Robert A. Mandell New US Ambassador to Luxembourg

AMBASSADOR

Robert A. Mandell
Ambassador of the United States of America to the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg

Following his nomination by President Barack Obama and confirmation by the U.S. Senate, Robert A. Mandell was sworn in as the 21st Ambassador of the United States of America to the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg on October 25, 2011, in Washington, DC.

Prior to becoming the U.S. Ambassador to Luxembourg, he was Chairman and CEO of Greater Properties Inc., a closely held commercial real estate venture in Central Florida. Previously, he served as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of The Greater Construction Corp. from 1998 until 2005. Greater was a family-owned homebuilding business established in Central Florida in 1965. During its history, Greater built 45 new communities in which it sold more than 12,000 homes in Central Florida. In October 2005, Greater Construction was sold to Meritage Homes, Inc., an Arizona company, and became part of the twelfth-largest homebuilder in America.

Ambassador Mandell has been involved in several capacities in the federal, state, regional and local governments. Two years ago President Barack Obama appointed him to serve on the President’s Export Council, where he was Vice Chairman of the Trade Promotion and Advocacy Subcommittee, as well as a member of the Small and Medium Sized Business Engagement Subcommittee. He took an active part in advancing President Obama’s goal of doubling exports within five years.

He also served on the Board of Directors of Florida Hospital, a 2000-bed, acute care hospital in Florida and part of the Adventist Health System. The Ambassador also was on the Audit and Finance Committee of the Adventist Health System. Other boards he served on include the Sanford-Burnham Institute for Medical Research of LaJolla, California, and the Vermont Studio Center. He also was on the Central Florida Advisory Board of Orange Bank.

Additionally, Ambassador Mandell was Chairman of the State of Florida Environmental Regulation Commission from 1987-1990; Chairman of the Orlando-Orange County Expressway Authority in 1990 and 1991 and Vice Chairman from 1992 to 1995. He was a member of Orange County Chairman Richard Crotty’s Transportation Commission in 2002 and the Blue Ribbon Panel on Education for the Orange County Public School System in 2004-2005.

The Ambassador is a 1969 graduate of the University of Florida with a BS in Advertising and, in 1972, a Juris Doctor degree. He is an “AV” rated lawyer in the Martindate-Hubbell legal list. In addition, he graduated from the Harvard Business School’s OPM Executive Program in 2000.

Ambassador Mandell is married to Julie Walker Mandell and is the father of two boys: Zack, 26, and Xan, 20. Mrs. Mandell has two children: Lauren, aged 17, and Daniel, 25. The Ambassador’s hobbies are painting, traveling, and reading.

Q&A: Bob Mandell of Winter Park talks about new role as ambassador to Luxembourg

Learn more about Ambassador to Luxembourg Bob Mandell. As seen in the "Orlando Sentinel".

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/orange/os-bob-mandell-ambassador-luxembourg-20111027,0,6913472.story

The Ambassador is leaving on Friday evening.

We all wish you a safe trip, hopefully not on Air France (they might strike).

Remember, Luxembourg is 999, nothing to do with the tax talk of that guy who wants to replace the President you supported. No, it's square miles. So aim carefully.

When you arrive in Luxembourg on Saturday, it will be 32ᵒ F, a little above during the day with a mix of snow and rain. That's a pretty good day in Luxembourg, what you would call actually a very warm reception. What follows then is documented, weather-wise, in the Battle of the Bulge history that you studied.

A good recipe for those days is glow wine. Have a look in the wine cellar. If during the Sede Vacante no-one poached around there, you should find $2,400 worth of wine, left from your predecessor Cynthia Stroum who bought it and doesn't drink wine, to the wrath of the Inspector General (buying wine that is, drinking wasn't the issue). Here is the recipe for a good glow wine, from @CDkitchen, where I think CD stands for Corps Diplomatique:

INGREDIENTS:

1 (750ml) bottle red wine
1/2 cup water
1/4 cup sugar
2 three-inch cinnamon sticks
3 cloves
2 lemon slices

PREPARATION:

Bring the sugar, spices, lemon, and water to a boil, then let this mixture steep for 30 minutes. Add the wine and carefully reheat to just under the boiling point. Strain into mugs and serve hot.

Note: You can substitute extra wine or a fine apple brandy for the water. And many traditional recipes call for a dash of Angostura bitters, though I think it tastes fine without them, and the Inspector General might not approve the expense. The rest is clearly a health issue and the best aboriginal Luxembourg medicine money can buy.

Robert A. Mandell's nomination as ambassador to Luxembourg .....

.... still waits approval from the US Senate. To my Luxembourg friends: don't hold your breath, The ways here are impenetrable, so who knows. I keep a watchful eye though and found someone who has to admit he doesn't know. In the meantime, this is a good overview about a fixture in US politics, that is useful for everyone to understand in Luxembourg. Bundling in Luxembourg is the other way round: the most faithful bundle board nominations without going through the pain of raising funds for the boss' campaign. Just for being faithful, reliable. Here we go:

http://news.muckety.com/2011/10/18/what-do-bundlers-get/34611

Quote:

"Ambassadorships are a favor handed out to many big money raisers. We count 23 such appointments in the Obama administration, some of which are shown in the map above. A 24th - Robert A. Mandell’s nomination as ambassador to Luxembourg - awaits Senate approval.

Mandell was named after another Obama bundler, Cynthia Stroum, stepped down in the midst of a near-mutiny by embassy staff."

