NYT- Plenty of Harm, Lots of Fouls (Bolton)

[underpants]

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/13/opinion/13fri1.html?pagewanted=print

Many passionate arguments were offered yesterday in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee against the nomination of John Bolton as ambassador to the United Nations, but Paul Sarbanes, Democrat of Maryland, made one of the most dramatic by simply reading the names of those who have held the post. Among them are Henry Cabot Lodge Jr., Adlai Stevenson, Arthur Goldberg, George Ball, George H. W. Bush, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, William Scranton, Andrew Young, Jeane Kirkpatrick, Vernon Walters, Madeleine Albright, Richard Holbrooke and John Danforth.

Mr. Bolton does not belong in this distinguished company of Republicans and Democrats, and the issue is not his "interpersonal style," as his supporters would like Americans to believe. Senator George Allen, a Republican, sneeringly suggested that the U.N. ambassador should not be one of those diplomats who are happy "drinking tea with their pinkies up." That was hardly a description of Mr. Moynihan and Ms. Kirkpatrick.

Senator George Voinovich said yesterday that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had assured him that Mr. Bolton would be closely supervised at the U.N. Ms. Rice's eagerness to get Mr. Bolton out of town is understandable, but, as Mr. Voinovich put it so well, "Why in the world would you want to send somebody up to the U.N. that has to be supervised?"

Like Mr. Voinovich, Mr. Hagel dismissed as "nonsense" his fellow Republicans' argument that opposing Mr. Bolton would mean opposing U.N. reform. Unlike Mr. Voinovich, Mr. Hagel said he was supporting the Bolton nomination. We agreed strongly when he said this issue should not be partisan. But Mr. Hagel couldn't come up with much to explain his decision beyond a partisan desire to support his president. Another Republican, Norm Coleman, said bluntly that Mr. Bolton should be confirmed simply because Mr. Bush won the election.

[freedom_to_read]

1. lol Coleman is such as asshat (eom)

[triguy46]

2. Maybe we ought to see

if any other UN members are interested in reform. If not, I guess we will have no choice but to invade Manhatten to liberate them from their oppressors.