Monthly Archives: January 2010

Video of the Week: The Diplomatic Platypus

January 30, 2010 By in Diplomacy, Literature, Poetry, Politics, Video of the Week

A reading of a cautionary poem about politics and diplomacy in which a small gaffe leads to disastrous consequences. “The Diplomatic Platypus” by Patrick Barrington.  Youtube video from SpokenVerse.

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Another Day, Another Evacuation

January 29, 2010 By in Americans Abroad, Consular Work, Foreign Service, FSOs, U.S. Missions, WHA|Western Hemisphere
Image via Wikipedia

Stranded Amcits in Aguas Calientes, Urubamba, Machu Picchu and Cuzco
The State Department has issued the following Travel Alert on the flooding in Peru on January 28:
Heavy rains have caused landslides throughout Peru’s Sacred Valley, blocking overland and train routes into and out of the major tourist destinations of Cuzco and Macchu Picchu.  The government of Peru has declared a state of emergency in the affected region.  The U.S. Embassy is actively engaged in a joint Peruvian-led effort to help evacuate stranded U.S. citizens and others in Aguas Calientes, at the base of Machu Picchu.  U.S. citizens intending to travel to the Sacred Valley of Peru should postpone their plans for at least the next several days.
The Peruvian government and the Embassy are sending helicopters to the city of Aguas Calientes to assist in removing people stranded by the weather.  Delays resulting from the rains, high altitude and fuel shortages have hampered air operations.   The Embassy sent teams to Aguas Calientes, where many tourists are stranded; to the town of Urubamba, where tourists who are being evacuated from the area of Machu Picchu are arriving; and to Cuzco, to assist American citizens who are stranded there.  The road from Urubamba to Cuzco is open and transportation is being provided to the evacuees.  U.S. citizens in Cuzco may wish to contact the U.S. Consular Agency located at Avenida Pardo #845, in Cuzco. For inquiries about U.S. citizens in the affected region, please call 1-888-407-4747 or email PeruCuzco@state.gov.
On January 27, the Spokesman confirmed that there are “about 200 American citizens around Aguas Calientes.”
The US Embassy in Peru has issued an update to its Warden Message (Posted: January 27, 2010):
The government of Peru has declared a state of emergency for 60 days in two southeast provinces due to heavy rains.  The region has suffered flash floods, landslides and flooding that have closed roads, bridges and railines.  The airport in Cusco is operating sporadically.
This measure covers the provinces of Cusco and Apurimac, and their towns of Calca, Cusco City, Urubamba, Canchis Quispicanchi, Anta and the Convention.  Included in affected areas are Aguas Calientes and Machu Picchu Pueblo. 
The U.S. Embassy has sent field teams to Aguas Calientes, where many tourists are stranded; to Ollantaytambo in the Sacred Valley, where tourists who are being evacuated from the area of Machu Picchu are arriving; and to Cusco, to assist American citizens who are stranded there.  The road from Ollantaytambo to Cusco is open and transportation is being provided to the evacuees.  American citizens may wish to contact the US consular agency located at Avenida Pardo #845, in Cusco. 
The Embassy is attempting to send helicopters to Aguas Calientes, at the base of the Machu Picchu ruins, to assist in removing American citizens, and in support of Peruvian Government assistance operations.  Delays resulting from the rains, high altitude and fuel shortages may hamper air operations. 
Read the full Warden Message here.


Working 20-hour days at US Embassy Haiti

January 29, 2010 By in Consular Work, Disasters, FSOs, U.S. Missions

Gordon Duguid, acting Deputy Spokesman for the State Department is presently serving with the Haiti Joint Information Center (HJIC) in Port-au-Prince.  He recently pens “On the Ground in Port-au-Prince” for DipNote. Excerpt below:

For the past week, we have had 2,000 people lining up outside of the embassy, mostly Haitians who have an American family connection and are trying to join that person in the United States. Today, that number doubled, and we had a very close impersonation of chaos. Despite the bedlam outside our gates, what the people in line are doing is very rational. For the most part, Haitians are trying to get the vulnerable in their families out of the country for the time being. I understand that instinct.

