Welcome to a New Blog

I’ll be writing about what interests me: economics, investing, public diplomacy, and, I expect, a good deal more. Let’s get a conversation going.

My Likely Successor

After the traditional long hiatus (Matt Armstrong’s calculations show the post has been vacant three-eighths of the time), the Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs will be nominated imminently, I hear. My designated successor is said to be Judith McHale, former CEO of Discovery Communications, Inc., parent of the Discovery Channel. Some public diplomacy experts I respect have been tough on McHale, while admitting they have no idea who she is. Much has been made of her large contributions to Democrats ($198,000 over the past four years), her friendship with Secretary Clinton, and her lack of experience in public diplomacy.

The biggest critic is Marc Lynch of George Washington University, who called her a “terrible, terrible selection” in this post. That’s unfair. Prejudging this nominee, an accomplished woman with a deep interest in foreign policy, is a mistake. The big questions are the whether she understands that this is a national security job, not a p.r. job and whether she recognizes the acute need to provide leadership for strategic communications across government.

My worry is that, while the Obama administration talks about the importance of soft power, it has shown no indication that it understands the effort to be more than messaging — or perhaps, more than showing up and not being the Bush Administration.

Public diplomacy requires strategic goals. Ours were to promote freedom and reduce threats primarily by undermining a dangerous ideology and diverting young people from following the path that leads to violent extremism. This is hard stuff. Her career shows that Judith McHale certainly has the drive and talent to do the job. The bigger issue is what she thinks the job is. We will soon find out.

Note to Press Conference Questioners

My TV mentor, Neal Freeman, taught me a useful rule: Ask ONE question at a time. I like a question to be short and to end abruptly, leaving dead air that the subject has to fill. When you ask multi-part questions, as so many reporters do, the President (or whoever is up there) can pick which question he wants to answer (or more likely not answer, if tonight’s interminable press conference is a guide).

Unprecedented?

President Obama has been widely complimented for his “unprecedented” video message to the Iranian people (here’s an example). Nice idea, but hardly unprecedented. In fact, the new president is following in the footsteps of George W. Bush, who issued his own Nowruz (new year’s) message to the Iranians during an interview on Persian News Network, the Voice of America TV network that more than one-fourth of Iranians watch weekly by satellite, even though dishes are illegal. Here is the video, posted on YouTube. The difference between the two presidents is that Bush talked to the Iranian people, who have a real affinity for Americans, and pointedly ignored the Iranian regime itself, while Obama talked to both groups. Bush was also far more direct. Rather than platitudes, he told Iranians that, by pursuing nuclear ambitions, their leaders were isolating a great civilization.I guess it is no surprise that the press assumes that Bush never tried to communicate with Iranians, but it’s a flat lie.

Obama’s early interview with Al Arabiya was also an admirable idea, but, again despite comments like this one in Time, hardly unprecedented. Bush had been doing interviews with that network since at least 2004. Oh, well. I guess this is a battle useless to fight, but let’s get the record right.