The Senate Appropriations committee late last month approved a funding bill for 2012 that would cut State’s budget by 8 percent, while the House Appropriations committee is holding on to legislation that would reduce funding by 18 percent next year.

For diplomatic and consular programs, including the account that pays Foreign Service salaries, Senate lawmakers recommended $6.87 billion, a decline of $1.89 billion compared with fiscal 2011. On the House side, the same fund would get only $5.66 billion, a drop of $3.11 billion.

The House bill also would cancel State’s authority to provide comparability pay for federal workers posted abroad. Foreign Service employees for years did not receive locality pay while on overseas assignments until Congress in 2009 began phasing in annual increases to close a 24 percent gap with Washington-area employees. Federal workers in posts abroad saw a 16 percent boost over 2009 and 2010. Lawmakers in April extended funding for the increases to 16.52 percent but barred State from using fiscal 2011 money to implement the third phase of the plan. The Senate version would provide funds for continuing phases one and two only.

According to American Foreign Service Association President Susan Johnson, threats to Foreign Service officer pay are particularly harmful because families usually lose the possibility of a second income when posted overseas and face rising health care and living costs. Cuts also hurt morale and State’s ability to recruit and retain employees, she said.

Hiring at both State and the U.S. Agency for International Development would take a hit under the proposals. House lawmakers would not provide funding for an additional 184 planned new hires at State, noting that the agency has hired 1,622 Foreign Service officers and 1,001 civilian workers above attrition since 2008. Both bills halt new hiring for Foreign Service positions at USAID, where 820 additional Foreign Service officers have come on board since 2008.

The House legislation would reduce USAID’s funding by $488 million compared with fiscal 2011, while the Senate would cut just $96.3 million.

Observers say steep budget cuts — and pay and hiring freezes in particular — could impede State’s diplomatic readiness and compromise national security. During a speech last week, Andrew Shapiro, assistant secretary at State’s Bureau of Political Military Affairs, said the House proposal could be especially detrimental.

Johnson agreed, noting it is easier to rebuild programs that have been underfunded than to bring back people.

“There’s no point in giving us missions and then not giving us funding to do them adequately,” Johnson said. “If you’re going to cut, cut programs, not people.”

“If further cuts are made, then I think the Foreign Service is perfectly willing to share in the sacrifice if made across-the-board,” she added. “We won’t welcome it, but it’ll be much easier to accept and soldier on.”

The new leader of the U.S. Embassy in Kabul has probably already walked past (and possibly petted?) Gordo, Freckles, Dusty, Ferdinand and Maria Teresa or any of the other 25 to 30 felines that populate the downtown diplomatic campus. But in case he has not been briefed on the bizarre battle over their fate (kill them! save them! fly them to Berkeley!), here are the basics.

Somewhere in the murky past, at least one, if not two, embassy staffers were bitten and/or scratched by the somewhat-feral cats that wander the grounds. Security of all forms is sacred here, so red flags went up, warnings went out, rabies vaccines went in. “I’m not anti-cat,” one senior diplomat explained. “I’m pro-public health.”

The writing was on the wall. The cats’ days were numbered.  “That meant exterminate,” one staffer recalled.

Enter the cat committee, which perhaps unsurprisingly is made up of people who love cats. But that doesn’t fully explain them. Working in Kabul is not easy. Staffers endure endless hours and monotonous food, walled off from the city where they work and a world away from their loved ones. Plus there’s the nagging threat that people want to kill them. The embassy bar is called the Duck and Cover.

“We basically can’t go out at all. We can’t walk across the street; we have to take a tunnel. There are no kids, no families, and basically what we have is the cats,” said one member of the committee. “It’s as close as we come to normality.”

In April, one of the embassy’s top diplomats, James Keith, convened a town hall to discuss the extermination order. Cat lovers came out in force to vent, but Keith stood his ground. The proposal that emerged would allow diplomats 60 days to adopt and ship out the cats they wanted, and the rest would meet some unspecified, but presumably unfortunate, end.

This did not assuage all concerns. As per a May 26 e-mail from a USAID staffer (Importance: High), the anti-cat crowd’s solution would do nothing for public health. Many of the cats, domesticated and immunized, it read, are “fiercely territorial” and, therefore, keep out feral cats, as well as vermin, poisonous snakes, rats and mice, “which certainly are more of a health risk to the Embassy Community.”

