So, what do these politically-appointed ambassadors do other than go to party's and I'm sure that whomever is appointed will and can do that real well.
Certainly, politically appointed ambassadors attend a lot of cocktail parties, but they don't normally spend a lot of time there. The powers-that-be in any given country would much rather have a political appointee as the U.S. Ambassador. Politically appointed ambassadors are usually big contributors to a president's campaign, and the ambassadorship is their payback. The locals would rather have a friend of the president's, who can pick up the phone and get right through to the Oval Office than a career Foreign Service Officer that worked his/her way up the ladder and doesn't have the juice that a big contributor has.
I was in Gabarone, Botswana, some years ago, and the Ambassador there was a big contributor to Reagan's campaign and was rewarded with the post there. He was a big game hunter, and for him, Botswana was paradise.