Dan Drezner: Assessing Nikki Haley: "Haley... had two traits that made her unusual within the Trump foreign policy team. The first is that she was a professional politician... able to send messages to key constituencies, pleasing the Trump White House at times and other groups at other junctures...
...At the White House on Tuesday she claimed “Now the United States is respected. Countries might not like what we do, but they respect what we do.” That is flatly wrong, but Haley’s ability to say things like this with a straight face endeared her to this White House. This did not go unnoticed by others. One former senior administration official told Vanity Fair’s Abigail Tracy, “I think her time at the U.N. has demonstrated very clearly that she will do whatever is politically expedient..." It worked: she polls pretty well,....
Haley’s true gift, however, was to pick the right fight at the right time within this administration. When Larry Kudlow claimed that Haley must have been momentarily confused after an announcement on Russia sanctions had not come to pass, Haley responded with “With all due respect, I don’t get confused.” That statement produced something extraordinary: an apology from a Trump White House official. In the end, that is the primary takeaway from Haley’s departure. She was adequate at the United Nations post at a time when so few Trump national security officials demonstrated adequacy. Furthermore, her departure, in contrast to Rex Tillerson, Gary Cohn, and H.R. McMaster, was on her terms.
Nikki Haley served in the Trump administration and departed with most of her dignity intact. That, in and of itself, is what makes her extraordinary...
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