Sixty days passed. The debate went on. Amid the diplomatic politesse of meetings and draft proposals, some interesting guerrilla tactics emerged. Taking a page from the Taliban’s book, someone taped a night letter on the wall of the Duck and Cover. “Warning,” it read, above an image of two insurgent cats toting AK-47s, “we will break out our fellow comrades from your compound.”

Another flier that popped up in USAID offices pictured a cat in a Guevaraesque beret: “Viva la revolucion,” signed El Gato.

A more sensitive soul composed an ode under the nom de plume Bacon and the Katz. It began: “Why oh why must we die?”

“Most of you will return to the US where the living is easy and good / We apologize if our actions (purring and eating) have been misunderstood. / Please do not despise us nor wish for our demise / We cannot help it that we have cat’s eyes.”

The humane-removal advocates had a few tricks up their own oxford-cloth sleeves.

Until recently, embassy staffers who lived in a trailer (officially: containerized housing unit, or CHU) were allowed to keep a non-dog. “Small pets (mainly cats) are permitted in the CHUs” was the policy as outlined by the “welcome to post” cable given to arriving diplomats earlier this year. A more recent version, officials said, quietly omits the language permitting cats.

Witnesses have spotted fewer cats these days. Embassy officials insist no cats have been killed. Some remain safely housed in trailers and apartments. Staffers are putting together a name-and-picture-book cat census for those that stay. Evacuation plans have also begun. One committee member has found shelters in Berkeley, Calif., willing to take in what one person called “Afghan refugee cats.”

Who knows where this will lead. Surely a diplomat of Crocker’s caliber can find a solution. If not, the cat fight may very well continue.

By Joshua Partlow, The Washington Post

Micah Zenko points out in a recent piece for Foreign Policy the glaring lack of women in Washington’s foreign policy community. Searching for numbers to support her assumptions, Zenko found less than 30 percent of policy and leadership positions held by women when she reviewed Washington’s ten most prominent think tanks.

The Center for Strategic and International Studies and Center for American Progress had the highest percentages of women in policy-related roles; the Stimson Center had the highest total percentage of women in all positions at 50 percent.

When Washingtonian magazine listed the salaries of ten think tank leaders, there was only one woman, Jessica Tuchman Mathews of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Zenko found the think tank gender trend to be relatively transferrable to academia, USAID and the Pentagon.

Anecdotally, Zenko found three reasons for the gender gap in the U.S. foreign policy community:

1) Women are generally less interested in writing about “hard power,” the dominant mode for discussing foreign policy.

2) Men in senior positions have an “unconscious cronyism” in hiring other men.

3) And, not dissimilar to explanations for the lack of women in corporate leadership, women cite difficulties juggling responsibilities at home with the demands of the job.

Suggesting that there is “unconscious cronyism” to explain the low number of women in these roles may not be a particularly satisfying answer to some and may be infuriating after observing some other data.

In the 1980s, approximately 80 percent of Foreign Service Officers (FSOs) were men. But since that decade, the numbers of women have significantly increased to the point that more women are starting off in the Foreign Service than men. In 2006, 215 women versus 172 men entered the basic A-100 courses held at the Foreign Service Institute–a trend that has held up for approximately the last decade.

What this suggests is that the foreign policy community has a retention and promotion-to-leadership problem.

Women are entering the field. Why is the community unable or unwilling to keep them?

The following piece was written by former Ambassador to Morocco, Ambassador Marc Ginsberg for the Huffington Post:

“Never take America for granted!” Words my American parents drilled into me during my formative years growing up in the Middle East. Is it possible to become more patriotic when the United States is far over the horizon? Perhaps.

Just to make sure I never forgot its words I often sang the Star Spangled Banner as I listened to the Voice of America sign-off. My patriotic equivalent of a nightly prayer.

So many other Americans live over that horizon… far from our shores. They are not only our young men and women in uniform, but dedicated members of the Peace Corps, the U.S. Foreign Service, and other organizations and NGOs for which the 4th of July is a day to assemble at a U.S. diplomatic outpost to celebrate our heritage and honor our nation’s legacy.

Every U.S. embassy hosts a 4th of July reception for Americans and foreign nationals. It is an opportunity for Peace Corps members to briefly depart from their remote assignments to a U.S. embassy and get a good American meal and feel U.S. soil under the feet again. It provides our remarkably talented Foreign Service diplomats a rare occasion to return the hospitality accorded the embassy by each host government. It is also an opportunity for U.S. marines guarding the embassy the privilege of parading our national colors instead of manning their outposts.