Our consular officers are working 20-hour days to provide assistance to those who are entitled based on legal or humanitarian grounds. Their work is not only exhausting, but heartbreaking. Many people have compelling stories about why they should travel to the United States, but not all are allowed under U.S. law. And because we have so many people in line, it is difficult to render service to those who are entitled to it while sorting through those who are just hoping we will let them travel. For example, there was an American citizen child in the line today suffering from a swollen brain and very ill. He was being cared for by a French woman and a Haitian man. Had they had to wait in line like all the rest to get to the consular section, the child might have been endangered. I just happened to be giving an interview near the spot where they were standing, and the TV producer saw the child and pointed him out. We then got the child and woman on the next flight out.

Frustrations in the line are high. All day today, the press section has been broadcasting public affairs messages via Haitian radio explaining who we can help and who we can’t. We are now planning more aggressive information campaigns to convince people to come only if they really are entitled to U.S. help. With the situation as it is now, we are really worried someone who survived the earthquake will be crushed on our doorstep.

Read the whole thing here.
Also read the CSM’s report on the near riots:  After near riots, US Embassy in Haiti asks Haitians to stay away.

Now David Ensor Heads to US Embassy Kabul

January 29, 2010 By in Af/Pak, Public Diplomacy, Staffing the FS, US Embassy Kabul

The editor at large for The Daily Beast, Lloyd Grove, asks “Can This Man Outsmart the Taliban?” He is talking about – you guess it — former war correspondent David Ensor who is shipping out for his toughest assignment yet: helping the State Department win Afghan hearts and minds. The long article is here; quick excerpt below: 

Ensor, who spent three decades in broadcast journalism (at National Public Radio, ABC and ultimately CNN) and then 3½ years as a London-based PR executive for an oil-trading company, will operate from the heavily fortified American compound in Kabul, and get around using armored vehicles with bullet-proof windows and teams of bodyguards. He has committed to at least a year in country, and will coordinate his efforts with those of two-star Rear Admiral Gregory J. Smith,  the Pentagon’s top spokesman in Kabul, and report to U.S. Ambassador Karl Eikenberry, a former three-star Army general.

Ensor wasn’t the Obama administration’s first choice. Before he started discussing the position with State Department officials in November, it was offered to Asia Society executive vice president Jamie Metzl, a frequent visitor to Afghanistan and a longtime protégé of Richard Holbrooke, the U.S. special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan. The 41-year-old Metzl—who has been a diplomat, a member of the National Security Council, a spy novelist and a congressional candidate—has  spent a good deal of time in Afghanistan, serving as a monitor for last fall’s hotly disputed presidential election that is widely believed to have been rigged by the incumbent, Hamid Karzai. But Metzl passed when he and the State Department couldn’t come to terms on logistical issues, which I hear included the question of whether the post would carry ambassadorial rank. It doesn’t.
[…]
Ensor brings with him the street cred of a well-traveled foreign correspondent, who spent years reporting from Soviet bloc countries and the Middle East, covered wars in Chechnya and the Balkans, and boasts a deep and wide knowledge of America’s national security and intelligence institutions, especially the CIA. As a Washington correspondent for CNN during the Clinton and Bush administrations, he enjoyed top-level access to government officials, especially the longtime director of the National Security Agency, General Mike Hayden. His early career at NPR also gives him a background in radio, the key mode of mass communications in Afghanistan, and his years supervising the two dozen ABC News employees in the Warsaw bureau potentially lend him relevant management experience.
[…]
Why would he leave his comfortable life in London, to say nothing of his wife Anita and their two children, in order to put himself in harm’s way?  A mixture of career restlessness, a desire to serve his country and simple curiosity, says Dobbs. “As a journalist, you always want to know what it’s like being on the inside.”
Ensor, for now, is keeping his own counsel. “Thanks very much for your interest in my upcoming work in Kabul,” he emailed me on Sunday. “I am sorry but I am not prepared to discuss it yet. Perhaps we could talk after I have taken office, and spent a little time in Afghanistan.”
Read the whole thing here.
On a related note, somebody wrote to ask if we notice “how top heavy the Embassy in Kabul is? DCMs don’t want to be called DCMs and invent new titles.” Makes one wonder whose idea this was. The top heavy front office is not unprecedented, of course, given the short history of the US Embassy in Baghdad. But that thing about inventing new titles, that may be unprecedented.
Currently we have Mr. Ricciardone as deputy ambassador at the US Embassy in Kabul. He was previously Ambassador to the Arab Republic of Egypt (2005-2008) and Ambassador to the Republic of the Philippines and the Republic of Palau from 2002 to 2005.  We also have Joseph A. Mussomeli as Assistant Chief of Mission (he was previously Ricciardone’s Deputy Chief of Mission in the Philippines (2002-2005) and later Ambassador to the U.S. Embassy in Cambodia (2005-2008).  Then we have Earl Anthony “Tony” Wayne, the Coordinating Director for Development and Economic Affairs. He was previously the U.S. Ambassador to Argentina from November 2006 to June 2009.

