Hillary Clinton was asked by reporters today about the outreach from within her State Department to Twitter.

According to the report from Agence France-Presse, the Secretary of State replied to the question with generic filler diplo-speak about the importance of free speech and the like. "The United States believes passionately and strongly in the basic principle of free expression," she said. She continued, "And it is the case that one of the means of expression, the use of Twitter is a very important one, not only to the Iranian people but now increasingly to people around the world, and most particularly to young people." Clinton got laughs, noted the AFP, by adding, "I wouldn't know a twitter [sic] from a tweeter."

We talked earlier today about how the framing of this undeniably interesting intersection of the State Department, Twitter, and Iran hasn't exactly been nuanced. That thesis isn't exactly diminished by the pointed headline AFP is running atop Clinton's ambiguous remarks: "Clinton Says Twitter Is Important for Iranian Free Speech."

It's rather striking, edifying -- downright breathtaking even -- to see the news late last night and first thing this morning that a State Department employee had reached out to someone at Twitter to suggest that perhaps now wasn't the best time for a service interruption. No, it wasn't that incident itself that was so eye-opening. It was the context-stripped way it has been reported and interpreted. It really was enough to make you think that Barack Obama himself got on his Blackberry to Twitter HQ, declared the service a global resource, and ordered it to stay up and running.

Take the headline from the New York Times, for example: "U.S. Steps Gingerly Into Tumult in Iran." Wow, just wow, considering how Obama has attempted to delicately negotiate what's taking place in Iran. Not surprisingly, given this idea that what had taken place was Uncle Sam himself "stepping" into the mix, Twitter's Biz Stone felt the need to blog that the company was an independent actor, not taking orders from Washington. "It's humbling to think that our two-year old company could be playing such a globally meaningful role that state officials find their way toward highlighting our significance," blogged Stone. "However, it's important to note that the State Department does not have access to our decision making process. "

Of course, Uncle Sam isn't real. Who is real is the State Department official who got in contact with Twitter, a 27-old staffer on the department's Policy Planning team by the name of Jared Cohen. (In a serious blow to assumptions about the Obama-era sea change Cohen's outreach to Twitter represents, he was hired by Condoleezza Rice's State Department under the George W. Bush Administration.) Policy Planning is sort of a cross between a think tank and State's R&D wing, charged with thinking big, new, modern thoughts. If you're a frequent reader, you've read here about how Cohen led an Iraq trip of new media folks to Iraq. Also on that trip: Jack Dorsey, the fellow at Twitter who, according to the Times, Cohen contacted about keeping Twitter up and running. In that in another ways, Cohen is working at the forefront of using technology to create more human-to-human connections in the diplomatic space. And that, of course, is exactly the sort of direct diplomacy he was attempting to facilitate by getting in touch with Dorsey.

But the supremely interesting thing here is what this State-meets-Twitter incident suggests about how unready the system to be to handle government engaging in human-to-human contact. Old framings get reverted to where huge, complex government institutions or even whole governments are anthropomorphized -- "Washington issues stern warning to Tehran," "U.S. calls Twitter..." In theory, there is among many of us close watchers a strong desire for a new era of more open, human, engaged government. In practice, we resort to old ways of thinking that make that engagement too dangerous for all but the most incautious.

When it comes to government agencies adapting to the Networked Age, the State Department is no slouch. It's had an Office of eDiplomacy since 2003; its staffers make heavy use of an internal unclassified online encyclopedia called Diplopedia; it's been blogging since September 2007 at Dipnote; and now State even has a Twitter feed. ExchangesConnect, a cultural exchange social networking site (built on Ning.com) that focuses on foreign exchange students, recently topped its 10,000th member.

Under Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the State Department has also been in the forefront of Obama administration moves to experiment with and adopt new ways to interact with the public, including using YouTube and text-messaging as ways to pose questions directly. The overall push is showing results, reports the AP: "Daily views of the Dipnote have doubled from 10,000 a year ago to 20,000 today, with 700 subscribers to its RSS feed, twice as many as in March 2008. The number of followers of the department on Twitter has tripled since Jan. 20, when Obama took office, while the department's Facebook friends have increased by 2 1/2 times in the same period." (Lots more details on State's digital initiatives here.)

But this is just the beginning of a larger conceptual shift, says Alec Ross, who recently was named senior adviser to the Secretary of State for innovation. During the campaign, Ross was a key person in developing Obama's far-reaching technology and open government platform, and he is looking forward to playing a similar role at State. The shift, he says, is away from a sole focus on government-to-government interaction and towards government-to-people, people-to-government, and maybe even people-to-people. Government can be much more creative in how they enable people to engage directly with each other, he argues, and there's no doubt that networked people can become important players on the international stage as well.

Remember that State Department trip that representatives from new media companies like Twitter, YouTube, and HowCast took to Baghdad a few weeks back? The outreach seems to already be fulfilling some of its more straightforward objectives. Iraq's Deputy Prime Minister Barham Salim has taken to Twitter -- an outcome predicted by participants on the trip. A sampling of Salim's tweets:

• Sorry, my first tweet not pleasant; dust storm in Baghdad today & yet another suicide bomb. Awful reminder that it is not yet all fine here.
• Boring day so far! Meeting after meeting-not much to show up for, I must admit. Preparing for London conf on investment in Iraq on the 30th.
• Pres Sarkozi is smart&engaging!Substantive meeting on Iraq-France relations& future of region. Amazing how dynamics have changed since war.

Jared Cohen, the State Department point person on the use of social media in public diplomacy, passes along his take on the significance of Salih's tweets:

It was a remarkable scene to sit in Deputy Prime Minister Salih's garden in Baghdad and watch Twitter founder Jack Dorsey convince him that he should be the first Iraqi senior official tweeting. The Deputy Prime Minister -- an avid technology evangelist himself -- promised to sign-up the next day. Not only did he sign-up, but he has been posting Twitter updates that are candid and insightful.

In America successful use of technology in the political sphere has highlighted how technology leads to more effective communication, organizing, engagement, accountability and transparency, empowerment, and capacity building. We hope that Dr. Salih tweeting will inspire similar trends in Iraq, not just for politicians and government officials, but also for civil society. The free flow of information and the enhanced ability for the Iraqi people to communicate in real time will be an exciting development in a country with tremendous history of innovation and talent.

(Photo of Salih with General David Petraeus, courtesy of the U.S. Army)