Any homesick American is welcome… it is the one day that an embassy opens its doors for Americans residing abroad to join together to rekindle our national bond — a bond we dare not let become divisible by party, ideology, or heritage. Americans serving abroad live by the principles that unite us, not those that divide us.

Today, I ask my fellow Americans to take a moment to honor the tens of thousands of brave, dedicated, and patriotic Americans serving our nation abroad who is not necessarily in uniform. They are civilian military personnel, diplomats, employees of the Agency for International Development, Peace Corps members, Americans assigned to international organizations and relief agencies, intelligence officials and so many others who serve America abroad.

By their service and sacrifice, they honor America and all Americans not only on this 4th of July, but the other 364 days of the year..

The following proficiency level descriptions characterize spoken language  use. Each of the six “base levels” (coded 00, 10, 20, 30, 40, and 50) implies control of any previous “base level’s” functions and accuracy. The ”plus level” designation (coded 06, 16, 26, etc.) will be assigned when proficiency substantially exceeds one base skill level and does not fully meet the criteria for the next “base level.” The “plus level” descriptions are therefore supplementary to the “base level” descriptions.

A skill level is assigned to a person through an authorized languageexamination. Examiners assign a level on a variety of performance criteriaexemplified in the descriptive statements. Therefore, the examples given here illustrate, but do not exhaustively describe, either the skills a person may possess or situations in which he/she may function effectively.

Statements describing accuracy refer to typical stages in the development of competence in the most commonly taught languages in formal training programs. In other languages, emerging competence parallels these characterizations, but often with different details.

Unless otherwise specified, the term “native speaker” refers to native speakers of a standard dialect.

“Well-educated,” in the context of these proficiency descriptions, does not necessarily imply formal higher education. However, in cultures where formal higher education is common, the language-use abilities of persons who have had such education is considered the standard. That is, such a person meets contemporary expectations for the formal, careful style of the language, as well as a range of less formal varieties of the language.

Speaking 0 (No Proficiency)

Unable to function in the spoken language. Oral production is limited to occasional isolated words. Has essentially no communicative ability. (Has been coded S-0 in some nonautomated applications.)

Speaking 0+ (Memorized Proficiency)

Able to satisfy immediate needs using rehearsed utterances. Shows little real autonomy of expression, flexibility, or spontaneity. Can ask questions or make statements with reasonable accuracy only with memorized utterances or formulae. Attempts at creating speech are usually unsuccessful.

Examples: The individual’s vocabulary is usually limited to areas of immediate survival needs. Most utterances are telegraphic; that is, functors (linking words, markers, and the like) are omitted, confused, or distorted. An individual can usually differentiate most significant sounds when produced in isolation, but, when combined in words or groups of words, errors may be frequent. Even with repetition, communication is severely limited even with people used to dealing with foreigners. Stress, intonation, tone, etc. are usually quite faulty. (Has been coded S-0+ in some nonautomated applications.)

Speaking 1 (Elementary Proficiency)

Able to satisfy minimum courtesy requirements and maintain very simple face-to-face conversations on familiar topics. A native speaker must often use slowed speech, repetition, paraphrase, or a combination of these to be understood by this individual. Similarly, the native speaker must strain and employ real-world knowledge to understand even simple statements/questions from this individual. This speaker has a functional, but limited proficiency. Misunderstandings are frequent, but the individual is able to ask for help and to verify comprehension of native speech in face-to-face interaction. The individual is unable to produce continuous discourse except with rehearsed material.

Examples: Structural accuracy is likely to be random or severely limited. Time concepts are vague. Vocabulary is inaccurate, and its range is very narrow. The individual often speaks with great difficulty. By repeating, such speakers can make themselves understood to native speakers who are in regular contact with foreigners, but there is little precision in the information conveyed. Needs, experience, or training may vary greatly from individual to individual; for example, speakers at this level may have encountered quite different vocabulary areas. However, the individual can typically satisfy predictable, simple, personal, and accommodation needs; can generally meet courtesy, introduction, and identification requirements; exchange greetings; elicit and provide, for example, predictable and skeletal biographical information. He/she might give information about business hours, explain routine procedures in a limited way, and state in a simple manner what actions will be taken. He/she is able to formulate some questions even in languages with complicated question constructions. Almost every utterance may be characterized by structural errors and errors in basic grammatical relations. Vocabulary is extremely limited and characteristically does not include modifiers. Pronunciation, stress, and intonation are generally poor, often heavily influenced by another language. Use of structure and vocabulary is highly imprecise. (Has been coded S-1 in some nonautomated applications.)

