(A Bit of Political Waves)Hi everyone, August 03, 2005 - from Jude If you scratch an ultra-conservative, they will bleed hostility ... there is a deep fear that they will lose what they have, that they will be attacked or victimized. In order to guard against that possibility, they are at once alarmists and hawks -- do unto others, quickly, before they do unto you. I remember reading John Birch Society hand-outs when I was a teen, and feeling sorry for those who lived their life with the deeply-held conviction that there is forever an "enemy at the gates." The public does not cotton to wing nuts, however, so ultra-conservatives have learned how to employ the veneer of sanity, while framing their fearspeak into a litany of "family values." Among them, then, with their now-perfected emotional lingo and morphed "mainstream" credentials, there is a sliding scale of civility. On the very top, we find the smooth, the slick, the squeaky-clean ... men like John G. Roberts, Jr., a gent who has positioned himself throughout an entire lifetime for an opportunity to take power and implement his narrow agenda. George W. Bush, while born into a highly cultured family, fell off that scale early on ... indeed, no one was more surprised that George became President than his own parents; I think that somewhere in their psyche's, they're still vibrating like a plucked harp and wringing their hands. George is what I think of as "canny," a natural politician from years of watching and glad-handing, learning the finer points of power-brokering at Poppies knee, and clever enough to adopt a "simple values" Texan persona so he doesn't have to compete with his more learned peers. I'd say on a scale from one to ten, George is probably about a four on the civility scale... that's the face he paints on when he speaks to his Neo-Con and Fundamentalist Christian power base and his One Party America. I'd give him a pretentious five, but all he talks about is kicking ass, anyhow ... not all that civil even in policy. Pictures of George flipping off the press as Governor of Texas tell us where he actually resides on the scale -- he's a charmer if you're with him, but count on being picked off with less than civil tactics if you aren't. His hostility looks like arrogance, looks like disdain, it's the kind that belittles and ignores. As our "unreality" president, George spends a good deal of time pretending the rest of us don't exist. If you keep slipping down that scale, you will find the bottom feeders. Enter John Bolton. John has been a loyal ultra-conservative foot soldier since the Reagan years. He is by no means an idealistic Neo-Con, and does not enjoy "buddy" status in the White House -- he is a tried and true Nationalist. He has no regard for nation building, internationalism or international law, and does not believe in humanitarian intervention. His entire thrust in life appears to a growling instance on keeping America "Numero Uno," safe from outside influence or control. His mannerism, his personality, his character are all described, by his own party, as difficult, belligerent and aggressive. He is given to fits and tantrums; those who have worked with him call him a "bully" and a "hysteric." He appears to be tirelessly inflexible, and his "management style" [ability to work with others] is dismal. Insiders have suggested they'd "slit their wrists" if they had to work with him. His record includes abuse of underlings, insults to peers and a complete lack of communication skills. Scratch John Bolton and he will bleed hostility. John has very few selling points, and he is Cheney's man, rather than Bush's -- on the face of it, there's no real justification for his recess appointment except that he's a junk yard dog, and that's exactly what Bush wants in the U.N. Bolton is the lowest-common-denominator conservative ... he only knows one song and he's unwilling to hear any other. He has the reputation of a hit man -- you might call him when you need him, but you don't want to sit at the table with him, or look him in the eye as you pass in the hall. It's rumored that Condi Rice couldn't be happier that he's distanced from her State Department now, and negotiations with the North Koreans [with whom Bolton had a name-calling episode] are going more smoothly. John's the equivalent of the Godfather's Luca Brasi; his loyalties are absolute, and he will be unwavering in his mission to cut the legs out from under the United Nations. Am I being too harsh? John Bolton is the man who said, in 1994, "there is no such thing as the United Nations," just "an international community that occasionally can be led by the only real power left in the world, and that is the United States." He called support of the International Criminal Court the product of "fuzzy-minded romanticism [that] is not just naive, but dangerous" He does not think