> all you need are high-level State Department contacts

That's a terrible strategy for getting out of the clutch's of a foreign country's law enforcement. Let alone an ally's.

Why? Who do you think negotiates things like prisoner exchanges?

You don't negotiate. That leaves fate to someone else whose interests most likely don't align with your own. You make your own luck.

State Departments are powerful, but politically complicated and slow. Cash in the right hands goes a long way in many places, and is much quicker - valuable when time isn't your ally.

It's not as simple as you suggest. Hearing someone is imprisoned, or kidnapped, is probably one of the last things that a local consulate or embassy wants to deal with. Unless there is broader geopolitical concern, there is little reason to think that these folks will do much beyond the minimum to keep you alive. There is a good chance that the local diplomatics aren't too sympathetic either because know what you should have known about the country before you got yourself into trouble.

If they think there is some injustice, then it depends on how much it'll play out in the media. The government posture at home will also play a part. You could see the Trump administration playing hardball in a lot of scenarios to demonstrate how tough they are, but then they undermine the general ability of the State Department to operate, so lower visibility problems struggle for attention and resources. The Obama administration provided more resources, but probably wasn't as hawkish.

What is this "honk honk"? I've seen it lots of places. Might just be baader meinhoff, but I first encountered it in Chicago where aggressive drivers are constantly honking but its commonplace practice to give two loud honks on your car horn coming out of alleyways letting pedestrians know you don't intend to stop and slowly approach but instead are barrel assing out of the alley and don't give a shit if you kill someone.

I asked and it appears to be a Chicago tradition like dibs. Since then I see it online usually accompanying controversial opinions, but I noticed a trend. Its usually also in connection with politically controversial opinions and insider information regarding politically motivated actions taken by government, military, black ops, or other groups where operation security is a concern.

Does it have some kind of special meaning or is it just random and I'm seeing connections where none exist?

"honk honk" is an alt-right meme. It refers to clown world or the fact that current politics, the zeitgeist or how the world works is clownish.

I have only ever seen "honk honk" used when referring to issues involving Islam, racial minorities or the treatment of women.

Your first paragraph is correct, but your second doesn't match the usage in the OP.

> This meme, like many others, has been effectively used to show that small communities online can trick mainstream media into reporting the idea that benign things (milk, the OK hand sign) are actually a secret racial symbol.

https://www.reddit.com/r/OutOfTheLoop/comments/bbyhxz/what_i...

Google search suggests it has "4chan racist troll" origins, but I'm hoping the origin for this poster was more innocuous.

[1] https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/clown-pepe-honk-honk-clown-wo...

It's weird how you ignored the first sentence of your link:

>Even after a failed U.S. Special Forces hostage rescue mission in Syria

So the state department literally sent in special forces to try to rescue her...

While there's hardly a shortage of things to criticize the State Department for, it's hard to argue that making exceptions to the "don't give money to ISIS" policy for ransoms is a good idea. That just encourages more kidnappings.

On the one hand, sure. On the other, if you're kidnapped for ransom by foreign terrorists or guerrillas (or even just hardened criminals without a political agenda) and no money or consideration at all is allowed to change hands, your odds of survival just went from "not ideal, but OK" to "terrible". Telling people they can't do that is basically telling them their loved one's already dead unless the murderous kidnappers respond well to "pretty please" and agree to take on the risk of a process to return the prisoner without even a token reward.

that contradiction was my point. the US govt already covertly gave ISIS over a billion dollars--the splashiest way to provide Material Support of ISIS. meanwhile, giving ISIS $100,000 in ransom for a hostage is just too much.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2017/08/02/worl...

if you doubt my claim that CIA gave ISIS over a billion dollars, that link proves it--they admit it themselves.

honk honk is a meme that means "irony." as in the noise of a clown's nose being squeezed while someone tells you something that is clearly self-contradictory and requires you to ignore the evidence you see in front of you.

i don't know what these quick-to-politicize-speech downvoters mean when they unpack a rather innocuous meme. memes are the Lingua Franca of the Internet. it doesnt matter where they originated, or who may have used them because after they are recycled a billion times all over forums, they lose whatever original meaning they had and become common slang.

i don't care about being down voted and i don't care about pleasing tattletale censor Karen's.

I'm not sure who you're replying to with the clown/meme thing? Might have the wrong comment.

Regardless, I'm sorry if people calling you a clown (?) offended you- that's not too productive and doesn't help anything. They shouldn't do that.