Absent From the Korea Talks: Bush*s Hard-Liner

[kskiska]

WASHINGTON, Sept. 1 — When the United States settled down to sensitive talks with North Korea last week, one senior Bush administration policy maker was thousands of miles away — to the relief of North Korean officials and not a few State Department colleagues.

John R. Bolton, the under secretary of state for arms control, who recently said North Korea was a "hellish nightmare" in the grip of a tyrant, was barred from the negotiations by the North's government, which called him "scum."

Mr. Bolton intended all along to have lower-level officials attend, his spokeswoman said. Mr. Bolton declined to be interviewed for this article.

But the fury of that exchange lingered over the talks and highlighted Mr. Bolton's role in his 27 months on the job as an iconoclast in the normally cautious State Department. On topics from Iran and Iraq to Syria and Cuba, he has shattered diplomatic niceties and stirred anger within the ranks.

more…
http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/02/international/asia/02BOLT.html

[pfitz59]

1. Bolton is scum.

One more Reich-wing "think-tank" nut case!

[bluedeminredstate]

2. Uh huh

"Mr. Bolton intended all along to have lower-level officials attend, his spokeswoman said."
Really? Is that because this isn't a big enough problem to require TOP-LEVEL officials to attend?

Can ANYONE in this misadministratration ever admit when they f**k up? Aside from George Tenant's hammy blame-taking performance, which doesn't really count since it was only to cover for Bush, I've yet to see one official admit they were wrong about anything.

[Gman]

3. Scum

a good word for Bolton.

[teryang]

4. Another world dominance f...k up bent on

...generating more threats/bidness for defense contractors. You know the more bidness they get, the cheaper the unit costs and the higher the profits.

Undersecretary for arms control equals promoter of Amerikan proliferation.

[berry]

5. Bolton's history is enough to damn him

even if he weren't still intent on doing more damage, as a "favorite" of Bush*.

<<Mr. Bolton's induction into politics occurred when, as a teenager, he worked for Barry Goldwater's presidential campaign in 1964. After law school, Mr. Bolton established a relationship with Senator Jesse Helms, the North Carolina Republican. In the 1980's he worked on a campaign to counter voter registration efforts that were undertaken on behalf of blacks and organized labor.

He worked for the Agency for International Development under President Reagan, then was named assistant attorney general under Edwin Meese, where he struggled to beat back inquiries into matters including the Iran-contra scandal.

Then, as the assistant secretary of state for international organizations, Mr. Bolton in 1989 blocked Palestinian admission to the World Health Organization and Unesco.

More recently he led American opposition to the International Criminal Court, saying it could become a forum for anti-American prosecutions.>>

What a resume! It's like an outline of the GOP/PNAC agenda. He ought to be the visible/public face of Bush* policy--ugly enough that maybe people would recognize where they would lead us. Are leading us, alas. This article is a good start.

[PATRICK]

6. Could be the truth

I mean Bolton is a trash talker. In an extremely hardball and important meeting he'd be toast. So he gets himself thrown into the penalty box on purpose. He's no Holbrook or Kissinger or anything but a cheap hatchet man.

I think they are afraid of substantive talks with just about anyone they cannot simply dictate to. Like Cuba. Like Venezuela. They trash, connive, "delegate and stir the pot at a distance like some luminous dark menace- which would be absurd and and despicable were it not for the fact that the most powrerful nation in history is at the whim of these idiots. They are just as frightened that the others could solve the problem and shut the US out of a game they don't want to play, by rules theyt don't write as they go along.

They have a brand new muscle car but they can't really drive it. They just tore up the road in Iraq, hooting and hollering but now the podunks are in a ditch.

Think. Are there any low level types from the OTHER countries there? No. The Bushistas are all bluff no diplomacy and literally afraid of anything except throwing their weight around and romantic dreams of childish stature. If Bolton cared a whit about the victims in NK he'd do more than throw stones against the windows of meeting room he dare nott enter.

[berry]

7. I love your picture of the way they operate--"tearing up the road in Iraq"

And I agree you completely (and with other posts I've read of yours on Korea--very, very interesting).

Do you mean that Bolton's suggestion that what the US wants is "The End of North Korea" is throwing stones against the windows? That seems more like catapulting in a boulder. He meant that remark to get out to the media, and isolated as N Korea is, I can't believe they don't monitor the media. Same with the incendiary speech in Seoul, of course. They know N Korea has reacted "emotionally" in the past--I think they're trying to provoke. Meanwhile, pretending to negotiate. Luckily, China seems to be calling them on it.

I didn't really have much to add--this is in the nature of a :kick: