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BACK TO : PROPAGANDA AND THE GWOT Year 4 - 2005
Job No. 1: U.S. image makeover by Cam Simpson 
Job No. 1: U.S. image makeover Experts say Hughes has clout to boost post's profile in D.C. By Cam Simpson Washington Bureau Chicago Tribune, Published March 15, 2005 WASHINGTON -- Thirteen months ago, one of Washington's top intelligence officials warned that burgeoning anti-American sentiment in the Muslim world was providing sustenance for extremists. Vice Adm. Lowell Jacoby, the head of Defense Intelligence Agency, updated that warning last month and turned up the volume, telling senators that Osama bin Laden was feeding off the negative feelings, which are at an all-time high. But on Monday--following months of simmering criticism about its foundering public diplomacy efforts--the White House named Karen Hughes, a longtime confidant of President Bush, to head the State Department office charged with turning that tide and improving America's image abroad. Hughes, a 48-year-old Texan who played a crucial role in the rise of George W. Bush from professional baseball executive to the presidency, was tapped to become the new undersecretary of public diplomacy, a position that had been without a permanent chief since last summer. "America's public diplomacy should be as much about listening and understanding as it is about speaking," Hughes said at the State Department. "I'm eager to listen and to learn." A key attribute: Clout Though she lacks diplomatic experience and expertise in the Muslim or Arab world, insiders and outsiders alike said that Hughes, who would be the third person to hold the post since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, may have the one qualification that matters most--clout. "I was kind of hoping that they would do something dramatic," Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.), chairman of the House subcommittee that holds the purse strings for the State Department, said approvingly after the announcement. Wolf, who had been nudging the White House on the issue for more than a year, said Hughes' most important asset might be that she "will have the ear of the president." A former Texas television reporter once dubbed the most powerful woman in Washington, Hughes left Bush's side nearly three years ago and returned to Texas to spend more time with her family, returning briefly to the fold last summer when insiders worried that Bush's re-election campaign was in trouble. Her decision to return to official Washington for a post far removed from the power center of the White House's West Wing surprised some, but signaled to others the importance Bush appears to be placing behind the effort. That was certainly the message received at the State Department, where one veteran of public diplomacy efforts said the high-profile appointment for what was largely considered an unwanted job could give the moribund campaign the jolt it needs. The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said Hughes' nomination could fill a vital void by finally putting someone in the post with relevance in policymaking circles. But this official also said, "The open question is, can she get the resources?" Funding for the effort has long been criticized. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has proposed a public diplomacy budget, including funds for exchange programs run by the U.S., of nearly $760 million for 2006, up from about $685 million this year. But the State Department official said those figures "amount to peanuts" when "you are engaged in a war of ideas." A special commission drew similar conclusions, arguing that funding for American efforts to influence the world fell off dramatically when the Cold War ended, instead of being retooled and refocused. The independent commission that investigated the Sept. 11 attacks also called for a new push to improve America's image in the Muslim world. `Feel-good' TV ads criticized The first person appointed to the job after the attacks, marketing executive Charlotte Beers, criticized the lack of resources and quit the post, acknowledging that she had failed in her quest to "rebrand" America. Arab and American diplomats, however, criticized Beers for producing feel-good television advertisements that networks in the Middle East declined to broadcast. Margaret Tutwiler, a longtime Bush family confidant with solid diplomatic credentials, replaced Beers, but quit after less than a year. All the while, the hostility detailed by Jacoby grew. Satellite TV images of the American occupation of Iraq, including the abuse of detainees at Abu Ghraib prison, and Israel's occupation of the Palestinian territories continued to merge, fairly or unfairly, in the minds of many Arabs and Muslims. Daniel Byman, a former Middle East analyst for the U.S. government who is now a professor at Georgetown University, said no public diplomacy chief can turn around resentment over American policies in the Middle East, barring a major shift in those policies. But Byman said effective public diplomacy could get people who hate America to "hate it a little less," and people who like it, "to like it a little more." He also said Hughes might be able to improve the U.S. image abroad because she has the political strength in Washington to unify the government's message to the world across all of the agencies involved. Copyright © 2005, Chicago Tribune |