US Ambassador to Luxembourg Cynthia Stroum and the Press.

I have several friends who brought up the story of US Ambassador Cynthia Stroum resigning, abruptly it seems, from her post.

Unfortunately, the story got sensationalized after she resigned. When you have a closer look, there are four key players:

• The inspector general and the official report. Given that this is an open administrative process and the report is factual with remedies that were recommended, it is the only source available to set my opinion. I don't see therein an absolute reason to resign, except for the embarrassment and the unusual spin this got.
• The Embassy staff. They were unhappy with their boss. If the boss has a boss that can boomerang.
• Ambassador Stroum said nothing as far as I know and leaves for personal reasons, in fact the usual boiler plate reasons when you don't want to elaborate.
• The Press: at least one guy seems to have read the official report, quite obliquely, just to find those passages that feed an interesting story, yellow mark them and then spin them a little bit. Chances are that the final product then was taken over as is and the Luxembourg press did not read any further. And I'm almost sure they didn't try to talk to Ms. Stroum either, because that's modern journalism.

I really believe that if this were a Luxembourg Embassy (of our own Grand Duchy), we would not talk about it. In my memoirs I'll have some stories about some funny but extraordinarily expensive and unreasonable Luxembourg Ambassadors. This US report doesn't even compare to those. Here is the report:

http://oig.state.gov/documents/organization/156129.pdf

I don't know the lady, just met her once. But I understood she did a good job in Luxembourg with Luxembourg. Her personal style is unknown to me except for the articles that look like gossip compared to the inspector general's underlying sober report. So she wanted a new smaller mattress? Which Democrat wants to sleep on a Republican's mattress, and vice-versa? As for wine buying, the Press subliminally suggests she has a drinking problem. I imagine though that the same is standard procedure in Luxembourg's Embassies and Administrations: not a drinking problem either I hope, but comes December 31st, they scramble to spend the last cent on their budgets. A scandalous waste, yes, the reason being that next year's budget risks to be amputated if you don't spend it all. All said, it looks to me like boulevard press reporting. I would speculate that she wasn't easy and was demanding, maybe too zealous in a sleepy post, which got translated into bullying and mobbing. She did not comment as far as I know. She was not a career diplomat, but so are many US Ambassadors. One has to wonder: did she get some guidance on how she was supposed to work? She certainly got a report with issues and with remedies.

Overall a sad story.