[SIZE=7][SIZE=7]

Bipartisan Boucher steps down at State

Washington Times,

by Nicholas Kralev

6/4/2005 2:32:18 PM

Richard Boucher, the State Department spokesman, stepped down from the briefing podium yesterday after speaking for six secretaries of state in both Republican and Democratic administrations over 13 years. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made a rare appearance in the department's briefing room to bid Mr. Boucher goodbye...Mr. Boucher yesterday turned his duties over to Sean McCormack, who worked for Miss Rice at the White House when she was national security adviser.

It's about time the one worlder, expatriate, liberal stepped down. Didn't take long for the the new Secretary of State to take care of that problem. My one disappointment with Secretary Powell was his not taking care of the milque toaste crowd in the DOS!

Too bad Powell couldn't have taken that lying piece of crap Rice with him.

Bolton said to orchestrate unlawful firing

By CHARLES J. HANLEY

John R. Bolton flew to Europe in 2002 to confront the head of a global arms-control agency and demand he resign, then orchestrated the firing of the unwilling diplomat in a move a U.N. tribunal has since judged unlawful, according to officials involved.

A former Bolton deputy says the U.S. undersecretary of state felt Jose Bustani "had to go," particularly because the Brazilian was trying to send chemical weapons inspectors to Baghdad. That might have helped defuse the crisis over alleged Iraqi weapons and undermined a U.S. rationale for war.

Bustani, who says he got a "menacing" phone call from Bolton at one point, was removed by a vote of just one-third of member nations at an unusual special session of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), at which the United States cited alleged mismanagement in calling for his ouster.

The United Nations' highest administrative tribunal later condemned the action as an "unacceptable violation" of principles protecting international civil servants. The OPCW session's Swiss chairman now calls it an "unfortunate precedent" and Bustani a "man with merit."

"Many believed the U.S. delegation didn't want meddling from outside in the Iraq business," said the retired Swiss diplomat, Heinrich Reimann. "That could be the case."

Bolton's handling of the multilateral showdown takes on added significance now as he looks for U.S. Senate confirmation as early as this week as U.N. ambassador, a key role on the international stage, and as more details have emerged in Associated Press interviews about what happened in 2002.

A spokeswoman told AP Bolton, keeping a low profile during his confirmation process, would have no comment for this article.

Bolton has been criticized for supposed bullying of junior U.S. officials and for efforts to get them fired. Bustani, a senior official under the U.N. umbrella, says Bolton used a threatening tone with him and "tried to order me around."

The Iraq connection to the OPCW affair comes as fresh evidence surfaces that the Bush administration was intent from early on to pursue military and not diplomatic action against Saddam Hussein's regime.

An official British document, disclosed last month, said Prime Minister Tony Blair agreed in April 2002 to join in an eventual U.S. attack on Iraq. Two weeks later, Bustani was ousted, with British help.

In 1997, the Brazilian arms-control specialist became founding director-general of the OPCW, whose inspectors oversee destruction of U.S., Russian and other chemical weapons under a 168-nation treaty banning such arms. The agency, based in The Hague, Netherlands, also inspects chemical plants worldwide to ensure they're not put to military use.

In May 2000, one year ahead of time and with strong U.S. support, Bustani was unanimously re-elected OPCW chief for a 2001-2005 term. Colin Powell, the new secretary of state, praised his leadership qualities in a personal letter in 2001.

But Ralph Earle, a veteran U.S. arms negotiator, told AP that he and others in Bolton's arms-control bureau grew unhappy with what they considered Bustani's mismanagement. The agency chief also "had a big ego. He did things on his own," and wasn't responsive to U.S. and other countries' positions, said Earle, now retired.

Both Earle and career diplomat Avis Bohlen, who retired in June 2002 as a top Bolton deputy, said the idea to remove Bustani did not originate with the undersecretary. But Bolton "leaped on it enthusiastically," Bohlen recalled. "He was very much in charge of the whole campaign," she said, and Bustani's initiative on Iraq seemed the "coup de grace."

"It was that that made Bolton decide he had to go," Bohlen said.

After U.N. arms inspectors had withdrawn from Iraq in 1998 in a dispute with the Baghdad government, Bustani stepped up his initiative, seeking to bring Iraq - and other Arab states - into the chemical weapons treaty.

Bustani's inspectors would have found nothing, because Iraq's chemical weapons were destroyed in the early 1990s. That would have undercut the U.S. rationale for war because the Bush administration by early 2002 was claiming, without hard evidence, that Baghdad still had such an arms program.

In a March 2002 "white paper," Bolton's office said Bustani was seeking an "inappropriate role" in Iraq, and the matter should be left to the U.N. Security Council - where Washington has a veto.

