Are we going to get a recess appointment this morning?

Madhat:

Recess? Oh, are they going to let all the little theocrat third-graders out to play?

JF

I was going to ask the same thing Madhat. What time is the press conference?

never mind

Bush at his press conference just said Bolton would have the votes to be confirmed if he got an up-or-down vote.

He was also asked about the NSA documents. Bush says he views it as just another stall tactic.

No recess appointment this morning, apparently. Bush just called on the Senate to quit stalling and give Bolton an up-or-down vote.

This question doesn't belong on this thread, but...

Why did Frist vote angainst cloture on Thursday?

Appologies if this is a naive question.

Because one has to be on the winning side to ask for a motion for reconsideration to bring the issue up again.

Now, if it was Biden who voted for cloture after his impassioned plea against it, because some arcane Senate rules manuevering was required, the right-wing nut media, even Cheney, would exploit the public's ignorance of Senate rules and call Biden's sanity into question from sea to shining sea.

We just ain't got the super brazen chutzpah necessary to do the incessant bold-faced lying that has the American people bedazzled with befuddlement and loyal to their King.

Headlines

On May 26, 2005: Bolton loses! “Democrats Force Senate to Delay A Vote on
Bolton as ambassador to the United Nations.” (1)

On May 27, 2005: Bolton wins! “Month of Talks Fails to Bolster Nuclear Treaty.
No gain on proliferation.” (2)

Ever since becoming Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International
Security (sic) John Bolton has been weakening U.S. support for the nuclear
Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). For the man who never saw an arms control treaty that
he liked, what more challenging a target than the 1970 NPT? (3) After all the NPT had
survived the Cold War nuclear build-up, with MAD (Mutual Assured Destruction), and
still had representatives from the 188 signatory nations coming together for the May 2005
NPT Review Conference.

Crippling a major treaty, especially one that promises to prevent the destruction of
the earth by a nuclear holocaust, is no small accomplishment. One has to strategize.

Step 1: The secret 2001 “Nuclear Posture Review,” (4) was leaked to the press in
early 2002. This plan to create, test and use new nuclear weapons is antithetical to the
NPT bargain which committed the nuclear-weapons-nations (China, France, Russia,
United Kingdom and United States) to negotiate the elimination of their nuclear weapons
and non-nuclear-weapons-nations not to acquire such weapons.
The risky gamble paid off big time. The media failed to alert U.S. citizens.
Congress hardly noticed and continued to vote billions of dollars for the Defense Budget
which adequately funded Nuclear Posture Review projects. Already U.S. support for the
NPT was on the slippery slope.

Step 2: On June 13, 2002 President Bush withdrew United States from the
Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty (ABM), (5) a treaty that the rest of the world regarded as
basic to the whole arms control structure.
The U.S. Congress took no action to prevent this, even though at the 2000 NPT
Review Conference the Clinton administration had agreed to strengthen the ABM treaty.
(6)

Step 3: Bolton repudiated several more agreements accepted by the Clinton
administration at the close of the 2000 NPT Review Conference including
+ opposing ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty;
+ blocking negotiation of a nondiscriminatory, multilateral and verifiable treaty to ban
production of fissile material; and
+ not reaffirming the objective of general and complete nuclear disarmament under
effective international control. (7)

Step 4: Bolton refused to agree to an agenda for the 2005 NPT Review
Conference. (7) As a result the Conference wasted two weeks creating an agenda. (8)

Step 5: “In the end, conferees criticized, without naming them, the United States
for ignoring its commitments, and the other nations for failing to grapple with the Iran
and North Korea problems.” (2)
The non-aligned nations wanted to include references to the 1995 and 2000 NPT
Review Conferences consensus agreements, but the 2005 Final Document will not
include them. “To ignore, then renege, then deny commitments already reached in a
multilateral forum serves not only to undermine the NPT Treaty itself, nor just the review
process, but rather multilateralism itself.” (8)

If everyone accepts that somber conclusion, John Bolton will be very happy!

But wait a minute! Is President Bush happy too? Was Bolton a “loose cannon” or
was Bolton following orders? What about living up to solemn agreements? What about
“treaties being the law of the land” (9) ? Does United States respect the Rule of Law?
What will the Congress do now? Endorse this “law of the jungle” as practiced by the
Bush administration? Or should we call it the “law of the desert” ? Because that is what
the whole earth will be if nuclear weapons become the weapons of choice.

Which will it be? Nuclear proliferation or nuclear disarmament? American
citizens must decide.

Footnotes:
1. New York Times, 5/27/2005, p.A1.
2. New York Times, 5/28/2005, p.A1.
3.
4.
5.
6. “13 Practical StepsToward Nonproliferation” in Friends Committee on National
Legislation’s Washington Newsletter, May 2005, p.6.
7. Letter from 59 ex-diplomats to Senator Lugar, March 29, 2005.
8. Daily NGO Newsletter, News in Review, May 27,
2005.
9. U.S. Constitution, Article VI, paragraph 2.

Lee Brown, May 30, 2005
(608) 663-5984
360 West Washington Avenue, #807, Madison, WI 53703