Speaking 1+ (Elementary Proficiency, Plus)

Can initiate and maintain predictable face-to-face conversations and satisfy limited social demands. He/she may, however, have little understanding of the social conventions of conversation. The interlocutor is generally required to strain and employ real-world knowledge to understand even some simple speech. The speaker at this level may hesitate and may have to change subjects due to lack of language resources. Range and control of the language are limited. Speech largely consists of a series of short, discrete utterances.

Examples: The individual is able to satisfy most travel and accommodation needs and a limited range of social demands beyond exchange of skeletal biographic information. Speaking ability may extend beyond immediate survival needs. Accuracy in basic grammatical relations is evident, although not consistent. May exhibit the more common forms of verb tenses, for example, but may make frequent errors in formation and selection. While some structures are established, errors occur in more complex patterns. The individual typically cannot sustain coherent structures in longer utterances or unfamiliar situations. Ability to describe and give precise information is limited. Person, space, and time references are often used incorrectly. Pronunciation is understandable to natives used to dealing with foreigners. Can combine most significant sounds with reasonable comprehensibility, but has difficulty in producing certain sounds in certain positions or in certain combinations. Speech will usually be labored. Frequently has to repeat utterances to be understood by the general public. (Has been coded S-1+ in some nonautomated applications.)

Speaking 2 (Limited Working Proficiency)

Able to satisfy routine social demands and limited work requirements. Can handle routine work-related interactions that are limited in scope. In more complex and sophisticated work-related tasks, language usage generally disturbs the native speaker. Can handle with confidence, but not with facility, most normal, high-frequency social conversational situations including extensive, but casual conversations about current events, as well as work, family, and autobiographical information. The individual can get the gist of most everyday conversations but has some difficulty understanding native speakers in situations that require specialized or sophisticated knowledge. The individual’s utterances are minimally cohesive. Linguistic structure is usually not very elaborate and not thoroughly controlled; errors are frequent. Vocabulary use is appropriate for high-frequency utterances, but unusual or imprecise elsewhere.

Examples: While these interactions will vary widely from individual to individual, the individual can typically ask and answer predictable questions in the workplace and give straightforward instructions to subordinates. Additionally, the individual can participate in personal and accommodation-type interactions with elaboration and facility; that is, can give and understand complicated, detailed, and extensive directions and make non-routine changes in travel and accommodation arrangements. Simple structures and basic grammatical relations are typically controlled; however, there are areas of weakness. In the commonly taught languages, these may be simple markings such as plurals, articles, linking words, and negatives or more complex structures such as tense/aspect usage, case morphology, passive constructions, word order, and embedding. (Has been coded S-2 in some nonautomated applications.)

Speaking 2+ (Limited Working Proficiency, Plus)

Able to satisfy most work requirements with language usage that is often, but not always, acceptable and effective. The individual shows considerable ability to communicate effectively on topics relating to particular interests and special fields of competence. Often shows a high degree of fluency and ease of speech, yet when under tension or pressure, the ability to use the language effectively may deteriorate. Comprehension of normal native speech is typically nearly complete. The individual may miss cultural and local references and may require a native speaker to adjust to his/her limitations in some ways. Native speakers often perceive the individual’s speech to contain awkward or inaccurate phrasing of ideas, mistaken time, space, and person references, or to be in some way inappropriate, if not strictly incorrect.

Examples: Typically the individual can participate in most social, formal, and informal interactions; but limitations either in range of contexts, types of tasks, or level of accuracy hinder effectiveness. The individual may be ill at ease with the use of the language either in social interaction or in speaking at length in professional contexts. He/she is generally strong in either structural precision or vocabulary, but not in both. Weakness or unevenness in one of the foregoing, or in pronunciation, occasionally results in miscommunication. Normally controls, but cannot always easily produce, general vocabulary. Discourse is often incohesive.

(Has been coded S-2+ in some nonautomated applications.)

Speaking 3 (General Professional Proficiency)

Able to speak the language with sufficient structural accuracy and vocabulary to participate effectively in most formal and informal conversations on practical, social, and professional topics. Nevertheless, the individual’s limitations generally restrict the professional contexts of language use to matters of shared knowledge and/or international convention. Discourse is cohesive. The individual uses the language acceptably, but with some noticeable imperfections; yet, errors virtually never interfere with understanding and rarely disturb the native speaker. The individual can effectively combine structure and vocabulary to convey his/her meaning accurately. The individual speaks readily and fills pauses suitably. In face-to-face conversation with natives speaking the standard dialect at a normal rate of speech, comprehension is quite complete. Although cultural references, proverbs, and the implications of nuances and idiom may not be fully understood, the individual can easily repair the conversation. Pronunciation may be obviously foreign. Individual sounds are accurate; but stress, intonation, and pitch control may be faulty.