Bolton said in a 2003 AP interview that Iraq was "completely irrelevant" to Bustani's responsibilities. Earle and Bohlen disagree. Enlisting new treaty members was part of the OPCW chief's job, they said, although they thought he should have consulted with Washington.

Former Bustani aide Bob Rigg, a New Zealander, sees a clear U.S. motivation: "Why did they not want OPCW involved in Iraq? They felt they couldn't rely on OPCW to come up with the findings the U.S. wanted."


http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/APWires/p.../D8AH162G0.html

Department of State rennovations??

Well, the place sure could use a good coat of fire!!!

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

I wasn't expecting that.

1/19/2006

UPDATED: Condi Outlines New State Dept. Skill Requirements

Filed under: General— site admin @ 7:30 am

Yesterday Secretary of State Rice discussed the 21st century “skill set” for US Foreign Service officers. (This link is to the Washington Post’s coverage.) These “new” skill requirements are (1) common sense, (2) critical to any sustained diplomatic effort but (3) especially critical when pursuing a reformationist foreign policy.

The lede:

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said yesterday that she will shift hundreds of Foreign Service positions from Europe and Washington to difficult assignments in the Middle East, Asia and elsewhere as part of a broad restructuring of the diplomatic corps that she has dubbed “transformational diplomacy.”

The State Department’s culture of deployment and ideas about career advancement must alter now that the Cold War is over and the United States is battling transnational threats of terrorism, drug smuggling and disease, Rice said in a speech at Georgetown University. “The greatest threats now emerge more within states than between them,” she said. “The fundamental character of regimes now matters more than the international distribution of power.”

As part of the change in priorities, Rice announced that diplomats will not be promoted into the senior ranks unless they accept assignments in dangerous posts, gain expertise in at least two regions and are fluent in two foreign languages, citing Chinese, Urdu and Arabic as a few preferred examples.

Rice noted that the United States has nearly as many State Department personnel in Germany — which has 82 million people — as in India, with 1 billion people. As a first step, 100 jobs in Europe and Washington will be immediately shifted to expanded embassies in countries such as India, China and Lebanon. Many of these diplomats had been scheduled to rotate into coveted posts in European capitals this summer, and the sudden change in assignment has caused some distress, State Department officials said............

Haven't seen much about this or much change in their actions if any has occured!

15 October 2006

Vote To Sanction North Korea Shows "Unity of Purpose," Rice Says

Secretary calls U.N. resolution "powerful tool" that needs to be used carefully

By Carrie Loewenthal
Washington File Special Correspondent

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice (file photo © AP Images)Washington -- The unanimous U.N. Security Council vote October 14 to impose sanctions on North Korea demonstrates a “remarkable unity of purpose and unity of message” from the international community regarding that country's nuclear activities, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice says.

U.N. Security Council Resolution 1718 “sends a very strong signal to North Korea that it is now completely isolated,” Rice said on FOX News Sunday October 15.

In remarks on CBS’s Face the Nation the same day, the secretary called the resolution a “powerful tool” for the international community to use to stop North Korea’s development of its nuclear arsenal and prevent the export of nuclear material from North Korea to other countries. Rice cautioned, however, that the resolution is “a tool that needs to be used carefully,” in a way that “does not enhance the possibility for open conflict.”

Rice plans to discuss implementation of the resolution.....





............The secretary noted the significance of China’s agreement to impose the sanctions, saying on FOX that the resolution is the “toughest action that China has ever signed onto, vis-à-vis North Korea.”

When asked about the likelihood that China would enforce bans along its border with North Korea or press for inspections of material coming in and out of North Korea, Rice expressed certainty that China would comply with the resolution.

“China has come a very long way in being willing to sign onto a resolution that makes China now responsible to make certain that North Korea is not trading,” Rice said on CBS. “I think that you’re going to find China carrying out its responsibilities, undoubtedly carrying it out in a way that it believes will not enhance conflict.”...............



Note the soft-serve - we'll just keep talking and bluffing and huffing and puffing along!

I think Sect. Rice has been "departmentalized", but they also did that to General Powell and that was a disappointment also!

I'm afraid our State Department has gone into a "love thy neighbor" model!

This is a RoccoR type Übertragung (rendition). Sorry RR.


PEACE in Action
Using Multi-Track Diplomacy to Deal With Ethnic Conflict


Which of the following is the most violent?

a. Eating an entire bag of chocolate chip cookies.

b. Berating yourself for eating chocolate chip cookies.

c. Not allowing yourself to eat any chocolate chip cookies.

