Politics? I'm Shocked, Shocked!

Little Green Footballs linked to an article in Time magazine trying to invent a scandal:

The Inter-American Telecommunication Commission meets three times a year in various cities across the Americas to discuss such dry but important issues as telecommunications standards and spectrum regulations. But for this week's meeting in Guatemala City, politics has barged onto the agenda. At least four of the two dozen or so U.S. delegates selected for the meeting, sources tell TIME, have been bumped by the White House because they supported John Kerry's 2004 campaign.

This is absurd. No one has the right to represent the United States in matters of foreign affairs, and ensuring delegation members are zelous advocates for the U.S. position is both a long-standing practice and logical.

I responded at LGF with an extensive comment, which also is reproduced below:

I work in telecom and have been a US delegate to several international conferences, including CITEL conferences. CITEL's central mission is to formulate, discuss and adopt technical standards in both wire-line telecommunications and radio-based services (including broadcasting). I emphasize "technical"--CITEL focuses on inter-networking protocols and harmonized allocation of the radio spectrum (so as to minimize interference). A few points:

1) CITEL is a technical body; at a typical conference, more than half the delegates or observers are engineers (especially the delegations of Central and South American nations). These conferences have almost no connection with freedom of speech--the principal exception over the years being a U.S. initiative aimed at liberalizing the free flow of information between countries. For example, the U.S. has been largely successful in encouraging CITEL member states to allow foreign media to use satellite uplinks to transmit stories back to their home-country headquarters. And, Nancy: CITEL does NOT address law enforcement or wiretap issues.

2) Article II of the Constitution invests the President with near-exclusive control over foreign relations, which the Executive in turn delegated to the State Department--but subject to Presidential control. The State Department exercises routine authority but decisions such as choosing a head of any delegation always require White House approval. Indeed, many of those omitted by the State Department lobby the White House requesting that they intervene.

3) US delegations, including to CITEL, cannot be infinitely large. So not everyone -- whether public or private sector -- can attend. Thus selection of delegates necessarily is a "political" process. Only a delegate can speak for the United States at such conferences. So delegate selection is founded on choosing members with the needed expertise to set forth and advocate the U.S. position at plenary or sub-group sessions. Powderfinger and chunkstyle are right--the First Amendment does not authorize any American to be a diplomat. As Carolyn said, it's hardly strange for an Administration to select delegates whose loyalty to the U.S. position is unquestioned.

4) Even if not on the U.S. delegation, industry representatives can join CITEL as "associate members." Associate members can attend most conference sessions. Because they do not represent a CITEL member nation, associates cannot "take the mic" at a conference. But, since most telecom conference negotiations occur in coffee houses and bars, non-delegation associates have nearly the same influence as those part of the official delegation.

In sum, and unsurprisingly, once again, the Moonbats are barking mad.