. Maybe we would be lucky to get Oprah.
Hysteria
October 21st, 2008 9:55pm Report this comment"Britain deserves better tham Ambassador Winfrey"
why...?
THX1138
October 22nd, 2008 12:27am Report this commentI grew up in Ghana and Shirley Temple was the US Ambassador and she did a great job
I think Oprah would be a great pick.
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