Examples: Can typically discuss particular interests and special fields of competence with reasonable ease. Can use the language as part of normal professional duties such as answering objections, clarifying points, justifying decisions, understanding the essence of challenges, stating and defending policy, conducting meetings, delivering briefings, or other extended and elaborate informative monologues. Can reliably elicit information and informed opinion from native speakers. Structural inaccuracy is rarely the major cause of misunderstanding. Use of structural devices is flexible and elaborate. Without searching for words or phrases, the individual uses the language clearly and relatively naturally to elaborate concepts freely and make ideas easily understandable to native speakers. Errors occur in low-frequency and highly complex structures.

(Has been coded S-3 in some nonautomated applications.)

Speaking 3+ (General Professional Proficiency, Plus)

Is often able to use the language to satisfy professional needs in a wide range of sophisticated and demanding tasks.

Examples: Despite obvious strengths, may exhibit some hesitancy, uncertainty, effort, or errors which limit range of language-use tasks that can be reliably performed. Typically there is particular strength in fluency and one or more, but not all, of the following: breadth of lexicon, including low- and medium-frequency items, especially socio-linguistic/cultural references and nuances of close synonyms; structural precision, with sophisticated features that are readily, accurately, and appropriately controlled (such as complex modification and embedding in Indo-European languages); discourse competence in a wide range of contexts and tasks, often matching a native speaker’s strategic and organizational abilities and expectations. Occasional patterned errors occur in low- frequency and highly complex structures. (Has been coded S-3+ in some nonautomated applications.)

Speaking 4 (Advanced Professional Proficiency)

Able to use the language fluently and accurately on all levels normally pertinent to professional needs. The individual’s language usage and ability to function are fully successful. Organizes discourse well, using appropriate rhetorical speech devices, native cultural references, and understanding. Language ability only rarely hinders him/her in performing any task requiring language; yet, the individual would seldom be perceived as a native. Speaks effortlessly and smoothly and is able to use the language with a high degree of effectiveness, reliability, and precision for all representational purposes within the range of personal and professional experience and scope of responsibilities. Can serve as an informal interpreter in a range of unpredictable circumstances. Can perform extensive, sophisticated language tasks, encompassing most matters of interest to well-educated native speakers, including tasks which do not bear directly on a professional specialty.

Examples: Can discuss in detail concepts which are fundamentally different from those of the target culture and make those concepts clear and accessible to the native speaker. Similarly, the individual can understand the details and ramifications of concepts that are culturally or conceptually different from his/her own. Can set the tone of interpersonal official, semi-official, and non-professional verbal exchanges with a representative range of native speakers (in a range of varied audiences, purposes, tasks, and settings). Can play an effective role among native speakers in such contexts as conferences, lectures, and debates on matters of disagreement. Can advocate a position at length, both formally and in chance encounters, using sophisticated verbal strategies. Understands and reliably produces shifts of both subject matter and tone. Can understand native speakers of the standard and other major dialects in essentially any face-to-face interaction. (Has been coded S-4 in some nonautomated applications.)

Speaking 4+ (Advanced Professional Proficiency, Plus)

Speaking proficiency is regularly superior in all respects, usually equivalent to that of a well-educated, highly articulate native speaker. Language ability does not impede the performance of any language-use task. However, the individual would not necessarily be perceived as culturally native.

Examples: The individual organizes discourse well, employing functional rhetorical speech devices, native cultural references, and understanding. Effectively applies a native speaker’s social and circumstantial knowledge. However, cannot sustain that performance under all circumstances. While the individual has a wide range and control of structure, an occasional non-native slip may occur. The individual has a sophisticated control of vocabulary and phrasing that is rarely imprecise, yet there are occasional weaknesses in idioms, colloquialisms, pronunciation, cultural reference, or there may be an occasional failure to interact in a totally native manner.

(Has been coded S-4+ in some nonautomated applications.)