Although there's no "correct" answer, most people choose b ). That's because our understanding of violence is that it's something overtly hostile; a way of being beaten up. To me, nonviolence is not simply the opposite of hostility (physical or psychological); it's much more than that.

Nonviolence is synonymous with love.

Nonviolence is synonymous with love. Like love, it is a powerful force that knows no opposition. Nonviolence is compassion. It is having loving kindness and understanding even for those who appear to have none themselves. Committing to the personal practice of nonviolence today can heal a lifetime of violent choices.

Sweden's Muslim minister turns on veil

The Times (UK), by Helena Frith Powell


10/22/2006 9:46:39 AM

THE latest media darling of Scandinavian politics is not only black, beautiful and Muslim; she is also firmly against the wearing of the veil. Nyamko Sabuni, 37, has caused a storm as Sweden’s new integration and equality minister by arguing that all girls should be checked for evidence of female circumcision; arranged marriages should be criminalised; religious schools should receive no state funding; and immigrants should learn Swedish and find a job.

Wish we had some jewels like her!!!

It ought to be a choice, but no woman should ever be killed over not wearing it. That's the problem, the religious nuts actually kill people over not wearing beards, veils, long pants, etc.

Don't need gubment taking on those jobs...

DIPLOMAT ACCUSES U.S. ON AL-JAZEERA

Monday, October 23, 2006

Nealz Nuze

If you're a diplomat in the State Department during the Bush Administration, this is probably not the best way to advance your career. Be that as it may, Alberto Fernandez now says he "seriously misspoke" when he went on Al-Jazeera and accused the United States of "arrogance and stupidity" in Iraq. To make matters worse, he said all of this in Arabic.

But this isn't much of a surprise. The U.S. State Department has never been on board with the war in Iraq, much less the whole war on terror itself. In fact, they have been sabotaging the current Bush Administration for years. But back to Fernandez's comments. Is he right? Well, maybe just a little bit.

Maybe not so much arrogance --- but there is enough stupidity to go around in Iraq for sure. After a brilliant invasion and takeover, the post-war military planners in Iraq blew it big-time. They allowed lawlessness and looting to take place. They dismantled the Iraqi Army. They got rid of the entire infrastructure in Iraq to start their own pie-in-the-sky nation building. It didn't work.

There weren't enough troops...especially to keep order initially. Then there's the problem of being too nice. Rather than going into Fallujah and cleaning house, we nibbled around the edges...tried to be politically correct about it. We didn't want it to look like the United States was occupying an Arab land, even though that was exactly what we were doing.

You could go on and on about the mistakes made in Iraq. But for an American government official to go on an enemy television network that supports terrorism and criticize his own government...that's not too bright.

Envoy Sorry for Iraq 'Stupidity' Comment

Associated Press, by Staff


10/22/2006 10:57:30 PM

A senior U.S. diplomat apologized Sunday night for saying U.S. policy in Iraq displayed ''arrogance'' and ''stupidity.'' /break/ ''Upon reading the transcript of my appearance on Al-Jazeera, I realized that I seriously misspoke by using the phrase 'there has been arrogance and stupidity' by the U.S. in Iraq," said Fernandez, director of public diplomacy in State's Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs. ''This represents neither my views nor those of the State Department,'' Fernandez added. ''I apologize.''








High Priestess of the Palestinian State

FrontPageMagazine.com

by Don Feder


10/23/2006 8:18:11 AM


If the State Department has a religion, it’s Palestinian statehood. On its altar, diplomats are eager to sacrifice the security of America’s only reliable Middle East ally and, ultimately, our own security as well. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has become the high priestess of this cult – muttering mystic incantations about Palestinian suffering under the brutal Israeli occupation and how a Palestinian state would be the crowning achievement of American foreign policy.

Europe to be in loop on foreign policy: Kennedy

Reuters, by Staff


11/9/2006 2:36:52 PM

Europe will be kept more in the loop about U.S. foreign policy after mid-term elections which swept away Republican control of Congress, senior Democratic party member Senator Edward Kennedy said on Thursday. /snip/ "There is a new game in the United States now," he told reporters after meeting Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi.


Appears Splash will be telling Sect. Rice what to do come January!

Don't count on it.

And Prodi will be telling Splash what to do.

The voices in your head tell you what to do.

French work hours push up baguette price

Reuters, by Staff

11/14/2006 7:58:16 PM

PARIS - Why have French baguettes become more expensive? Because of France's shorter work week, French Finance Minister Thierry Breton said on Tuesday. Breton, who has been a vocal critic of France's 35-hour work week, said the price of a baguette had risen by 23 percent over the past five years, while the price of German bread had fallen by 3 percent over the same period.

Nothing wrong with a little Suicidal Tendencies...

It's just Rush Limpbag. Turn off the radio.

