What Did Jamaica Do to Deserve Kari Lake?

Jamaica is a beautiful island with white beaches; a green, mountainous interior; and, despite its small size, one of the most recognizable cultures in the world. Jamaica has exported music, fashion, and food to the farthest corners of the planet. Bob Marley alone wrote songs that hundreds of millions of people would instantly recognize as Jamaican.Jamaica also has a stable parliamentary democracy and excellent relations with its neighbors. The United States is the country’s largest trading partner. Some 3 million Americans visit the island every year, and hundreds of thousands of Jamaicans come to the United States. Jamaica and the United States, according to the State Department website, “maintain strong and productive relations, based on trust and mutual interest.”Given all of that: What did Jamaica do to deserve Kari Lake?Lake, a failed Senate and gubernatorial candidate from Arizona, has just been named as President Trump’s candidate for ambassador to Jamaica. If confirmed, she will arrive in Kingston with no diplomatic or political preparation, other than the 14 months she just spent running America’s foreign broadcasting agencies into the ground. During a chaotic tenure as the leader of the U.S. Agency for Global Media, Lake tried to dismantle Voice of America, and to block funding for America’s other broadcasters, including Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Radio Free Asia. By doing so, Lake ceded influence to Chinese and Russian state media all over the world and undermined America’s ability to reach people during times of crisis, most notably in Venezuela and Iran.[Read: What is Kari Lake trying to achieve?]Lake also squandered tens of millions of dollars, perhaps hundreds of millions, of taxpayer money. Because she couldn’t be bothered to understand U.S. employment law, she tried and failed to fire hundreds of VOA staff. Many of them remained on administrative leave for months, receiving salaries while being barred from working. She abruptly canceled a c