W.House gives strong signal on Bolton appointment

[Rose Siding]

By Steve Holland WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House gave its strongest signal yet on Friday that President Bush will soon bypass the Senate and appoint John Bolton to become the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.
Reuters Friday, July 29, 2005; 11:54 AM

snip>
Asked about the possibility of a recess appointment for Bolton, White House spokesman Scott McClellan gave a strong hint.

"We do need a permanent representative at the United Nations. This is a critical time and it's important to continue moving forward on comprehensive reform," McClellan said.

"Clearly John Bolton is someone who has enjoyed majority support from the United States Senate, but unfortunately Senate Democrats have taken the path of playing politics," he said.
...
McClellan spoke a day after the State Department reversed itself and acknowledged that Bolton had given Congress inaccurate information when he written that he had not been questioned or provided information to jury or government investigations in the past five years.....

In a subsequent letter to Bush, California Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer said Bolton's admission was "too little, too late" and urged Bush to withdraw the nomination.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/29/AR2005072900840.html

[nyhuskyfan]

1. Playing Politics?

For all intents and purposes, the guy lied on his resume.

[xxqqqzme]

4. yea, playing politics

hey that's rich! scotty's a funny, funny man.

[klyon]

25. that seems to be the rights most used answer lately

KL

[Goldmund]

2. Awesome -- let them.

Can't wait.

[Strawman]

6. Exactly. They're not going to appoint anyone good

So I'd just as soon see them appoint someone who is going to be a complete embarassment to them. Give it a few months.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

15. Six days, maybe six weeks. Not 6 months

Now, didn't someone else say something like that?

[Todd B]

3. Does Bush even READ the Constitution?

Clause 3: The President shall have Power to fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the Recess of the Senate, by granting Commissions which shall expire at the End of their next Session.

http://www.house.gov/Constitution/Constitution.html

Considering, if I recall correctly, that the vacancie didn't occur during a Congressional Recess he should have no authority to appoint Bolton to the UN without Senate approval, right?

[AllyCat]

8. He doesn't read and used it last to start a fire in the fireplace. n/t

[Lone_Star_Dem]

12. I thought he used it when they ran out of toilet paper in the WH

:shrug:

[AllyCat]

17. Bwahahahah!

:evilgrin:

[jackstraw45]

16. Sadly, it's not when the vacancy begins that matters...

Just that it's vacant and needs to be filled.

Recess appointment coming for Liar Bolton!

[napi21]

5. Fine! DO it Shrub! Then Bolton's inditment can be a WORLD

WIDE embarrassment to you!

I'm actually glad he's pushing so hard on Bolton's appointment! Every day I read another thread about Bolton's involvement in the Plame case, lying to congress, and maybe lying to the GJ.

Thanks for helping the Dems to bring you down, you idiot!

[HereSince1628]

10. Exactly, let Georgie boy tie Bolton to his ankle.

When Bolton sinks he can drag the pretender king down with him

[PurityOfEssence]

13. Sho 'nuff: PLEASE do it; show us for what we truly are

This man is a knotted-up, vengeful toady to the ruling class. He's typical of so many from somewhat humble origins who curry favor with the powerful and serve as their attack dogs. The only thing that separates him from a Bernard Kerik is that he's not a gutter-living street-fighting brownshirt.

The face we should honestly show to the world is one of hate-filled, weakling-crushing primitive privilege, and Bolton's just the guy. The very thought of installing someone into an honorable institution when he's on record advocating the destruction of that institution is pure and elegant beauty. As a "reality based" ingrate, I applaud this with glee.

This country will never come to any sort of decency while we fuck everybody in sight in order to preserve our unfair advantages. At least showing our ugly, vicious and brutal side for all to see is a start.

[AllyCat]

7. And the people do NOT support him Scotty!

Oh yeah, we don't care about the grubby little people, right?

[skip fox]

9. Not if reporters start thinking Bolton likely 1st leak in PlameGate.

Figure it:

1.) We also know Bolton gave testimony to Fitzgerald's grand jury.