Rice: U.S. Concerned About Rising China

Nov 17 11:37 AM US/Eastern

By ANNE GEARAN
AP Diplomatic Writer



HANOI, Vietnam

The United States has some concerns about a rising China, including a military expansion that may be excessive, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Friday.
Beijing has spent heavily in recent years on adding submarines, missiles, fighter planes and other high-tech weapons to its arsenal and extending the reach of the 2.3 million-member People's Liberation Army, the world's largest fighting force.

Its reported military budget rose more than 14 percent this year to $35.3 billion, but outside estimates of China's true spending are up to three times that level.

"There are concerns about China's military buildup," Rice told a television interviewer. "It's sometimes seemed outsized for China's regional role."

Beijing insists its multibillion-dollar buildup is defensive, but it has alarmed some Asian neighbors and U.S. military planners who see China as a potential threat to U.S. military pre-eminence in the Pacific.

Asked whether U.S. foreign policy toward China is aimed at containing China's ability to flex military power, Rice turned the question to politics and economics.

"U.S. policy is aimed at having China be a responsible stakeholder in international politics," she replied. "That means that Chinese energy, Chinese growth, Chinese incredible innovation and entrepreneurship, would be channeled into an international economy in which everybody can compete and compete equally."

Rice, in Asia with President Bush for a regional economic forum, said China's economic growth "has been a net gain for the international system." But she also ticked off a list of U.S. concerns including questions of economic fairness and China's record on human rights.

"There are concerns about a rising China, concerns about China's transition, concerns about whether the Chinese economy will in fact act in a way that is consistent with the level playing field that the international economy needs," Rice said in the interview with CNBC Asia.

U.S. concerns are manageable within a relationship she described as strong overall, Rice said. She visited China last month to shore up United Nations sanctions against China's ally, North Korea, and she credited Beijing with cooperation in opposing the North's nuclear development.

Bush and Rice were both meeting with their Chinese counterparts during this weekend's Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit.

A congressional advisory panel on Thursday questioned China's willingness to be a more responsible international player, saying world prosperity depends on China's abandoning a single-minded pursuit of its "own narrow national interests."

The U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission made 44 recommendations in its annual report to lawmakers. It calls on the United States to combat Chinese attempts to isolate Taiwan by supporting the island's membership in various world bodies, and urges Washington to pressure Beijing to help end the bloody conflict in Sudan's Darfur region.

"While China is a global actor, its sense of responsibility has not kept up with its expanding power," said Larry Wortzel, chairman of the commission, which Congress created in 2000 to investigate U.S.-China issues.

The panel also admonished U.S. intelligence agencies, urging the United States to set up "a more effective program" for gathering information about China's military buildup and development.

In Beijing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu said she had not seen the report, but "we are against the attempt by any country or any organization to interfere with China's internal affairs under the pretext of the Taiwan question and impede our reunification course."

The report said China's global reach extends beyond East Asia to the Middle East, Africa, South Asia and Latin America, where China "is coming to be regarded almost as a second superpower."

Since when? Republicans are in bed with the Red Chinese. Been there for years.

Ayn Rand Institute Press Release

U.S. Appeasement Encourages Arab Nations to Go Nuclear

November 16, 2006

Irvine, CA--Six Arab nations have told the U.N. atomic energy agency that they plan to pursue and master nuclear technology--meaning that we face the threat of nuclear weapons held not only by Iran, but by several other regimes swarming with and supportive of Islamists. "That nations like Islamist-sponsor Saudi Arabia can make such a declaration is a consequence of America's appeasement-ridden foreign policy--a policy that encourages new threats and aggression," said Elan Journo, junior fellow at the Ayn Rand Institute.

"America's treatment of nuclear-chasing North Korea and Iran has emboldened these Arab states. For decades America and its allies have submitted to the extortion of North Korea, appeasing that hostile regime and showering it with money. North Korea succeeded in going nuclear not despite, but thanks to, Western diplomacy.

"Concessions to North Korea emboldened the Iranians, who are aggressively pursuing nuclear technology. America's groveling diplomatic overtures toward Iran have demonstrated that the United States is willing to provide economic 'incentives'--essentially, protection money--to hostile regimes bent on arming themselves.

"America's shameful policy toward Iran and North Korea has made these regimes stronger and worse threats. That is a necessary result of rewarding evil. And, witnessing the spectacle of the lone superpower prostrating itself at the feet of enemies, what malignant regime would not be encouraged to seek nuclear weapons? And, when it acquires such weapons, deploying them against us through terrorist proxies?

"We need a radically different foreign policy--a policy that upholds American self-interest on moral principle. Such a policy would punish hostile regimes, not reward them."