However, the embassy’s POL/MIL guy according to the latest listing is Phil Kosnett, a senior Foreign Service officer who served three tours in Iraq. The POL counselor is Annie Pforzheimer, who might be in the SFS, too although we can’t confirm it. So there’s still room for more former or current ambassador ranked officials to join the Kabul embassy team.

    
An email to the press office in Kabul inquiring about Mr. Ensor’s approximate arrival in Kabul and his job title has not received a response as of this writing.  With the addition of David Ensor and the civilian surge on, I supposed this makes the baghdafication of US Embassy Kabul officially on but we’re not quite there yet.

Related Post:

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Quickie: Female Diplomats’ Challenge — The ‘Trailing Spouse’

January 29, 2010 By in Foreign Service, FSOs, Realities of the FS, Spouses

Caitlin Kelly for True/Slant has a piece on the male trailing spouse: I remembered I actually know a “trailing spouse” and asked if he’d be willing to share some of his life with us. I’m delighted that he agreed; his answers to my many questions are below.

Michael Barrientos started out as a photo editor for The New York Times, which is how I know him. He and his wife are heading back to D.C. soon for two years, awaiting their next posting. I have always wondered what it’s like to be(come) the trailing spouse and know that many ambitious women with global careers and ambitions face these issues as well.
As you might imagine, it requires tremendous flexibility and grace to manage a marriage, two careers and kids while moving from one unfamiliar nation and culture to the next. Thank heaven for such men!
Excerpt from Michael Barrientos:
The toughest challenge has been leaving my job and career.  I really loved working at The New York Times. I had the highest regard for the newspaper, what we did, the people I worked with, and hated to step away.  We had a lot of conflict early on.  I was resentful about leaving a job that I deeply enjoyed and was very satisfied in.  It was a hard transition to becoming an instant stay-at-home father and trailing spouse. 
Gradually, I have adapted and gotten used to it.  I had been in newspapers for so long that it was tough to get used to being out of the industry.   There were a number of issues at play, such as Mexican-American family pressure and lack of full support of my decision to step away from my career.
[…]
Advising a Foreign Service spouse would be difficult.  It’s an individual decision and not everybody is cut out for it.  I have seen a number of spouses and foreign service officers who could not handle the changes in lifestyle, culture and being away from family and friends.  I had grown accustomed to it over my career despite growing up in a tight-knit family.
[…]
Our income has been affected.  I was paid well at the Times and it was tough giving up two incomes to become a dependent while contributing with my supplementary freelance money.  Our marriage has had tough challenges.  Not having support of family and friends is tough.  The Internet helps tremendously with Skype, social media like Facebook and Twitter, blogs and e-mail.  We stay involved in the diplomatic community and established a daily family routine.  Families in the Foreign Service are often close because of its nomadic nature.
Read the whole thing here.

