Trump / UK Diplomat Row Escalates

[P.J. Denyer]

I'm surprised how bland the statements made by the ambassador were. From what's been leaked so far, he didn't say anything that wasn't common knowledge and printed in many newspapers. I hope he did say some more interesting things - otherwise he wasn't worth his very generous salary and benefits.

It's not the Ambassador's fault that Trump hangs his dirty washing out for all to see. It's like blaming a Detective because his last case was a man standing over a corpse, covered in blood, holding the murder weapons saying "I did it, I killed her, here's the video and notarized witness statements.

 

[P.J. Denyer]

Okay, but how many egregious violations of public trust would have gone unnoticed if state secrets were suppressed from publication?

Then there's a whole other can of worms to go through with what is and isn't a state secret. Because a lot of times it seems like the definition of "state secrets" is "information that would embarrass a public official and outrage the electorate."

Any breaking of the OSA should only be acceptable if there is a public interest defence, there was nothing here that the public needed to know, and needed to know now. This was political vandalism at best.

There are now two 'journalists' involved, one is a notable right wing, pro-Brexit commentator and media personality who happens to also be the alleged mistress of a major Brexit Party figure, the other works for the Brexit Party (having previously worked for anti public service lobbyists "Tax Payers Alliance" and Leave.eu) and has supposedly managed to cultivate senior civil service sources willing to hand over classified material despite only being 19 years old. Nothing dodgy here at all....

 

[Delphic Oracle]

Any breaking of the OSA should only be acceptable if there is a public interest defence, there was nothing here that the public needed to know, and needed to know now. This was political vandalism at best.



There are now two 'journalists' involved, one is a notable right wing, pro-Brexit commentator and media personality who happens to also be the alleged mistress of a major Brexit Party figure, the other works for the Brexit Party (having previously worked for anti public service lobbyists "Tax Payers Alliance" and Leave.eu) and has supposedly managed to cultivate senior civil service sources willing to hand over classified material despite only being 19 years old. Nothing dodgy here at all....

Well now that you've told me their political leanings, I'll go ahead and abandon my principles.

 

[ponderingturtle]

What's really fun is when something is both awful and true, it's the person who was "caught" saying so that is expected to be ashamed and embarrassed over it.

Who ever undermined UK foreign service for political advantage with in a political party gets your full support I see.

https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/kim-darroch-trump-uk-ambassador-to-us-email-leak-un-a8996196.html

I guess the only solution is to stop trying to report facts to your superiors and tell them what Trump wants them to hear.

 

[Delphic Oracle]

Who ever undermined UK foreign service for political advantage with in a political party gets your full support I see.



https://www.independent.co.uk/voice...-ambassador-to-us-email-leak-un-a8996196.html



I guess the only solution is to stop trying to report facts to your superiors and tell them what Trump wants them to hear.

I'm pretty sure I referenced being rebuffed by superiors as part of my calculus, but they may have been in a different thread.

In any case, I really tire of this "let me turn something you didn't specifically refute in this last comment into your entire worldview" tactic lately.

A simpler way to have a discussion is to maybe ask for clarification. Although that too has a tendency to turn into "let me ask about these 713 edge cases."

 

[P.J. Denyer]

Well now that you've told me their political leanings, I'll go ahead and abandon my principles.

My principal is that breaking the OSA should only be considered if it is necessary in the public interest and not for political advantage. I would have assumed that was an uncontroversial position but maybe I'm wrong.

 

[Delphic Oracle]

My principal is that breaking the OSA should only be considered if it is necessary in the public interest and not for political advantage. I would have assumed that was an uncontroversial position but maybe I'm wrong.

Sorry, replied to the wrong post. That rebuttal was meant for ponderingturtle's first line.

 

[Vixen]

Any breaking of the OSA should only be acceptable if there is a public interest defence, there was nothing here that the public needed to know, and needed to know now. This was political vandalism at best.

There are now two 'journalists' involved, one is a notable right wing, pro-Brexit commentator and media personality who happens to also be the alleged mistress of a major Brexit Party figure, the other works for the Brexit Party (having previously worked for anti public service lobbyists "Tax Payers Alliance" and Leave.eu) and has supposedly managed to cultivate senior civil service sources willing to hand over classified material despite only being 19 years old. Nothing dodgy here at all....

It's so obvious that 19-year old journalist is offering to take the fall to protect the leaker.

 

[Vixen]

The plot thickens. So now Trump is hinting Farage may be the next UK Ambassador to Washington.

And Trump raised the idea he will become UK's next ambassador to the US.

"I think Nigel is some place in this audience. Where is Nigel? Nigel Farage," Trump told the crowd.

"He's here some place. I saw him. I said what is he doing here, he's a little older than most of you

"I tell you what, he got 32 per cent of the vote from nowhere over in the UK.

"He did a great job, and I know he's going to work well with Boris, they are going to do some tremendous things."

That answers the question, 'cui bene? from the leak.