Copyright © 2006 Ayn Rand® Institute. All rights reserved.

Mr. James Baker was sent by your President Bush to negotiate with the Iranians. Does President Bush APPEASE the Iranians? Mr. Baker is already in talks with the Syrians. He'll come back with agreements at hand.

Bush is the one who is negotiating with TERRORIST STATES. Not the democrats.

Just don't beyotch when we quit negotiating and MOAB Teheran.

We have no intention of doing anything to Iran. Israel might, we won't.

Be careful what you wish for.

Neither side will. All this talk keeps the hoi polloi excited.

Chertoff says U.S. threatened by international law

Fri Nov 17, 2006 6:31pm ET

By David Morgan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A top Bush administration official on Friday said the European Union, the United Nations and other international entities increasingly are using international law to challenge U.S. powers to reject treaties and protect itself from attack.

"International law is being used as a rhetorical weapon against us," Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, a former federal appellate judge, said in a speech to the Federalist Society, a conservative policy group.

Chertoff cited members of the European Parliament in particular as harboring an "increasingly activist, left-wing and even elitist philosophy of law" at odds with American practices and interests.


But he said the same pattern could be seen in the policies of the United Nations and other international bodies.

"What we see here is a vision of international law that if taken aggressively would literally strike at the heart of some of our basic fundamental principals -- separation of powers, respect for the Senate's ability to ratify treaties and ... reject treaties," Chertoff said.

President George W. Bush's administration has been repeatedly criticized by rights groups and foreign governments, including some allies, over some of the tactics it has used in Washington's war on terrorism since the September 11 attacks.

Critics have aimed at Bush's policies such as the indefinite detention of foreign terrorism suspects at the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba.

Chertoff said the U.S. Supreme Court decision on Guantanamo prisoner Salim Ahmed Hamdan that required the United States to treat detainees under Geneva Conventions standards showed international law's entry into the U.S. domain.

He also pointed to negotiations leading up to last month's interim agreement between the United States and the European Union on sharing personal information about trans-Atlantic airline passengers.

The Bush administration sought addresses, credit card details, phone numbers and other details for U.S.-bound European air passengers as a way to determine whether any should be turned back from entering the United States as a security risk.

"Some in the European Parliament argued that the fact the information was derived from Europeans coming to the U.S. meant that we should be forced in the United States to let Europe supervise and set the terms of how we make use of that information," Chertoff said.

"Fortunately, we resolved it in a way that does address the principal concerns that we have," he added.


Chertoff also cited press reports of European privacy activists trying to constrain U.S. use of financial information obtained in Washington's war on terrorism.

"There are increasing efforts to control our use of information in our own country," he said.

Some EU activists, he said, believe national sovereignty is weakening under an avalanche of international laws.

"It (is) a chilling vision of where we could go, given the current developments in international and transnational law," Chertoff said.

© Reuters 2006. All Rights Reserved

Chertoff is another power mad brownshirt. You ever read the Constitution there buddy?

isn't it obvious yet?

I mean REALLY... do you think they want democracy? equal rights? representation?

"for the people, by the people" is so 20'th century....

Foreign Affairs

Is Putin Being Set Up?

by Patrick J. Buchanan

Posted Nov 27, 2006


PARIS—Whoever poisoned Alexander Litvinenko had two goals: a long and lingering death for the KGB defector and pointing a finger of accusation for his killing right in the face of Vladimir Putin.

Which leads me to believe Putin had nothing to do with it.

In an assassination, one must ask: Cui bono? To whose benefit? Who would gain from the poisoning of Litvinenko?

Certainly not Putin. Litvinenko's death puts him, the Kremlin and the KGB, now the FSB, under suspicion of having reverted to the terror tactics of Stalin, who commissioned killers to liquidate enemies like Leon Trotsky, murdered in Mexico in 1940.

What benefit could Putin conceivably realize from the London killing of an enemy of his regime, who had just become a British citizen? Why would the Russian president, at the peak of his popularity, with his regime awash in oil revenue and himself playing a strong hand in world politics, risk a breach with every Western nation by ordering the public murder of a man who was more of a nuisance than a threat to his regime?

Litvinenko, after all, made his sensational charges against the Kremlin—that the KGB blew up the Moscow apartment buildings, not Chechen terrorists, as a casus belli for a war on Chechnya and that he had refused a KGB order to assassinate oligarch Boris Berezovsky— in the late 1990s. Of late, Litvinenko has been regarded as a less and less credible figure, with his charges of KGB involvement in 9-11 and complicity in the Danish cartoons mocking Muhammad that ignited the Muslim firestorm.

