Obama Picks Financial Backer for UK Ambassador Post A little bit of Chicago is about to descend on the Court of St James's. Barack Obama, in spite of promising to end cronyism in Washington, is about to name one of his hometown friends and financial backers to the plum London posting. The next Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary will be Louis Susman, a lawyer and financier with little experience in foreign affairs. The posting to London, to interact with America's supposedly close ally, has virtually become a retirement posting, offering a comfortable home in one of the best mansions in London, Winfield House in Regent's Park, and dinner invitations to Downing Street and Buckingham Palace. The recent crop of US ambassadors, since the career diplomat Ray Seitz left in 1994, have been political appointees more interested in talking about country walks or horses than Iraq or nuclear non-proliferation. Most of the diplomatic work is left to the number two and threes at the embassy, career diplomats. The appointment of Susman will end months of speculation. His name first surfaced in a diary column in the Washington Post in February but Caroline Kennedy was also mentioned as was Oprah Winfrey, another of Obama's Chicago supporters. There was no official confirmation of Susman's posting today but the Guardian has learned that the all the necessary diplomatic paperwork been completed. Buckingham Palace this month approved the appointment and Obama is to make a formal announcement shortly. Susman, 71, a vice-president of Citigroup until he retired in February, has long been a financial backer of the Democrats, nicknamed the "vacuum cleaner" by the Chicago Tribune for his ability to hoover up campaign funding. "I don't think anyone enjoys raising money, but for some reason I seem to have a knack for how to do it," he told the paper. Susman, who lives in an expensive neighbourhood of Chicago overlooking Lake Michigan, raised at least $500,000 for Obama's campaign and a further $300,000 for his inauguration. London is not the only posting being used to reward political supporters. Other postings in Europe are expected to filled on the basis of patronage too rather than foreign policy experience Dan Rooney, owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers NFL team, who campaigned for Obama, is to be ambassador to Dublin. The picks will disappoint former US career diplomats who have been pressing Obama to end the practice, especially since he promised to offer more of the top jobs to demoralised career diplomats. A retired diplomat with 30 years service, Morton Abramowitz, writing in the Washington Post in December, called on Obama to "publicly declare that he will not appoint ambassadors who have in effect secured their posts through financial contributions and who have little background to merit any such appointment". Ronald Neumann, a former career diplomat and ambassador and now president of the Washington-based American Academy of Diplomacy, sent a letter to Obama last year after he secured the Democratic nomination saying ambassadors should have demonstrated an interest in foreign affairs and, preferably, experience of the country they are being appointed to. Neumann said today: "You would think with our most important ally we might occasionally send someone with some experience." The first US minister to Britain was John Adams, who presented his credentials to King George the Third in 1785. Adams was a political appointment but he was a figure of stature, sent to a diplomatically sensitive post: the representative of the newly-independent states dealing with the man who had until recently been his sovereign. Paris too was regarded as a key post, occupied by Benjamin Franklin. Almost all Adams' successors to the Court of St James's have been political appointees. One exception was Ray Seitz, a career diplomat appointed by George Bush Sr, and so popular with both Conservative and Labour MPs, and with the Foreign Office, that Bill Clinton kept him on. George W Bush sent two of his financial backers, neither of whom had any experience in foreign policy: William Farish, a Texan multi-millionaire, and Robert Tuttle, a Californian car dealer. The lack of an experienced diplomat at the top in London was felt most in the run-up to the war in Iraq in 2003, with Farish near-invisible at a time when an energetic and knowledgeable figure was needed to put the US case on camera and in print. Obama sending Susman to Britain could be viewed as a snub. The relationship between the Obama administration and the UK government got off to a bad start. At least one member of the administration holds a grudge over the leaking during the campaign of a memo from the British ambassador, Sir Nigel Sheinwald, assessing Obama as "aloof". But the minor rows over the memo, the removal of the Churchill bust from the Oval Office, the DVD present to Gordon Brown and other perceived slights have been presentational problems rather than a sign of ruptured relations. The relationship with Britain long ago ceased to be "special" but it is on par with France and Germany. Neumann said that the lack of importance attached to the UK ambassadorship could reflect the fact that much of the work these days is done directly between the White House and Downing Street and cabinet minister to cabinet minister, with the ambassador bypassed. With so many ambassadorships still to be announced, it is too early yet to compare Obama with previous presidents. Historically, about 25% to 30% of the diplomatic posts have been political appointees. Obama's ratio could yet be lower. But he has stuck with tradition with regard to the plum jobs, as Neumann noted. "Historically, you pay out your big guys first," he said.
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