2.) We know Bolton was one of the officials neo-cons forced upon the State Department in May 2001. The became the Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International

3.) We know that a secret State Department memo given to Powell by Armitage just before his trip to Africa in 2003 contained the information (marked secret) to the effect that Wilson's wife (Plame) was instrumental in his visit to Niger.

4.) We know that a number of "high ranking administration officials" knew this information within a day and leaked it (winthin 2) to the press to discredit Wilson and his criticism of the administration with respect to Saddam's desires for WMDs.

Connect the dots. IF THE INFORMATION CAME FROM THE STATE DEPARTMENT MEMO (as was speculated upon last week because of grand jury testimony in the Plame case THEN IS IS MORE THAN SIMPLY LIKELY THAT BOLTON WAS THE CONDUIT OF THE INFORMATION AND, THEREFORE, THE PRIMARY LEAKER!

Even if Bolton was not on the 2003 trip to Africa, ti was like that in the capacity of Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security he would have been given the same momo by Armitage.


Now President Bush is considering appointing Bolton as Ambassador to the U.N. through a mid-term appointment.

If the press begins seriously putting this together and speculating upon it, Bush will either pull back or brazenly apoint him at significant political damage.

[hang a left]

11. I think that they are just blowing smoke. I don't think he'll do it.

Just an FYI, it seems that we don't know for sure if Bolton in fact did testify before the GJ in the Plame affair.

Last night, after issuing a stong "MSNBC stands by their story" and that their source was "unimpeachable", earlier in the day, they backed off of their story that Bolton had testified before the GJ.

Yesterday the State Department issued a statement, after they denied that Bolton was ever questioned, saying the Bolton HAD been question by the State Department IG and the CIA in an investigation into the Niger forgeries.

Now that is not to say the State Department is not lying again, but that is what went down yesterday.

[AirAmFan]

26. Another metaphor: Scotty's strewing shark repellant in the water,

trying to throw the media off the scent of Bolton blood from the harpoon Joe Biden sank into him!

Biden's BRILLIANTLY timed letter to Condi--two days before a long Congressional recess begins--has wounded Bolton as a UN nominee. If the media smell blood in the water, there'll be a feeding frenzy, at a time when Senate committees can't meet to give Bolton the trappings of respectability.

It well may be Bolton whom Judith Miller has gone to jail to protect! It's not Rove, because Rove released ALL reporters from keeping his name secret as a confidential source. Already, there have been MSM stories about a mysterious "third senior Administration official" (after Rove and Libby) who may have leaked Valerie "Wilson's" name to the press. Chances are, many WH press pass holders already suspect this third Bushevik is Bolton.

Bolton was THE top State political appointee having the most to do with PR about WMD policy, the narrow focus of Fitzgerald's investigation. A great timeline on the Plame affair just published, written by a former top NSC staffer, speculates that Bolton may have been the original source of the Plame leak for Judith Miller, who Arianna Huffington thinks was the key conduit for subsequent leaks to Novak, Rove, and Libby:

From http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0728-25.htm :

"The Source Beyond Rove- Condoleezza Rice at the Center of the Plame Scandal by Roger Morris

Published on Thursday, July 28, 2005 by CommonDreams.org

...June 10, 2003: Undersecretary of State Marc Grossman asks the Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR) for a briefing on the Niger uranium issue, and specifically the State Department's opposition to the continuing White House view that Iraq had tried to buy yellow cake. The resulting memo is dated the same day.... Befitting the sensitivity of the information, the memo is classified 'Top Secret," and contains in one paragraph, separately marked "(S/NF)" for "Secret/No dissemination to foreign governments or intelligence agencies," two sentences describing in passing Valerie "Wilson's" identity as a CIA operative and her role in the inception of the Wilson trip to Niger. This June 10 memo reportedly does not use her maiden name Plame....