Speaking 5 (Functionally Native Proficiency)

Speaking proficiency is functionally equivalent to that of a highly articulate well-educated native speaker and reflects the cultural standards of the country where the language is natively spoken. The individual uses the language with complete flexibility and intuition, so that speech on all levels is fully accepted by well-educated native speakers in all of its features, including breadth of vocabulary and idiom, colloquialisms, and pertinent cultural references. Pronunciation is typically consistent with that of well-educated native speakers of a non-stigmatized dialect. (Has been coded S-5 in some nonautomated applications.)

. Larry is an Economic Officer currently on post in Rome.  His interesting take in this post on the art of cable writing is a great introduction into the life of an Economic Officer in the Foreign Service.  Take some time to read through his blog, it’s worth the time!

In Rome I am an Economic Officer. Economic Officers and Political Officers are known as ‘reporting’ officers and that pretty much describes the job we do. We each have assigned areas of responsibility that we study, research and then report on back to Washington. These areas are called our portfolios and we are expected to become the local experts on the various topics in them. We are also required to interact with our appropriate counterparts in the Italian government on these topics. Therefore, a big part of the job is developing our contacts in the various Italian ministries. I, for example, now have contacts in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Economics & Finance and the Ministry for Economic Development. Diplomacy, it turns out, is both hierarchical and rank observant which goes a long way towards explaining why Prime Minister Berlusconi hasn’t returned my calls requesting a status update on Italy’s aid to developing nations program.

Of course you realize that I never actually placed a call to Berlusconi; unfortunately however, I did attempt to establish Franco Frattini as one of my contacts. This would have been akin to having the guy who mows the lawn at the Italian Embassy in Washington establish Hillary Clinton as his contact on the proper use of Spring fertilizer. As my boss put it when he discovered that I was looking for Frattini’s number, “You’re kidding, right? You’re kidding, right? No, really, you’re kidding, right!” Umhhh, yeah, I was just kidding. Diplomacy is not actually saying the word “idiot” but having all parties involved fully understand that it was said. In my defense, Frattini is Italy’s Foreign Minister and he is responsible for Italy’s aid program so it seemed to me that he’d have the most up to date information.

My workload evolves something like this: someone in Washington becomes interested, curious or concerned about some aspect of Italian policy on a topic in my portfolio and ‘tasks’ me with either getting information from or delivering a message to an appropriate contact. Often I am called upon to request the Government of Italy to support a position we’ve taken or intend to take in our own foreign policy. Official communications of this nature between governments are known as demarches and I’ve done a ton of them. For example, we are encouraging our European allies to increase their aid to Somalia and because Italy’s aid to developing nations is part of my portfolio, I am tasked with bringing our request to rank appropriate contacts in the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Economic Development. After a few days have passed, I go back to my contacts for their response, reaction or reply to our request. Then I draft a cable with that response and send it to Washington. Washington sends me a brief note of thanks and then arranges a dinner in my honor for having helped save Somalia.

Okay, so the whole ‘dinner in my honor’ thing is an exaggeration, as is the ‘brief note of thanks’ and, in fact, as is the ’send it to Washington’ bit too. The literal truth part ends at ‘draft a cable’. Then my cable goes into the clearance process, followed by the re-writing process, followed by additional clearance processes repeated as required, followed by the approval process and then, finally, by the sending to Washington process. We call this ‘feeding the beast’ and ever since George Keenan wrote his Long Telegram in 1946, our reporting cables have been held to an unachievably high standard. Strangely enough they must be factual, concise and accurate. Paradoxically, they must also be intelligent and informative. I tend to ramble, offer mutually exclusive explanations, digress into cul de sacs of misinterpretation and summarize by missing the point entirely. Cable writing, State Department style, is an art form I’m struggling to master.

That’s the takeaway of a report by the American Academy of Diplomacy and the Stimson Center, which was discussed at a congressional hearing Tuesday.

“There is little question that under-investment in diplomacy over the last decade or so has left our Foreign Service overstretched and under prepared,” the report says.

Yet, despite the gravity of the situation, the hearing had a distinct lack of urgency. The poor attendance by senators was indicative of scant attention too often provided issues involving federal employees – except, of course, when they can be convenient whipping boys.

Former ambassador Ronald E. Neumann, president of the academy, supplied a shot of energy when he told the hearing that “our government lacks sufficient trained Arabic-language-speaking officers to fully understand and assess what is happening – to go beyond the glib, English-speaking reporters in Tahrir Square to take the full measure of what Islamists, younger people, the demonstrators and the jobless are saying off camera.”

“We lack these capacities because for years the Department of State has lacked the resources to train enough officers in language skills,” he said.