that international treaties are "legally binding." And let's all remember that former Sen. Jesse Helms thinks of him as "the kind of man with whom I would want to stand at the gates of Armageddon." At least he's literate -- he called U.N. officials "nabobs." As nominee to this post, John did not win the endorsement of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee who sent him on to Congress without recommendation -- the Senate requested to review documents that suggested that John bullied his CIA investigators and ignored their intelligence reports in order to spin for WMD in Iraq, during the build-up to war. Bush refused to release the memos and twice Bolton's nomination was blocked. It was one of the few bright moments in legislation in the last five years -- I took glee in Senator Joe Biden's remark that, "I have always voted against nominees who oppose the avowed purpose of the position for which they have been nominated." Bolton does not serve with the approval and confidence of the American people or it's legislative branch -- he serves at the pleasure of George W. Bush. And everybody knows it. How long will it take to connect the dots from George to John as Dubya's dark alter ego? Boltons recess appointment during legislative hiatus was long rumored, but the reality of it is still a shock. John Bolton will be the "face of America" at the table of nations -- a man who has no regard for the purpose of international diplomacy. A man who bleeds hostility, and who only knows one song. How will such a man respond to sensitive nations that require respect, with people who's culture requires a delicate touch? How will he manage the duties of "diplomat" when his own employee's call him a monster? More poignantly, how can such a man follow in the remarkable footsteps of Henry Cabot Lodge Jr, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Jean Kirkpatrick, Madeine Albright and Richard Holbrooke? How will John Bolton address the concerns of Adlai Stevenson, who as U.N. Ambassador said, "The whole basis of the United Nations is the right of all nations--great or small--to have weight, to have a vote, to be attended to, to be a part of the twentieth century." Answer: he can't. It's not my purpose to demonize Bolton -- he is what he is. I find his beliefs archaic and dangerous, as I do almost all those of the uber-conservative administration now in power. But I have no doubt he believes them unquestioningly. The more important question is why did George Bush insist on this. The Republican rationalization is that the United Nations is desperately in need of reform, and a hard-hitting, kick-ass Ambassador is just the ticket. That those reforms have already been addressed in the last months is one of the facts the Pubs leave out of the argument. It's actually simpler than that. Anyone who watched the build-up to war knows what George Bush thinks of the U.N. -- he has no respect for it as an institution and no interest in it's stabilization. The Bolton appointment is yet another example of Bush's amazing disregard for public and political opinion other than his own. This wasn't just an appointment -- it was a slap in the face of anyone who has opposed him, and most specifically, the United States Congress that dared to insist that it has power of its own. A reasonable man would never have proposed John Bolton, given his record. A reasonable man would have acquiesced to the enormous howl that erupted during the mans vetting process. A thoughtful man would have noticed that Bolton has ethical problems in his ties to both manipulation of intelligence in rush to war [Downing Street] and the outing of CIA agent Valerie Plame [Plamegate.] But George is apprently in no mood to pussyfoot around, these days. He has a more pressing agenda -- increasing presidential power. No president has extended it as has George, no president has surrounded himself with legal eagles and P.R. campaigns and covert workings to snatch it up as relentlessly as has George. The problem is ... he's gotten away with it. With 9/11 and "war on terror" and "homeland security," he's managed to chip away at constitutional protections, while telling us all that nothing needs defending so much as ... the Constitution [listen to his Supreme Court rhetoric.] The three-branched Executive, Legislative, Judicial base of Democracy is beginning to wobble in George's hands. His Supreme Court nominee is perfectly suited to sustain and increase that lopsided condition. Every president before George Bush has sent to the United Nations the best this country had to offer -- people skilled and lucid and high-minded and shiny as new pennies. George has sent someone exactly like himself. I expect this is a watershed moment, an egoism that will cost him dearly. What George sold us in 2000 as "confident," has begun to take shape as maniacal. The "loyalty" that looked so attractive early on, has now become "unyielding stubbornness." What had appeared to be "determination" in the first days of his presidency now looks like a headlong run off the highest cliff ... and he intends to take all of us with him. I've posted a number of links below -- all of them good reads if you want to know how all this happened and more about the decidedly "uncivil" John Bolton ... all important to know, since he will be representing YOU to the world. The first one, the Rothschild piece, has resonance with me. It's a "bring it on!" challenge to George to do his worst -- I understand that premise. Like avoiding elective surgery, we only prolong the pain if we don't jump in with both feet. The scandals of previous months are finally "sticking" to this president and they're not going away any time soon. Plamegate and Downing Street and a failing Iraq has dropped Bush's numbers into the gutter. As we looked hopefully at the astrology around Christmas, we saw "overreach" ... it's happening now. It's transparent. It's ruthless. Bolton illustrates it beautifully. At Political Waves, we look for overreach in every new article ... but even our moderate neighbors have noticed. They've noticed gas prices, higher grocery and utility bills. They're sending their kids back to school in politically charged environments, careful of what they wear, what they say. They've noticed the bombings in London that were supposed to "stay" in Iraq. The worse this gets, the more our neighbors wonder where that Texas "charm" is taking them. If you thought you saw defiance in George's nomination of Bolton, you did. It's Texas bluff in a difficult phase of his presidency. Bush's machine has given us only Republicans in power -- and Republicans will reap the political harvest of what they've sown. No one else is accountable ... they can't deflect responsibility forever. Dubya embarrassed us with, punished our allies with, a belligerent and unyielding John Bolton -- and more than any other enforced appointment, Bolton is going to be Dubya's Man, the blunt and coarse Bush doppelganger that has been selected to represent the face of America to collective global civilization. This is less a question of Who Is John Bolton, than Who Is George W. Bush. With this appointment, George gave the world the finger, much as he did that day in Texas when a reporters camera caught it for posterity. History will not forget either event. And under the smoke and mirrors, there is still the heartbeat of American culture, to which the civility scale matters. This nation, the entire world, is increasingly hungry for relief from chaos and strife ... and dare we dream, peace. Instead of feeding that hope, Bush gave us a tantrum in the making ... both in John Bolton as "diplomat" and his insistence that Bolton serve over the objection of anyone with good sense. Can ANYONE view this as less than a disaster and the beginning of another Bush failure? How many failures can one President balance and still be credible? Credibility is Bush's Achilles Heel at the moment, according to the polls. So, I say -- be cheerful with this in-credible appointment. The only thing that has kept Bush in power is the collective notion that he seems credible -- remember, he's the "Trust me!" President. The more failures we absorb, the more tantrums we see, the more he will appear the petulant child he is. The 2006 elections are coming up -- if there should, God/dess willing, be some color other than red dominating either legislative body, accountability will begin. [See the last link for hopeful news on that front.] Under such circumstance, the Reign of Tantrum would collapse. And I have a notion that, in their heart of hearts, even Old George and Barbara would breathe a sigh of relief. Namaste ~ -- Jude John Bolton: Ugly Face on Ugly Policy http://progressive.org/?q=mag_wx080105 Who Is John Bolton? http://www.americanprogressaction.org/site/pp.asp?c=klLWJcP7H&b=83210 The Bolton Embarrassment http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0802-31.htm Bush, Bolton to Congress: Screw You! http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0802-33.htm Destroying America http://www.capitolhillblue.com/artman/publish/article_7141.shtml Bolton The Albatross http://www.tompaine.com/articles/20050803/bolton_the_albatross.php Call the President an "SOB," Win Votes http://www.commondreams.org/views05/0803-24.htm -------------------------------- Jude, the editor of Political Waves, is standing in for Eric for a couple of days. You can subscribe to Political Waves (our all-politics news distribution list) for free at the link below. You'll receive between five and 10 news articles each day. You may write to Jude with your responses to her commentaries at moderator@planetwaves.net. 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