There is also the intriguing relationship between John Bolton, the regime�s stymied appointee to the UN, and Judith Miller, the New York Times correspondent sent to jail for contempt in refusing to divulge her sources on Plame even for a story she never wrote. Bolton�s close relationship to Miller, in which many suspect the right-wing lobbyist handed the reporter much of the fraudulent accounts of Iraqi weaponry that ended up on the front page of the Times, may well have encompassed as well the passing of information from the INR memo on Plame, which Bolton saw before Powell or even Rice....

And, of course, the larger issue beyond Plame is the Bush regime�s Big Lie behind the invasion of Iraq, in which the phantom Nigerien yellowcake was an important malignant element. No government since World War II has more blatantly invented the pretext for waging a war of aggression....

Roger Morris was Senior Staff on the National Security Council under both Presidents Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon, until resigning over the invasion of Cambodia. An award winning author, he has written extensively about the Presidency and American foreign policy."

See also another active DU thread, at http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=104&topic_id=4214093&mesg_id=4218398 .

[Newsjock]

14. Can the U.N. refuse to accept Bolton?

That would be a hoot.

[skip fox]

18. How could Bolton NOT be called to grand jury in Plame matter????

He was the neo-cons' plant in State Depertment. His title was Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Securtiy. The informantion, as we heard last week, focused for a time on the 2003 State Department memo with the Plame-Wilson-Niger information given by Armitage to Powell on his Africa trip. That information was in the hands of administration officials within two days.

Now there are MANY ways they could have gotten the material, but doesn't it seem wildly out of characer for prosecutor Fitzgerald NOT TO CALL Bolton in front of the grand jury? OR AT LEAST TO HAVE HIM INTERVIEWED BY FBI?

Has Fitzgerald got something up his sleeve besides and arm (I'm assume he's tattoo free)?

Something seems "passing strange," as they say.

[Generator]

19. Let me translate

"We do need a permanent representative at the United Nations. This is a critical time and it's important to continue moving forward on comprehensive reform," McClellan said.

What he really means is this:

We need him in there NOW to gut the UN as much as possible, plant false information, make critical alliances and buy off anyone we can, threaten those that won't play ball, and finally get that Iran freedom plan going! (They have nukes! WE will all perish! Must invade! Must destory them before they destory us!)

Bush only has three and half years left to destroy the planet. Let's get a move on. Ya think a few fucking Dems are going to stand in my way??

Mad laughter insues.

[donkeyotay]

24. Bolton must have some pretty important work to do

He'll make a lovely kick-down, kiss-up kind of ambassador.

[0007]

20. I hope junior defies the Senate......and the GOP wonders why the people on

this planet hates this little dictator.

Please do it junior, show some balls, instead of trying to be a scarecrow.

[catmandu57]

21. Pen or finger, either way this makes a strong statement

to all of us little people it's the chimpanzee stamping it's foot telling us to eat shit he's going to do whatever in the fuck he wants to.
This is a pretty shitty deal, bolton is going to be lucky not to see the inside of a jail cell before years end.
I just can't see any plan they had put together as working now, the whole world is wised up, even some people here have wised up, though it's too late.
It would be so much like calling wolf.

[IA_Seth]

22. Anything to keep the spotlight off of ROVE n/t

[Rex]

23. Scott clearly knows who is to blame for Bolton being an asshole

The Clenis! :eyes:

[Voltaire99]

27. Don't be so quick to celebrate.

With a recess appointment, Bush will have won.

And that will mean the Dems have frittered away weeks and weeks on the Bolton game, only to have been beaten again.

Weeks during which they should have been denouncing the Iraq war.

Weeks during which they should have been pushing populist economic reform.

Celebrating having your ass kicked all over the floor after losing what was doomed to be a symbolic struggle? Er, yeah; rock on, etc.

[jayfish]

28. I Love How They Blame Everything On The Minority Party.

I guess the Repubs were responsible for every bad thing that went down in Congress while they were in the minority. ..oh wait I forgot, they are Republicans so it doesn't work that way. Stupid me :banghead:

Jay