I’m going to start mentioning names whom the White House should consider as outstanding possibilities with which to replace John Bolton’s nomination. I’m very high on Heather Wilson, who wants to be Secretary of Defense some day, I’m told. But this job in the U.N., at this time, would be a very good credential builder….
I really do like the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner and read it every once in a while as I lived in Fairbanks for a few years as a child and visited there a few years ago as the President’s Lecturer at the University of Alaska at Fairbanks.
Andy Card is on the “White House is infallible” kick and thinks that all of the problems that are churning right now — from the issue of confirming judges and John Bolton to Tom DeLay surviving — are the fault of Democrats.
This ran in Al Kamen’s column today: In the fight over John R. Bolton’s nomination to be U.N. ambassador, there’s been a huge fuss over a speech Bolton gave in 2003 in Seoul, which some have suggested was not diplomatic enough and was out of sync with administration policy.
Newsweek‘s Mark Hosenball has a nice clip on what to look for in the upcoming NSA intercepts story this next week: Bolton’s critics are also pressing for details of requests he made for National Security Agency electronic “intercepts” containing the names of U.S. officials.
Some very interesting and thoughtful folks have emailed me today and shared with me their views on why they are so opposed to John Bolton serving as America’s Ambassador to the United Nations.
As reported on Saturday, the National Security Agency has recommended that access be provided to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on the ten sets of intercepts of which John Bolton requested to know the names of redacted U.S. official’s names.
I don’t plan to write any more about the private issues of Mr. Bolton. As I have written, I am very uncomfortable with such an approach, but I think that those who are trying to white-wash his past need to know that there are others who have information that won’t be helpful.
Major epic-style exposes are emerging on John Bolton in the Los Angeles Times and New York Times. Although Sonni Efron starts with the countours of battle that existed between Richard Armitage and Colin Powell on one side and Bolton on the other, she then delves into personal vignettes from friends and colleagues, particularly at AEI….
