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Ambassador Bolton to
take the UN floor/s
By William
Fisher
NEW
YORK - US President George W Bush has poked a
thumb in the eye of Senate Democrats with his
recess appointment of  John Bolton as the
United States' ambassador to the United Nations -
and triggered wholly predictable responses from
legislators and the
foreign policy community.
Bush used his
authority to make the controversial appointment
during the Senate's current break. Bush has the
power to fill vacancies without Senate approval
while Congress is in recess. Under the
constitution, if the appointment is not confirmed
by the current Congress, it will last until a new
Congress convenes in January 2007.
Senator Edward Kennedy,
Democrat of Massachusetts, called it a "devious
maneuver" that "further darkens the cloud over Mr
Bolton's credibility". Senator Christopher Dodd of
Connecticut, a senior Democrat on the Senate
Foreign Relations Committee, said, ”The president
has done a real disservice to our nation by
appointing an individual who lacks the credibility
to further US
"All
right, since you've twisted my arm, I'll tell
you: he's [Bolton's] going to make it, though
just barely ... do you really think the next
nominee would be a French wine-swilling
connoisseur of diplomatic
niceties?"
- How Bolton would reform
the
UN, by
Maggie Mitchell Salem, Asia
Times Online, May 3,
2005 |
interests at the United
Nations.” And Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid
of Nevada said Bolton was a ”seriously flawed and
weakened candidate”.
Reaction from
Republicans was equally predictable.
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, a
Tennessee Republican, declared that, ”The
president did the right thing by sending Mr Bolton
to the UN. He is a smart, principled and
straightforward candidate and will represent the
president and America well on the world stage.”
Senator Jon Kyl, a conservative Republican from
Arizona, also applauded the appointment. He said
that Senate Democrats' obstructionism left the
president no other choice. ”Everybody (at the UN)
will know that he's the president's man.”
<
Democrats' reaction to the president's
circumvention of the Senate confirmation process
comes at a time when Bush needs all the support he
can muster to confirm his nomination of John
Roberts to serve on the Supreme Court.
Critics say Bolton, who has been accused
of mistreating subordinates and has been openly
skeptical about the United Nations, would be
ill-suited to the sensitive diplomatic task at the
world body. The White House says the former
undersecretary of state for arms control, who has
long been one of Bush's most conservative foreign
policy advisers, is exactly the man to whip the
United Nations into shape.
John Gershman,
director of the Global Affairs Programme at the
International Relations Center and co-director of
Foreign Policy In Focus, said, ”President Bush's
recess appointment ... places a Bush
administration loyalist opposed to the United
Nations and international law in a position that
demands a skilled diplomat. His appointment is a
travesty for those that support international law
and a stronger United Nations.”
Rami G
Khouri, editor-at-large for The Daily Star
newspaper in Beirut and an internationally
respected commentator on foreign affairs,
commented, ”So much for checks and balances.”
And a spokesperson for Human Rights First,
an advocacy group, noted that the appointment
"will add to the challenges faced by US Foreign
Service officers who work to promote human rights.
These diplomats have faced formidable obstacles in
part because of increased US unilateralism and the
rejection by the US of international standards
relating to humanitarian law and laws prohibiting
torture and cruel, inhuman, and degrading
treatment.”
A contrarian view came from
Joshua Fouts, director of the Center for Public
Diplomacy at the University of Southern
California. ”I think the core issues surrounding
the appointment of Bolton have largely been
debated,” he said. ”While a recess appointment is
not the best solution, what I think is most
important, at this juncture in the UN's history,
is that the United States has an official senior
representative in place to frame their role and
position in the debate about the evolving role of
the United Nations in the world.”
Bush
said the post was "too important to leave vacant
any longer". He was sending Bolton, a 56-year-old
lawyer, to the United Nations with his ”complete
confidence”, he said.
The appointment
ended a stormy five-month impasse with Senate
Democrats who had accused the conservative Bolton
of twisting intelligence to suit a hawkish
ideology and of abusing subordinates.
Speaking at the White House, with Bolton
and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice at his
side, Bush said, ”A majority of US senators agree
that he is the right man for the job. Yet, because
of partisan delaying tactics by a handful of
senators, John was unfairly denied the up or down
vote that he deserves.”
UN
Secretary-General Kofi Annan welcomed Bolton's
appointment and did not address the question of
whether Bolton would be weakened by the recess
appointment. He said the manner of Bolton's
appointment was Bush's prerogative.
Bolton, whose criticisms of the United
Nations cast doubt on his ability to be effective
in his new post, said he was ”profoundly honored,
indeed humbled by the confidence” the president
had shown in him.
Bush had refused to
withdraw the Bolton nomination even though the
Senate had twice voted to sustain a filibuster
against him.
State Department officials
accused him of berating career officials and
analysts who challenged his views and of
selectively choosing intelligence to support his
assertions about the dangers posed by Cuba and
other nations.
When a Republican on the
Foreign Relations Committee, Ohio Senator George V
Voinovich, decided to oppose Bolton, the
nomination moved to the full Senate with no
recommendation, a relatively rare action for the
usually bipartisan Senate Foreign Relations
Committee.
The nomination has been held up
by Democrats' demands to see two sets of documents
related to Bolton's State Department work. One
involved national security intercepts of
conversations.
On August 29, 35 Democratic
senators and one independent, Senator Jim Jeffords
of Vermont, sent a letter to Bush urging against a
recess appointment. ”Sending someone to the United
Nations who has not been confirmed by the United
States Senate and now who has admitted to not
being truthful on a document so important that it
requires a sworn affidavit is going to set our
efforts back in many ways,” the letter said.
(Inter Press Service) |
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