Officially In: Theodore Sedgwick to Bratislava

January 29, 2010 By in Ambassadors, Nominations, Officially In, Political Appointees
Bratislava CastleImage via Wikipedia

On January 20, President Obama announced his intent to nominate Theodore Sedgwick to be US Ambassador to the Slovak Republic. The WH released the following bio:

Theodore Sedgwick is a business executive with experience in the publishing and timber industries. He founded Pasha Publications, a specialty publisher focused on energy, defense and environment markets, and served as its chief executive for 20 years. More recently, he founded Io Energy, an online energy information company covering the natural gas, coal and electricity industries. He was president of Red Hills Lumber Co., a producer of pine flooring. Mr. Sedgwick serves on a number of private company boards, including Inside Higher Ed, Atlantic Information Services, and Washington Business Information Inc. He has served on the boards of a number of cultural institutions including the Folger Shakespeare Library, the Shakespeare Theater Co. and the Gennadius Library in Athens, Greece. He has also served on the boards of a number of land preservation organizations, including the Civil War Preservation Trust, which he chaired in 2006-2009, and Wetlands America Trust, an affiliate of Ducks Unlimited. He is on the National Council of the Land Trust Alliance.
Mr. Sedgwick is a member of the Chief Executives Organization, an organization of global business leaders. He graduated with honors from Harvard College, cum laude, where he majored in Ottoman History.
* * * 
The United States recognized the Slovak Republic as an independent state and established diplomatic relations with it on Jan 1, 1993. Embassy Bratislava was established Jan 4, 1993.  Four of the six  ambassador to the US Embassy Bratislava were all non-career appointees.  Except if you look them up here, the last two, Rodolphe M. Vallee and Vincent Obsitnik are also listed as FSOs instead of political appointees. 

If confirmed, Mr. Sedgwick would replace corporate executive, Vincent Obsitnik (born in Slovakia and fluent in the Slovak language) who was appointed to post by President Bush in 2007.

Via Al Kamen:
“Obama last week nominated publishing executive (and, yes, major contributor and bundler) Theodore “Tod” Sedgwick to be ambassador to Slovakia. Sedgwick founded and headed Pasha Publications, which focused on energy, defense and environment markets matters, and ran a lumber company. He’s also on the boards of a number of cultural and land preservation organizations. Slovakia, a NATO member, is a lovely country in the heart of Europe. It’s small, but Sedgwick only bundled a bit more than $200,000 for the Obama campaign, plus contributing $42,416 of his own money to Democrats in the 2008 cycle and another $10,000 for the inauguration.”
Related Item:
President Obama Announces More Key Administration Posts, 1/20/10

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Andrew Wyllie: How to send him your help and support

January 28, 2010 By in Foreign Service, FSOs, Memorial, Spouses

I’ve asked the FLO how the Foreign Service community can help and send support to Andrew Wyllie in this time of bereavement.  I’m passing along the following information for those interested.  I’ve requested and received permission from the family to release this information here:

To all of Andy Wyllie’s friends and family,

Many of you have inquired about ways that you could help the Wyllie family during this extremely difficult time.  In lieu of flowers, a financial gift would be greatly appreciated and would be put to good use in order to assist with the numerous expenses that will be incurred during the coming months and weeks.

The monetary gifts will be collected by Andy’s brother-in-law, on Andy’s behalf, and should be made payable and sent to:        

    Matt Johnson
   6214 Duntley Place
   Springfield, VA 22152
   (703) 644-0042
    mattfjohnson[a]hotmail.com

We greatly appreciate the support that is being given to Andy and his family during this time.                                        
The memorial for Andy’s family will be this weekend in Washington, DC.  Please contact Matt above for time and location.

