2007.11.04: November 4, 2007: Headlines: Diplomacy: Public Diplomacy: Houston Chronicle: Houston Chronicle writes: Karen Hughes' slim qualifications and the administration's policies, her work as U.S. public diplomacy chief came close to nothing
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2007.11.04: November 4, 2007: Headlines: Diplomacy: Public Diplomacy: Houston Chronicle: Houston Chronicle writes: Karen Hughes' slim qualifications and the administration's policies, her work as U.S. public diplomacy chief came close to nothing
Houston Chronicle writes: Karen Hughes' slim qualifications and the administration's policies, her work as U.S. public diplomacy chief came close to nothing
Appointed by President George W. Bush to promote American values to the world's Muslims, Hughes said last week she knew the job would take years. The sad fact is that Bush only started taking U.S. stature in the world seriously around 2005. In the wake of 9/11, a powerful plan to connect with the Muslim public should have been in action before an American boot or missile ever landed in the Middle East. The energetic Hughes had worked as Bush's communications chief. But she entered the world's most delicate PR job two years ago with barely a scrap of relevant background. The fact that Bush assigned a novice with the aim of making her America's face and voice to the Muslim public shows the disinterest in that culture that so marred America's image in the first place.
Houston Chronicle writes: Karen Hughes' slim qualifications and the administration's policies, her work as U.S. public diplomacy chief came close to nothing
Off the street
Public diplomacy chief Karen Hughes leaves the job her boss made nearly impossible
Copyright 2007 Houston Chronicl
No one could say she gave less than 100 percent. But given Karen Hughes' slim qualifications and the administration's policies, her work as U.S. public diplomacy chief came close to nothing.
Appointed by President George W. Bush to promote American values to the world's Muslims, Hughes said last week she knew the job would take years. The sad fact is that Bush only started taking U.S. stature in the world seriously around 2005. In the wake of 9/11, a powerful plan to connect with the Muslim public should have been in action before an American boot or missile ever landed in the Middle East.
The energetic Hughes had worked as Bush's communications chief. But she entered the world's most delicate PR job two years ago with barely a scrap of relevant background. The fact that Bush assigned a novice with the aim of making her America's face and voice to the Muslim public shows the disinterest in that culture that so marred America's image in the first place.
Because Hughes speaks no Arabic and launched her tenure with noticeable tone-deafness, she spent her first months as a walking symbol of Bush's arrogance. Later, Hughes became more adept (and lowered her profile). But her tenure was marred by such early gaffs as offending Saudi women about their country's ban on female drivers.
It's not Hughes' fault that Muslim views of the United States remain low, and in some places have plunged, since she was hired. The U.S. occupation of Iraq, passivity in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and Abu Ghraib, Guantanamo and Blackwater mercenaries made her hand essentially unplayable.
Hughes did help U.S. efforts to convey the best of our culture, if not our policies. She dreamed up "Rapid Response Units," two-page digests of international headlines, with the official U.S. response, so diplomats in other time zones could swiftly answer before Washington awakes. Diplomats, from ambassadors on down, now are urged to talk to TV and radio, preferably in Arabic. And on her watch, the State Department finally stopped the decline in student exchange programs that began after 9/11.
Yet that decline shouldn't have occurred. Similarly, a smart new program dispatching Muslim-Americans to talk up U.S. culture abroad should have been in overdrive six years ago. While Hughes' office formed a special team to counter misinformation on Arabic language blogs, it still doesn't have anyone doing the task in Urdu or Farsi.
Though Hughes helped to revive the functions of the U.S. Information Agency, mothballed when the Cold War ended, its cultural offerings come nowhere near the kaleidoscopic banquet once served to nations living under communism. Hearts and minds are won with feasting, not medicinal lectures that invasion is the path to peace.
Perhaps if Hughes had committed longer than two years, she might have made more impact on policy. Though she told Bush that resolving the Israeli-Palestinian deadlock would improve Muslim perceptions, he did little in response. Maybe, too, Hughes could have urged him to end the persecution of Arabic linguists under "don't ask, don't tell." So far, more than 58 Arabic linguists have been driven out of the military since the policy began.
Last week as Hughes prepared to leave, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice gushed, "She has done just a remarkable job," making public diplomacy "strong and central to foreign policy."
Hughes did strengthen this tool of national security for the future. But it's inexcusable that a diplomatic program wasn't in place, fully loaded, when we really needed it: before we went to war.
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Headlines: November, 2007; Diplomacy; Public Diplomacy
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Story Source: Houston Chronicle
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