The Foreign Service Journal, March 2006

Follow the Money Daniel Zussman is to be com- mended for his research on global warming (December Cybernotes, “Hurricane Season 2005: A Global Warming Link?”). I especially appre- ciated his links to useful Web sites. Zussman correctly cites Dr. Patrick Michaels, of the University of Virginia, as one of the more notable critics of global warming studies. What he does not mention is that Dr. Michaels is also a fellow at the Cato Institute and has numerous ties to seven groups funded by ExxonMobil. In all, there are 40 public policy groups dealing with the environment that have two things in common: they are all funded by ExxonMobil and they all seek to undermine the science that underlies global warming studies. I recommend the articles “Some Like It Hot” by Chris Mooney and “Snow- ed” by Ross Gelbspan in the May/ June 2005 issue of Mother Jones mag- azine for a closer look at the unprece- dented influence ExxonMobil, and its surrogates, wield in the Bush adminis- tration’s environmental decisions. John C. Garon FSO, retired Placerville, Calif. So Much for Debate I enjoyed the December Cyber- notes article on global warming, and appreciated the different perspectives on the link between climate change and the recent worldwide spate of destructive hurricanes. It was telling but not surprising, however, to read that reviewers from the magazines Science and Nature refused to publish the findings of researchers whose work casts doubt on the link between global warming and human activity. So much for rigorous academic debate in the sciences! The icing on the politically-correct cake was the statement by Sir John Lawton, chairman of the Royal Com- mission on Environmental Pollution, who said, referring to the hurricanes along the Gulf Coast in 2005, “If this makes the climate loonies in the (United) States realize we’ve got a problem, some good will come out of a truly awful situation.” Chicken Little couldn’t have said it better. Steve Hubler FSO Embassy Skopje Defending DS It is unfortunate that Diplomatic Security is often misunderstood and criticized for doing its job in this dan- gerous world. In response to the December letter, “One Service,” by Stephen Muller, I feel compelled to defend DS from those who seem, by choice or not, to be ignorant of the realities of the profession. As an agent on the Secretary of State’s detail, it saddens me to hear an FSO belittle our mission. We don’t merely spend our time “sitting outside a hotel room,” as charged. DS is unique, but in ways that the writer simply doesn’t, or doesn’t want to, understand. Such ignorance of our culture and responsibilities are unfor- tunately commonplace. All would be better served if persons who are unaware of our mission simply learned a little bit about what we do, instead of charging that we don’t understand, respect or appreciate what they do. C.S. Belcher Special Agent, DS Washington, D.C. Doing Our Jobs As a DS agent with six years’ expe- rience, I would like to respond to the December letter from retired FSO Stephen Muller. He first derides DS agents for receiving, as he puts it, “overtime pay for doing their job.” Muller also wonders why FSOs “expect and accept the need to work long hours without compensation” while DS agents “earn overtime for sitting outside a hotel room.” DS agents receive no more addi- tional compensation than any other federal law enforcement agents in the U.S. government. Like all federal law enforcement agents, DS agents are expected to protect human life and take the life of another if necessary. The consequences for mistakes are at the very least life-altering (dismissal or prison), if not life-ending. Con- gress and the president have recog- nized that the willing acceptance of these responsibilities deserves recog- nition in the form of additional com- pensation. While I do not doubt that Muller and other FSOs do invaluable work in the service of their country and deserve every penny they make and much more, I doubt that any of the hundreds, or even thousands, of people who are alive today because DS agents have willingly risked their lives would agree with him that they are overpaid. L ETTERS 6 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / M A R C H 2 0 0 6