An Impressive But One-Sided Resume

David Welch resigned.

That is, Assistant Secretary of State David Welch resigned.

Who?

The top U.S. diplomat for the Middle East, that's who.

And who was he?

...former ambassador to Egypt who also served in Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria and Pakistan, Welch took the top Mideast spot in March 2005 and became the lead U.S. liaison to the Israeli-Palestinian negotiations that began at a peace conference last November in Annapolis, Md.

The guy who said this at his good-bye reception:

It’s been a good career to be an American diplomat. I was fortunate to work on the most exciting and challenging of issues, and I’m privileged to be a representative of our nation. I like this work also because I got to know quite a number of people outside the United States. I like that, and it’s good to work with people of different nationalities, backgrounds, histories, from Morocco to Israel to Iraq. I have a lot of good friends out there, and even some folks with whom we’ve had some difficulties, there’s still some estrangement and we have yet to bridge that. But that, too, can change, as we’ve recently seen.

It’s also a time of transition in this building; of course, everybody knows that. And I think it’s appropriate for those of us in the career service to think a little bit about that. I’ve been lucky; I’ve served for Democrat presidents and Republican presidents, and I’ve had presidential appointments for both parties. And I’ve worked closely with secretaries of states since Jim Baker. So some words of advice for my colleagues: Pay attention, folks. (Laughter.) My bureau typically ignores my advice. (Laughter.)