New US Ambassador to Luxembourg: From "Call me Madam" to "Call me Monsieur".

President Obama has announced the nomination of Robert A. Mandell as the US Ambassador to Luxembourg. He is the Chief Executive Officer of a real estate and two mall development companies in Central Florida. Please see here what the Huffington Post has found out:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/29/obama-donor-robert-mandel_n_887061.html

There you have it. Just like his predecessor Cynthia Stroum, Robert Mandell has been a donor and fund raiser for President Obama's election campaign. That was the easiest part. Ask Cynthia Stroum. After just one year at her post, she got quite an earful from "The General Inspector". That name sounds scary. Though Luxembourg loved her, she had to go. She says, she has been wrongfully accused. I know that Luxembourgers have considered the various accounts of wrongdoing she was tagged with as peccadilloes. But that's us: we live on large footprints and do more in generalities, not the focused particularizations on concrete matters of a meticulous audit. So our Embassies don't need Inspector Generals. Luxembourg developed its own dynamic self regulation processes. But again, back to Cynthia Stroum: we called her Madam, in remembrance of Irving Berlin's musical "Call Me Madam!" I always thought there should be a sequel. What about "Call Me Monsieur"? Which reminds me of John Wayne. Not that he played in "Call Me Madam". But he played in "Comancheros", where he tried a thousand times to call his co-star Whitman "Monsieur". It took me a while to get that he meant to say "Monsieur" when he said "Monn-Dzioor". So it is a tongue breaker. We'll have to advise if that title is adequate for a sequel. In the meantime, we can give plenty of advice to Monsieur, based on Irving Berlin's musical, Pearl Mesta's and Cynthia Stroum's adventures in foreign lands and my own deep, deep insights into diplomacy.

There will be hearings first. We would love to contribute to your mandatory initial statement and say, that Luxembourg is of such an importance that it goes way beyond its size, it is everywhere in the front peloton: founding member of the UN, NATO and the European Union. You might want to kick in BeNeLux, the OECD, and the promising Schleck brothers in the Tour de France. We are the richest country on Earth and all the other planets, with trillions of dollars lying around. Therefore we also promised to take one prisoner from Gitmo. Yep, trillions. So someone has to come over and see when we are going to make good on the Gitmo promise. You did doctor the video with our SOS from that day, didn't you? You can also say that we are not a tax haven and don't qualify for Barney Frank's planned judicial haven benchmarks. We are very hard working people, to keep things the way they are, even after you find out what we are doing. It is politically very correct to mention the Luxembourg-American Cultural Society, based in Belgium, Wisconsin. Belgium!? And also the Luxembourg-American Chamber of Commerce, based in New York. I'll see you there!

Benefiting from Pearl Mesta's and Cynthia Stroum's experience, I would say, double check where Luxembourg is. Pearl Mesta got lost in the Belgian Province of Luxembourg upon her arrival. Those Belgians feed on our excellent reputation.

The Embassy in Luxembourg might look empty. I understand that most of the staff applied for positions in Afghanistan to escape hardship in Luxembourg. I would definitely keep the queen size mattress. It was bought by a democrat and the country can't really accept king size mattresses. Those restrictions are based on its limited territory of 999 square miles. You might have to man the Embassy's outside surveillance cameras yourself as everybody left. Be aware that some guys in Luxembourg have criticized those as an intrusion of their privacy! They will show up making faces to the camera. I would for sure investigate where the equivalent of $2,400 of wine went, that Cynthia Stroum left there. The wine still should be there, because I know for a fact that Cynthia Stroum didn't drink it. She had 3 glasses in 30 years. Go ask her!

Don't expect to meet the Prime Minister of Luxembourg. He is home, but exclusively in Europe. He is berating the Greek and other PIIGS because he is Monsieur too, but Monsieur Euro only. He would have liked to become Monsieur Europe, but he got outfoxed by Monsieur Van Rompuy. You won't meet him either, because he is Belgian. Van isn't his first name, but that is an aristocratic prefix you could buy from broke aristocrats some time ago. The sale is no longer available.

Don't expect to meet our SOS either. He is also our Vice Prime Minister. I call him Jang, but in America you would spell that Zhang. No, he doesn't live in Chinatown. We haven't any yet. Jang will be in Zimbabwe, Tonga, Vanuatu, Congo and basically every place where a guy can decide to vote for Luxembourg as a future member of the UN Security Council. Keep your veto handy, here we are coming. Except for Israel though, I don't believe you'll have bad behavior. And on key strategies, such as pulling back from Afghanistan, I assume we'll follow closely the US lead, and withdraw 3 soldiers in July 2012, and the remaining 4 a week later.

I know, Monsieur, that as a real estate professional, your choice of Luxembourg hasn't been left to chance. You chose location, location, location. It is a very nice place to be. Getting bored? Rome, Paris, Berlin, London etc. all are just one hour away. But don't try beating boredom by moonlighting, building malls in Luxembourg. The building permit will take 7 years to get, then you have to fight a lawsuit from those against, another 7 years, and then you have to go to the Human Rights Court in Strasbourg, because justice delayed is Justice denied. You could however build just across the border in Belgium, next to Ikea. Those guys had no patience and gave up prematurely on Luxembourg, after only a handful of years trying to get a permit. Now, on the three days where the sun shines, people can watch Ikea's growing shadow totally enveloping Luxembourg before sunset. It's the Ikea eclipse.

And Monsieur, before closing my eyes after all these eye-openers, may I wish you the best of luck and success in your new career.