Although the hearing focused on Foreign Service officers, training is a universal issue in the federal workplace and often among the first items to be cut. For State Department workers – and the nation – it’s also a matter of national security.

In a forward to the report, Brent Scowcroft, national security adviser to presidents Gerald R. Ford and George H.W. Bush, said the study “emphasizes that on-the-job training alone is no longer a sufficient method, if it ever was, to develop a US diplomatic service that is second to none.”

The Senate federal workforce subcommittee hearing was chaired by Sen. Daniel K. Akaka (D-Hawaii). He was alone on the dais, except for a brief appearance by Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.). The top Republican on the panel, Sen. Ronald H. Johnson (Wis.), was a no-show because, he said, he attended a Budget Committee hearing.

Coburn arrived a half-hour late, told witnesses to expect even less money for staffing and training, and was gone in about eight minutes. He asked no questions.

It was a far cry from the days when Akaka and former senator George V. Voinovich (R-Ohio) operated as a team. Voinovich, who was the ranking Republican on the panel when he retired in January, was deeply involved in the subcommittee. He and Akaka often worked closely on legislation affecting federal employees.

Akaka doesn’t have that kind of a partner now.

Coburn’s single focus was saving money. He dismissed State’s plans for a 25 percent Foreign Service increase by 2014, saying, “It’s not going to be ramped up because we don’t have the money to do it.”

About overseas locality pay for Foreign Service officers, Coburn said: “It’s going to go away. People ought to be expecting that.”

If budget-cutters slash already meager training budgets, the result will be less effective government, said Max Stier, president of the nonprofit Partnership for Public Service. (The group has a content-sharing relationship with The Washington Post.)

“It’s amazing that in the same government, we have two vastly different models for investing in talent,” Stier said in a telephone interview.

The military makes enormous investments in training, he said, but the civilian side of the government does very little. “Clearly the military has the right answer.”

Even if plans to boost State Department staffing are fulfilled, the academy says, the surge “will not be enough” unless accompanied by better training. “If America intends to be known for the quality and effectiveness of its diplomacy, we must sustain traditional skills and develop more broadly new capabilities demanded in an increasingly complex international environment.”

The report makes a series of recommendations, including a year of advanced study for Foreign Service officers before they are promoted to the senior ranks.

“Professional education and training are essential to raise the overall level of performance of our Foreign Service,” the report says.

The Government Accountability Office also released a report on State Department training at the hearing. The GAO report says that State “has taken many steps” to increase training but that “the department’s strategic approach to workforce training could be improved in several key areas.”

For example, State offers guidance for employees on training opportunities and career paths, the GAO says, but “the guidance does not provide complete and accurate information.”

The department also “could not sufficiently demonstrate consistent and appropriate support for training,” according to the GAO.

The GAO report does not look at language training, the agency said, because its September 2009 study called for a comprehensive State plan to address “persistent foreign language shortfalls.”

State has told the GAO that it has taken steps to improve language training.

By Joe Davidson, The Washington Post

With each regime that teeters, each uprising that forces a U.S. embassy to be evacuated, more American diplomats, aid workers and their families seek shelter at a nondescript Falls Church apartment complex with a nondescript name: Oakwood. The only hint of its connection to international affairs is the United Nations flag flying overhead.

The students left Cairo American College, the city’s preeminent international high school, in the middle of cross country season, a few months before Advanced Placement exams and days before the performance of the semester’s musical. Less than a week later, they started classes in Falls Church.

The diplomats’ children expected to stay briefly, just long enough to wait out the revolution’s fever pitch. But three weeks later, they were still biding time in a school system that feels at once foreign and familiar. Although they’re American citizens, this is the first time some have attended school in the United States.

“I’m just ready to go home,” said Phoebe Bredin, 17, meaning Cairo. “We lived through the beginning of a revolution, and now we’re here waiting in the suburbs. It’s weird.”

Bredin learned that Hosni Mubarak had stepped down during a college visit to Virginia Tech. When she jumped and squealed in the admissions office, “people looked at me like I was crazy. But this is something I really care about.”

Some of these students wear high school athletic uniforms with the word “Cairo” emblazoned on their chests. Some refuse to change their watches from Egyptian time. They get news through friends’ Facebook pages, where Egyptian classmates have posted photos from Tahrir Square and exultant messages in Arabic.

“There are a lot of rumors: We could go back next week, or next month, or it could be much longer than that,” said Arden Rose, 16. “I just wish we knew for sure.”