Yet, listening to some Western pundits on the BBC and Fox News, one would think Putin himself poisoned Litvinenko. Who else, they ask, could have acquired polonium 210, the rare radioactive substance used to kill Litvinenko? Who else had the motive to eliminate the ex-agent who had dedicated his life to exposing the crimes of the Kremlin?

Indeed, no sooner had Litvinenko expired than his collaborator in anti-Putin politics, Alex Goldfarb, was in front of the television cameras reading Litvinenko's deathbed statement charging Putin with murder:

"You may succeed in silencing one man, but the howl of protest from around the world will reverberate, Mr. Putin, in your ears for the rest of your life. ... You may succeed in silencing me, but that silence comes at a price. You have shown yourself to be as barbaric and ruthless as your most hostile critics have claimed."

Litvinenko's statement is awfully coherent and eloquent for a man writhing in a death agony. But if he did not write it, who did? All of which leads me to conclude Putin is being set up, framed for a crime he did not commit. But then, if Putin did not order the killing, who did?

Who else could have acquired the polonium 210? Who else would kill Litvinenko to make Putin a pariah? These are the questions Scotland Yard, which also seems skeptical that Putin had a hand in this bizarre business, has begun to ask.

As the predictable effect of Litvinenko's death has been to put a cloud of suspicion over Putin and a chill over Russian relations with the West, one must ask: To whose benefit is the discrediting of Putin? Who would seek a renewal of the Cold War?

Certainly, the oligarchs and robber barons like Berezovsky—many of them now dispossessed of the wealth they amassed in a collapsing Soviet Union, and all of whom have been run out of the country or imprisoned—have the most powerful of motives. They hate Putin and seek to bring him down. And Goldfarb and Litvinenko both enjoyed the patronage of the billionaire Berezovsky.

Surely, rogue or retired KGB agents, passed over by Putin and bitter at Litvinenko, would have a motive: to send a message, written in polonium 210, that this is what happens to those who betray us and Mother Russia.

Scotland Yard has yet to declare this a murder case and is looking into the possibility of a "martyrdom operation"—suicide dressed up like murder—in which Litvinenko may have colluded. The Putin-dominated Russian press is pushing this line, as well as the idea of an oligarchs' plot to discredit Putin and destroy Russia's relations with the West.

Yet Litvinenko was still in his early 40s, with a wife and two children. While his agonizing public death would make him a celebrity even more famous than Georgi Markov, the Bulgarian anti-communist murdered in London in 1979 with a poison-tipped umbrella, Litvinenko would not be around to enjoy his fame.

America has a vital interest in this Scotland Yard investigation. What it discovers may tell us more about the character of the man into whose eyes George Bush claimed to have stared, and seen his soul, or it may tell us who the real enemies of this country are, who are out to restart the Cold War, and perhaps another hot one.


Mr. Buchanan is a nationally syndicated columnist and author of "The Death of the West," "The Great Betrayal," "A Republic, Not an Empire" and "Where the Right Went Wrong."

The problem is Putin is making himself a pariah. This is just icing on the cake. Pat may be right, but it doesn't help Putin much.

Bolton to exit as U.N. ambassador

Mon Dec 4, 2006 2:58 PM ET

By Steve Holland

WASHINGTON (Reuters)

- U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton announced on Monday he would soon give up his job after being unable to satisfy Senate opponents concerned he would pursue a unilateral U.S. foreign policy.

Bolton's attempt to hang on to his diplomatic post, already tenuous, became even more problematic after Democrats who had blocked his nomination won control of the Senate in November elections. Bolton was appointed on a temporary basis.

He had a history of angering diplomats and colleagues in his previous State Department job and could not gain sufficient support from the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to stay on despite winning praise from some envoys at the United Nations.

Surprising some White House officials still searching for a way to keep him in his job, Bolton submitted a resignation letter to President George W. Bush on Friday. Aides said Bush thought about it over the weekend before reluctantly accepting it.

"I am deeply disappointed that a handful of United States senators prevented Ambassador Bolton from receiving the up or down vote he deserved in the Senate," Bush said.

While there was much speculation in Washington that Bush might give Bolton another position that did not require Senate confirmation, Bolton's departure letter appeared to close the door on that option.

He is to leave the U.N. post when the current session of the U.S. Congress ends, possibly at the end of the week. Democrats take control of both the Senate and the House of Representatives when the new session begins in January.

"After careful consideration I have concluded that my service in your administration should end when the current recess appointment expires," Bolton wrote.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

© Reuters 2006. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Reuters content, including by caching, framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters and the Reuters sphere logo are registered trademarks and trademarks of the Reuters group of companies around the world.

Bolton to exit as U.N. ambassador

see ya!

wouldn't wanna be ya!

whats tough guy afraid of? Did he do all the damage he wanted to do?