As far as cards for Andy, you might direct those to: 8090 Winding Way Court, Springfield, VA 22153.                                     

I know words are poor things in times like this but I’m told that cards and kind thoughts from friends have been a great comfort to him.  If you are reading this blog, please send help in any way you can. Thank you.  

                           

Related Post:
Three FS Family Members Perished in Haiti Quake  | January 26, 2009

Updated 1/29 per request of the family.

US Embassy Haiti: Local Staff Update

January 28, 2010 By in Disasters, Locally Employed Staff, U.S. Missions

The U.S. Joint Information Center – Haiti confirmed that following numbers on the locally employed staff at the US Embassy in Port au Prince are correct as of 1/27.  USJIC-H also said that “We are working however to update those figures as we receive new information.”

793 | Total FSNs or locally employed staff at US Embassy PaP
28 | FSNs unaccounted for
6 | FSNs killed
6 | Total FSNs injured
3 | FSNs seriously injured
Thanks to Gordon Duguid, acting Deputy Spokesman for taking the time to address this inquiry. He is presently serving with the Haiti Joint Information Center in Port-au-Prince.
Related Post:
Don’t Forget the FSN Emergency Relief Fund

Who Leaked the Eikenberry Cables and Why?

January 27, 2010 By in Af/Pak, Ambassadors, US Embassy Kabul

The New York Times has posted online two Secret cables from Ambassador Eikenberry on the U.S. Strategy in Afghanistan. 

In November 2009, Karl W. Eikenberry, the United States ambassador to Afghanistan and retired Army lieutenant general, sent two classified cables to his superiors in which he offered his assessment of the proposed U.S. strategy in Afghanistan. While the broad outlines of Mr. Eikenberry’s cables were leaked soon after he sent them, the complete cables, obtained recently by The New York Times, show just how strongly the current ambassador feels about President Hamid Karzai and the Afghan government, the state of its military, and the chances that a troop buildup will actually hurt the war effort by making the Karzai government too dependent on the United States. Related Article »
Who leaked these cables in November, and who just gave the complete cables to the NYT? Is Diplomatic Security hunting down the culprit/s?  Is anyone at Foggy Bottom upset about this?  See –Hamid Karzai, himself can now read those cables online.  Given that this unavoidably would have an impact on the ambassador’s relationship with Kabul, is somebody after Karl Eikenberry’s head … or job?

Hamid Karzai won the 2009 presidential election after his opponent Abdullah Abdullah withdrew from the run-off. He’ll be president of Afghanistan beyond the Obama Administration’s first term so they have to deal with him whether they like it or not. How effective a representative would Ambassador Eikenberry be after this?        

Or is it as Nick Mills over at the Huffinton Post puts it: “[I]f the diplomatic waters between the U.S. embassy in Kabul and the Arg Palace were chilly before, you’ll be able to skate on them now that the texts of the cables have been published. But does President Karzai care? I doubt it. He obviously feels that the American ambassador’s views are irrelevant anyway, that the Western money and military forces will keep on coming whether or not he invites the Eikenberrys to tea.”
Who leaked the Eikenberry cables and why? From Laura Rozen:  “But a third former official posits, the motivation may be different: “One more, perhaps obvious note: who stands to benefit from a worsening of the Eikenberry-Karzai relationship to the point that it’s untenable?”

That’s the $65 billion question for 2010.
Updated: 1/28
Mother Jones has reported that the State Department just launched a probe on the Afghanistan leak.  Read it here.  The piece quoted  the Department Spokesman saying, “My suspicion is that a copy of a copy or a copy of a copy of a copy found its way to the New York Times.”  Aha! Whose copy … and how … and why?  A NODIS cable with extremely limited distribution?  Mother Jones also cited NYT for the “why” part.  “According to the Times, the full versions of the memos were ultimately provided to the paper by an “American official” who believed Eikenberry’s assessment “was important for the historical record.”

Pleaze!  I’m dense at times but not that dense.  We have the FRUS (Foreign Relations of the U.S.) series  for the historical record, folks! The “American official” seemed more interested in the “historical record” that he/she did not worry about how this makes life and work more difficult for our man in Kabul and the US Mission in Afghanistan?  This is a firing offense.         

HRC Town Hall Meeting – One Year at State

January 27, 2010 By in Career Employees, Foreign Service, Org Life, Secretary of State, State Department

Jan. 26, 2010 | Secretary Clinton holds a Town Hall Meeting with Department of State Employees Marking One Year at State, at the Department of State.

The Full Text is here. Lots of things said but I’m interested in what goes on inside the building.  Quick takes from the town hall.

On the Foreign Service loss:
When I spoke to family members who had lost loved ones – Victoria DeLong – and then I spoke with Andrew Wyllie – they both thanked me as Secretary for the outpouring of support that they had received from colleagues. In Victoria’s case, from people who had served with her, who knew her, who had reached out to the family, who had really demonstrated the closeness of community that exists among us. And for Andrew Wyllie, who inconceivably, unimaginably lost his wife on her birthday and his seven-and-a-half and five-year-old children, he mentioned specifically the names of those who had been working with him in these very difficult days to recover the bodies of his wife and children. And again, the sense that it was not even just a community, but a large and extended family came through in everything he said to me.
On misleading media reports and criticisms:
I have absolutely no argument with anyone lodging a legitimate criticism against our country. I think we can learn from that. And we are foolish if we keep our head in the sand and pretend that we can’t. On the other hand, I deeply resent those who attack our country, the generosity of our people, and the leadership of our President in trying to respond to historically disastrous conditions after the earthquake. So what we’re asking for is that people view us fairly.
And we sent cables to all posts. We asked our entire teams to be prepared to respond to any misleading media report. And we stood up for who we are and what we represent. And we saw the change. We’re not going to leave unanswered charges against the United States of America and the kind of work that we do every single day. That has to be, going forward, what becomes the norm, not the exception. We have a story to tell. We have an important message to deliver. And we need every single person to be part of that. So going forward, we’re going to look in a very clear-eyed way at what we do well, what we could improve on, but to make sure that the extraordinary story that the United States has to tell is presented forcefully and effectively in every corner of the world.
On jobs for family members. Nothing new here, maalesef:
QUESTION: Thank you. Thank you. And my second question is that employment opportunities for eligible family members overseas are an important factor in recruitment, retention, and post morale. Seventy-five percent of eligible family members have college degrees, of whom 50 percent have advanced degrees. Can you comment on the prospects for increasing eligible family member employment overseas and also address the possibility of increasing opportunities for employment through the use of teleworking?

SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, on the last one, teleworking, we are constantly exploring what more can be done. We think it has a lot of advantages. One that we have been promoting is more conferences by teleconference, SVTS, and the like. It saves money, it saves wear and tear, and it can often lead to the same or better outcome than you would get if people had to travel distances. On the teleworking side, similarly, we’re going to explore all kinds of options. I mean, technology gives us the chance to do that.
With respect to family members, again, this is an area that we are constantly reevaluating. We know that when we send someone to serve in a post overseas, the family serves, whether the family accompanies the officer or stays behind. We know that there is a family that is involved in most cases. It really depends on a case-by-case analysis and a post-by-post situational analysis. Some posts, it’s a lot easier. Some we have, as you know, reciprocal agreements with the host countries, others we don’t. So we’re working on this because we know it’s an impediment for a lot of families, but I can’t give you more than the commitment we’ve made to work through this and the fact that we are trying to push as hard as we can to provide opportunities for those who accompany the person who’s assigned.
Civil servant, Walter Bruce on Ombudsman:
This is a Foreign Service organization. We got no doubts about that. But there should be an infrastructure in place that looks out for the interests and advances of those that we consider to be civil servants. (Applause.) I just wanted a status. So, Madame Secretary, all I want to know is – and I’m sure Pat going to be able to tell me this – where we stand on it. (Laughter.) That’s all I have.
SECRETARY CLINTON: Thank you so much and thanks for your many years of service to our country, first in the military and now here. We’re going to have that ombudsman, aren’t we, Pat? (Laughter.)
UNDER SECRETARY KENNEDY: Madame Secretary, yes, the law requires that the ombudsman must be a member of the Senior Executive Service. We have no other choice; it’s written in the statute. So we are in the process in all this turnover of recruiting someone because we have to identify an SES position and recruit someone. That process is ongoing.
On Civil Servant Dorothy Burkette who wanted a Civil Service not Foreign Service supervisor:
QUESTION: My name is Dorothy Burkette and I’m sort of coming behind Major Bruce in the sense that I am concerned that I’ve been here 11 years and I’ve never had a good supervisor. I’ve always had – (laughter).
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, shall we give equal time to your supervisors? (Laughter.)
QUESTION: Oh, okay. I am concerned because they’re not accountable to anyone. In fact, in the two bureaus I’ve worked in here, the particular supervisor is always supported by management all the way up to the assistant secretary. And whatever they do, as one assistant secretary told me, we don’t ever tell any supervisor what they can do in their office. And so that is a very poor environment to work in and I have experienced that. I’ve been – every office I’ve been in, I’ve been discriminated against. In my present office, one low-line supervisor came in, a young 30-something-year-old, with people in my age group, and with a hard hand and decided to tell all of the supervisory people up to the assistant secretary that I was a terrible person. They accepted it. I had no redress. None of my rights were acknowledged. I was never able to give – I was never given a list of all charges against me. And there is a memo in your office about this, but I’m sure it didn’t get to you. But – so that’s the reason why I’m saying something today.
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well —
QUESTION: But we need – as he’s saying Civil Service employees, we need to have Civil Service supervisors. This was a Foreign Service person who knew nothing —
SECRETARY CLINTON: I’m sorry. I —
QUESTION: — about Civil Service. 
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, then there really is no – we will certainly pay attention to ensuring that people get their grievances heard. But this is a mixed workplace and Foreign Service officers have a lot of responsibility, Civil Service officers also have a lot of responsibility, and it’s just not possible to say that you can only be supervised by one or the other. That just is not possible.
QUESTION: I just want you to know the organizations I’ve been to which were the Office of Civil Rights, which at one time was known as affirmative action. As you know now, they are – they have to take a neutral approach. So even if what I’ve told is – even if they see a problem, they can’t speak to it.
SECRETARY CLINTON: That’s just not the case.
QUESTION: So that was out with that.
SECRETARY CLINTON: That is not the case. I’m sorry, ma’am.
QUESTION: Well, I’m just telling you this is what happened.
SECRETARY CLINTON: No, I know. But I think we’ve heard that you have some questions that you feel strongly about, and I’m sorry that that’s been your experience, but I think there are a lot of people in the Office of Civil Rights and in the management chain who can listen to that. That doesn’t mean they’re going to always side with you. I mean, just because someone feels —
QUESTION: Of course not. Of course not.
SECRETARY CLINTON: — I mean, I’ve had more criticism in my life than probably whole countries have had. (Applause.) And it doesn’t mean that I’m always right or I’m always wrong. But especially when we do have these systems for your grievances to be heard, I really urge you to do that and pursue those and do the best you can under the circumstances.
QUESTION: So what can I do if the union didn’t help me and the Office of Civil Rights didn’t help me?
SECRETARY CLINTON: Well, I think you need to ask yourself why nobody is agreeing with you.
QUESTION: Okay. No, I’m not saying that’s what the problem is. But thank you for listening.
SECRETARY CLINTON: Okay, thank you.