Falls Church isn’t the only school district that has received students fleeing unrest. Fairfax has received 28 students from diplomatic families based in Egypt, and other Virginia districts have enrolled some, prompting the Virginia Department of Education to send a statewide message to school officials about how to handle American students who have returned to the United States, sometimes without parents or housing.

The State Department uses the term “third-culture kid” to describe young people who live the Foreign Service lifestyle – often jolted between postings and hemispheres, not entirely adapting to the cultures of their home nations or adopted ones.

That description feels stale to some of Falls Church’s newest students, for whom the amalgamation of cultures at Cairo American College hardly seemed unusual. So what if cross country practice takes place in a dried-up river bed not far from the Nile? So what if they find themselves in U.S. history classes with the grandchildren of Mubarak and Anwar Sadat?

Even though most of the students have adjusted academically – many say the workload in Falls Church is more manageable than in Cairo – their frustrations are mounting.

The seniors in the group are particularly eager to return. In June, they are due to graduate in front of the Pyramids of Giza, dressed in red and white robes. They hope to get their diplomas, grab hold of the limestone – normally off limits – and climb the base of the monuments, posing for photos that might one day decorate college dorm rooms.

“It’s something we all look forward to,” said Phoebe Bredin, 17, “graduating with all of our friends, in the middle of such an amazing place. I just hope we’re back in time.”

By Kevin Staff, The Washington Post

It is right and natural that we devote a great deal of time deliberating about the foreign policy and other implications of the events unfolding in Egypt. For Egypt, these events constitute a national crisis; for the United States, a foreign-policy crisis. But for many individuals, these events also represent a personal crisis. These include first and foremost Egyptians themselves, of course, who amid jubilation and trepidation about the future of their country must also grapple with rapidly rising food prices, various shortages, looting, and a complete standstill in tourist spending. But the crisis has also affected Americans who live and work in Egypt or tourists who have found themselves unexpectedly stranded there.

While we debate the intentions of President Mubarak, the attitude of the military, and the likely place of various groups and figures in a successor government, many in Cairo worry about
sounds of gunfire outside their windows and reports of looters in their neighborhoods. Their friends and relatives inside and outside Egypt struggle to get information on their safety and whereabouts, frustrated by the interruption of email, mobile phones, and other means of communication.

Looking after the welfare of Americans abroad — particularly during a crisis — is one of the core missions of the State Department and a foremost responsibility of U.S. diplomats stationed overseas. U.S. diplomats are rarely noticed, much less celebrated, but their service and sacrifices deserve the American people’s recognition.

When a crisis such as this erupts, the local U.S. Embassy will scramble to understand and report to Washington on events and offer its advice on U.S. policy. But it will also initiate a massive effort to account for and care for American citizens, both those who wish to leave and those who remain behind. Right now at the Cairo airport, our Foreign Service officers and other U.S. personnel are putting in days-long shifts to assist Americans who want to leave Egypt. The same officers who are responding to Washington’s demands for analysis of opposition figures and the latest reports on protests in Tahrir Square are also comforting weary travelers, serving them food and water, and packing them on to evacuation flights.

Among those the officers have seen off are their own families, whom the State Department yesterday ordered to depart Egypt. The farewells are hasty — families must leave quickly once the order is given — and sometimes do not take place at all if the employee is needed elsewhere. The families do not know when they will be able to return, if at all, and must make accommodations for housing and schools on the fly. When their families are long gone, the officers stay on to perform vital work to advance U.S. national security.

The experience of the officers in Cairo is hardly unique — many diplomats are stationed at embassies and consulates overseas where conditions do not permit their families to
accompany them. Alongside other civilians and of course members of the military, they make daily sacrifices to serve their country. Few Americans are actually aware of what they do, and fewer still will ever have need to call upon their help. But they are there when Americans require, and for Americans stranded in Egypt, that is a deep relief.

By Michael Singh, Foreign Policy Magazine

State doesn’t provide much (any?) info on the somewhat nebulous T-scores, but there’s a table available at the following link.  It provides relative values for various types of test results (group percentages, T-scores, Z-scores, GRE):

http://www.psychology.eku.edu/Links/prtable.htm

Look under the T-score column until you find what you scored. Then move over to the PR column to see what that means in terms of percentages.

For example:

FSOT:  JK: 63.67;   BI: 62.72;   EE 57.66   means you scored better than 88%-90% on JK and BI, and 76% for EE.

That’s a bit easier