It's really quite simple. Ambassador Bolton is serving on a recess appointment which will end in any event at the commencement of the next session of Congress in January. To remain in office he must be confirmed by the Senate. The same party that prevented, thanks to the silly 60 vote rule the Senate is saddled with (the only way to invoke cloture on a measure in the face of an oppositive debate, or worse, a filibuster, is to have 60 or more votes to invoke and call the question), has already stated they they will not, when they assume Senate leadership, grant the President any such up or down vote. His further Ambassadorship is a moot point. It will not happen. Rather than play any further games, he has tendered his resignation effective with the ending of the current session of Congress. This has the effect of freeing the President to start the replacement process earlier and takes Ambassador Bolton off the table as a political issue.

well yeah, but whats the real reason?

His uncanny ressemblance to Captain Kangeroo?

Bob Keeshan had better hair (or at least no affinity for Grecian formula).

Yeah and wasnt he an actual Captain or something? Seems to me he had military experience. And no, I'm not talking about that retarded email that said that Mister Rogers was a former Navy SEAL with (XXX) many confirmed kills.

"BOB KEESHAN. Born in New York City, New York, U.S.A., 27 June 1927. Attended Fordham University, 1946-49. Served in United States Marine Corps Reserve, 1945-46. Married: Anne Jeanne Laurie, 1950; children: Michael Derek, Laurie Margaret, and Maeve Jeanne. Began career as Clarabell for NBC-TV's Howdy Doody Show, 1947-52; appeared as Corny the Clown (ABC-TV), 1953-55, and Tinker the Toymaker (ABC-TV), 1954-55; starred as Captain Kangaroo (CBS-TV), 1955-85; president of Robert Keeshan Associates, from 1955; appeared as Mr. Mayor and the Town Clown (CBS-TV), 1964-65;..."

Source: http://www.museum.tv/archives/etv/K/htmlK/.../keeshanbob.htm

Keeshan- marines
Rogers-nada

Bolton looks like Captain Kangaroo and Yosemite Sam combined.

They Got Bolton

By Robert D. Novak

CNSNews.com Commentary

December 07, 2006

Over lunch in New York two weeks ago, John Bolton told me he was thinking about abandoning his long struggle for confirmation as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and leaving government service. But he asked me to defer writing about his situation. The White House felt anything I wrote would undermine last-ditch efforts at confirmation.

That reflects continuing failure by George W. Bush and his team, six years in power, to perceive the implacable nature of Democratic opposition. The White House was still eager not to offend Sen. Christopher Dodd, the Democrat most determined to block Bolton. Furthermore, Bush aides to the end sought to bring around lame duck Republican Sen. Lincoln Chafee to allow Bolton's nomination on the Senate floor during the lame duck session.

All such efforts were futile. Dodd and his colleagues were determined to get outspoken conservative Bolton, and they got him. Chafee kept showing contempt for his nominal party even after the White House saved him from defeat in the primary. The Democratic election victory on Nov. 7 sealed Bolton's fate, ending Republican efforts to find another two years for Bolton even without confirmation.

A senior White House aide told me the president had been "considering" an offer of deputy secretary of state (which requires Senate confirmation) or Cabinet-level counselor (which does not). When he decided last week he wanted out, Bolton had no interest in any alternative post. But neither job was even mentioned to Bolton. After serving four years as an under secretary, Bolton following the 2004 election asked for the deputy secretary's job. The new secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, said no, but offered him the U.N. post.

Dodd's campaign has been relentless and unfair. "He's been a very ineffective bully," Dodd has said in describing Bolton's performance at the United Nations as a recess appointee. In fact, the permanent U.S. staff there regards Bolton as President Bush's most effective U.N. envoy, his record climaxed by achieving a unanimous Security Council vote on the Korean question. Dodd's delight over Bolton's departure is shared at the United Nations by anti-American Third World ambassadors and U.N. bureaucrats.

The continuing Democratic rationale for opposing Bolton is the administration's refusal to turn over intelligence intercepts requested by Bolton as under secretary of state. But the liberal cabal that opposed him for the United Nations also voted against him in 2001 for the under secretary's post. That includes Sen. Joseph Biden, now returned as Foreign Relations Committee chairman. He tends to vote against Republican presidential nominees when there is any opposition.

But Dodd, striking a pose of smiling affability, has been the driving force behind the assault on Bolton. An ardent supporter of normalizing relations with Cuba, Dodd is inexorable in blocking any nominee hostile to Fidel Castro's dictatorship. He kept Otto Reich from getting confirmed as assistant secretary of state for inter-American affairs and now has done the same to Bolton.

