Mary E. Kramer served in the Iowa Senate beginning in 1991 and was elected President of the Senate in 1997. In 2003, President George W. Bush nominated her to serve as U.S. Ambassador to Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean. Her experience began in May of 2003 and continued until November of 2007. Her first book,“More Than a Walk on the Beach; Confessions of an Unlikely Diplomat” describes her experiences as a U.S. ambassador. Her second book, co-authored with her daughter Krista Kramer Hartman, is titled, "An Unlikely Ambassador and Her Diplomatic Daughter."
It is also disappointing when a presidential candidate equates the long standing practice of Presidents appointing private citizens as ambassadors as an example of government corruption
