Do you know that Trump has still not appointed an ambassador to Australia?

[pink]

n/t

[TheCowsCameHome]

1. That's their good fortune.

[Fred Sanders]

7. A Shitler appointee is likely to be as stupid and useless as Shitler. Australia is grateful.

[dhol82]

2. Whole lot of shit he has not done yet

Any bets on when he might start?

[democratisphere]

3. Unconscionable.

[VMA131Marine]

4. He's still mad at them.

What a child he is, a spoiled brat of a child.

[MrPurple]

5. That has to be it, Scott Brown became ambassador to New Zealand like 8 months ago

[JI7]

6. Wasn't that supposed to go to papadopoulos

[struggle4progress]

8. He's quite the lazy boy: here are some other ambassadorships with no nominees yet

Albania
Argentina
Armenia
ASEAN
Australia
Austria
Azerbaijan
Bangladesh
Belarus
Belgium
Belize
Benin
Bolivia
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Botswana
Brazil
Brunei Darussalam
Bulgaria
Burkina Faso
Burma
Burundi
Cabo Verde
Cambodia
Central African Republic
Chad
Congo (DR)
Cote d'Ivoire
Cuba
Cyprus
Ecuador
Egypt
El Salvador
Equatorial Guinea
Eritrea
Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru, Tonga, & Tuvalu
The Gambia
Georgia
Ghana
Greece
Guinea
Guyana
Honduras
Hungary
Iceland
Indonesia
Iraq
Ireland
Jamaica
Jordan
Kazakhstan
Kenya
Kosovo
Kuwait
Kyrgyz Republic
Laos
Latvia
Lebanon
Libya
Lithuania
Macedonia
Madagascar & Comoros
Malawi
Malaysia
Mali
Malta
Marshall Islands
Mexico
Micronesia
Moldova
Mongolia
Montenegro
Mozambique
Nepal
Nicaragua
Nigeria
Oman
Pakistan
Palau
Panama
Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands & Vanuatu
Philippines
Poland
Qatar
Romania
Saudi Arabia
Serbia
Slovakia
Slovenia
South Africa
South Korea
Sri Lanka & Maldives
Sudan
Suriname
Swaziland
Sweden
Syria
Tajikistan
Tanzania
Thailand
Togo
Trinidad and Tobago
Tunisia
Turkey
Turkmenistan
Uganda
Ukraine
United Arab Emirates
Uruguay
Uzbekistan
Venezuela
Yemen
Zimbabwe

source: http://www.afsa.org/appointments-donald-j-trump

[muriel_volestrangler]

10. That includes places with career ambassadors currently in place

Here's a list from the same org with which spaces are still vacant or not confirmed:

http://www.afsa.org/list-ambassadorial-appointments

so we see that, for instance, Brazil has " P. Michael McKinley Career confirmed 9/15/16".

Of countries of current major geopolitical interest that really should have someone permanent (and competent) in, and that the US exchanges ambassadors with, but are vacant not not yet confirmed, I'd pick out:

Argentina
Australia
Congo (DR)
Cuba
Egypt
European Union
Germany
Qatar
Somalia
South Africa
South Korea
South Sudan (Nominated August)
Turkey

Now, it's possible they have very good acting diplomats doing all that needs to be; but after a year, those career diplomats really ought to have been promoted to permanent ambassador in that case. I'd imagine career appointments go through the Senate swiftly, though it seems strange the South Sudan career nominee hasn't been confirmed yet.

[canetoad]

9. Yeah, read an article the other day

That empty seat at the US embassy ...

Should Australia be worried if the Trump administration has not appointed its ambassador to Canberra?

The former deputy prime minister, Tim Fischer, thinks so. Fischer argues that by not appointing a successor to President Obama's man, John Berry, who left the post in September 2016, Washington is in effect insulting one of its closest allies.

The issue matters, because as most people can see, the current occupant of the White House bears little resemblance in the way he conducts himself to previous holders of the position. He is best understood as someone for whom the intricacies of international diplomacy are only comprehensible as personal transactions. If this is an insult, it may therefore matter more than normal.

The relationship is already supposed to be tense. Malcolm Turnbull's famous phone call to the newly installed President Donald Trump last January, on this view, got the relationship off to a bad start. By seeking a commitment from the new president to stand by the agreement Australia had struck with his predecessor, Turnbull was apparently taking risks with the relationship.

http://www.theage.com.au/comment/smh-editorial/that-empty-seat-at-the-us-embassy--20180105-h0dzwz.html