Is the statement below a presupposition" --- At the time of my first assignment in New York, there was a joke that circulating among the American diplomats. They used to complain about the state of affairs in the State Department (lines like 'we failed in most of our tasks', 'we lost respect', 'the morale of the staff is low' etc.). And then they said: "None of these would have happened if Warren Cristopher had been alive."

The point is that at that time it was precisely Warren Christopher who was State Secretary and very much alive.

Source author: Petru Dumitriu PetruD@diplomacy.edu