Reply to Something “big” dropping this week ahead at Dept. State

Forum Index » Political Discussion

Reply to "Something “big” dropping this week ahead at Dept. State"

Subject:

Emoticons





More smilies

Text Color: Font: Close Marks

[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Getting rid of the exam is wild. The best people. [/quote]

There have long been complaints about the exam. A republican-tied career ambassador told me that he found it impossible to get his best people through it and they were limited to other functions. In general, the selection process does seem to favor bland personalities. [/quote]

Why would an ambassador’s best people suddenly be taking the foreign service exam?

And maybe there’s a reason why the adjective “diplomatic” is not synonymous with flamboyant, charismatic, etc?[/quote]

Not everyone in the State Department is in the foreign service. There are even ambassadors, such as this one, that are part of the career service.

His beef was more with the oral portion than the written part. He said it favored milquetoast personalities who are mostly comfortable asking everyone else at the table to share their opinion. He's right that we do need to be at least a *little* assertive to get anything done. I'd be fired if I refused to take a position on anything. [/quote]

The "assertiveness" is supposed to come from the politically appointed Ambassadors and the central State Department leadership. The FSO's carry out the agenda, which is usually related to trade mission and administrative functions that should be non-political.[/quote]

You're dead wrong. We cannot have only one person per country effectuating America's goals. And you're also wrong that government workers make no policy decisions, in fact, its a huge aspect of their roles at State and everywhere else. Policy isnt considered partisan within the government. [/quote]

Please explain again why the bar to become an FSO should be lowered. [/quote]

Because smart competent people who want to walk the walk on public service strongly trend liberal.  So, you need to go a couple tiers down to get a conservative cohort. [/quote]

Right wingers do mission trips.[/quote]

Mormans do mission trips. Sure there are other religious volunteer programs, but MAGAs generally do not do these things.[/quote]

[b]For the record, there are a lot of Mormons in the foreign service. [/b]

Anyone who has actually served overseas would know that political leanings at embassies runs the spectrum.  Way more politically diverse than agencies like the EPA, etc.  Maybe not a lot of true MAGAs but definitely conservatives.  [/quote]

That doesn’t sound right because the claim is state was doing a lot of LGBTQ+ work but Mormons absolutely hate LGBTQ.[/quote]

DP. It is true. I've worked closely with State and can confirm it's true that there are a variety of viewpoints. In general, government workers need to be flexible about their views because policies change. [/quote]

Flexible? Mormons are anything but flexible. They absolutely hate the LGBTQ community.[/quote]

Options

	Disable HTML in this message
	Disable BB Code in this message
	Disable smilies in this message

Review message

Search Recent Topics Hottest Topics