by J Michael Waller / The Daily Caller / September 12, 2017.
International community organizers are targeting American companies worldwide for shutdown. Those companies can no longer presume the State Department will help. In some cases, American diplomats are actively allied with local anti-business movements.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s reforms can’t come quickly enough.
Radicalized professional foreign service officers have risen to the top of the American diplomatic corps. The business-minded Tillerson is addressing that, adding “prosperity” to the State Department’s mission.
Washington’s top diplomat in Guatemala, Ambassador Todd Robinson, personifies the problem Tillerson faces. Over the past three years, Robinson has effectively presided over the shutdown of Escobal, one of the largest and most modern silver mines on earth. The mine’s Canada-registered owner, Tahoe Resources, is headquartered in Reno, Nevada and traded as TAHO on the New York Stock Exchange.
During Robinson’s ambassadorship, Tahoe’s market cap has tanked billions. While Escobal faced a local lawsuit, Robinson deployed the U.S. Embassy to help a movement of Marxist political groups, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and activist lawyers gain in the courts what they could never do in free elections. He pressured Guatemala’s elected Congress to confirm a radical lawyer to head the country’s highest court.
A prize awaits the victor: More than a quarter billion troy ounces of silver, plus gold, that Escobal will bring to the surface. [Click here for the rest of the article.]