White House aides were living in an unreal world when they privately blamed Dodd's hostility to Bolton on me and blamed my hostility to Dodd on Bolton. In fact, I was scourging Dodd for his pro-Castro bias long before Bolton became an issue.

The fecklessness at the White House in managing Bolton's nomination is exemplified by the feeling there to the end that Chafee could be brought along. Having poured money into Chafee's Rhode Island Republican primary campaign against a conservative challenger, Bush in private is furious over betrayal by the maverick Republican. Chafee's fellow GOP senators believe that if he were re-elected, he would have permitted Bolton's name to go to the Senate floor. Quirky to the end, Chafee says the Democratic election victory is reason to block Bolton.

"It was a travesty," Republican Sen. Norm Coleman, in describing Bolton's demise, told me. "Bipartisanship is a two-way street." Coleman, who as chairman of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations probed U.N. corruption, believes Bolton "was the best" of Bush's U.N. ambassadors.

Now Coleman loses his chairmanship, and Bolton is gone. No wonder U.N. Deputy Secretary General Mark Malloch Brown, a Briton who brazenly has interfered in U.S. politics, was caught smiling at Turtle Bay this week.

( To find out more about Robert D. Novak and read his past columns, visit the Creators Syndicate web page.)

Copyright 2006, Creators Syndicate, Inc.

Adios Bolton, we don't need jerks like you in positions of power.

Talking Never Brings Peace, Madam Albright

December 7, 2006

BEGIN TRANSCRIPT

RUSH: Madam Albright has weighed in, once again perfectly happy and proud to display her ignorance about all of this to the world. She was on Larry King Alive last night and King said, "Do you think this administration will sit down with Iran and Syria?"

ALBRIGHT: You have to talk to your enemies. You make peace with your enemies, not with your friends, and --

RUSH: Stop the tape! You don't make peace with your enemies, you defeat them, madam. Madam Albright's definition of peace is the thing we have now with North Korea. A whole lot of talking with North Korea, Jimmy Carter went over there. Madam Albright herself went over there, sat down with this little wacko, this little pervert and pot-bellied, dog-eating dictator and wanted peace. They're testing nukes, they're trying to. But we've got peace. Cue this up to the top, Mike, if you will. You don't have peace with your enemy. When you make peace is after you have defeated them, and at such time as you have dominion over them and you read them the riot act. You give them the rules and say, here's what it is from now on. That's how it used to work and that's what led to peace. Peace always follows victory. It doesn't come from smoking a pipe, sitting down and jawing or talking and sharing stories with perverts about their favorite cognac or any of that, it comes from defeating your enemies. All right, I'll play now the whole Madam Albright bite without interrupting it.

ALBRIGHT: You have to talk to your enemies. You make peace with your enemies, not with your friends. And there is no question that both Iran and Syria, especially Iran, has a great deal of influence in the region. So I do hope that they consider talking with Iranians and Syrians. It does not have to be in a one-on-one as has been pointed out, but I do think they need to be brought into the process.


RUSH: What do you mean, one-on-one? Brought into the process? They are in the process! You know what these people are talking about -- go back to the early thing she said. You make peace with your enemies, not with your friends, and there was no question that both Iran and Syria, especially Iran, a great deal of influence in the region. What have we been doing? We've been selling out our friends. You sell out your friends; you make peace with the enemies. Thank you, Democrats and liberals, because that's your definition of peace. Make peace with the enemy, meaning appease them, sell out your friends. Hello, Israel. We'll be happy to sell you out if we can make ourselves look good in this Iraq mess, and we hope that Syria and Iran will help us to look good while we sell you out. Thank you, Madam Albright. You have crystallized for all of us exactly how liberals look at all of this. Rick Santorum gave his, I guess, farewell address on the floor of the Senate last night. We have a couple of bites. Here's the first.

SANTORUM: When we did, this year, this summer, attempt to negotiate with Iran, we told the people of Iran that we are not on their side, that we want to make deals with people who oppress them, who torture them, who enslave them, who abuse them, and who kill them. That's why we should not have entered into any negotiations in spite of the entreaties of Europe with this evil regime in Iran. We should confront them and only confront them.

RUSH: He continued with these remarks.

SANTORUM: This is the call of this generation. This is America's hour. This is the hour that we need to leadership, Churchillian leadership, who had a keen eye for the enemy and a resolve, in spite of the political climate, to confront it. I ask my colleagues to stand and make this America's finest hour.

RUSH: Fat chance.

SANTORUM: I regret that the new secretary of defense is not up to the task, in my opinion.
RUSH: Ooooh, farewell address, drops a bomb, floor of the Senate.


END TRANSCRIPT