Bolton Vote on Sept 7th

[TayTay]

Just saw this on the SFRC site:

Business Meeting
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HEARING
before the

COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN RELATIONS
UNITED STATES SENATE
ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION

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Thursday, September 7, 2006

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Time: 9:30 AM
Place: 419 Dirksen Senate Office Building
Presiding: Senator Lugar

The Committee will consider and vote on the following agenda items:

Treaty:

Extradition Treaty Between the United States of
America and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and
Northern Ireland (Treaty Doc. 108-23)
Nominations:

The Honorable Richard E. Hoagland
To be Ambassador to the Republic of Armenia

The Honorable John R. Bolton
To be U.S. Representative to the United Nations with
rank of Ambassador and U.S. Representative to the
United Nations Security Council and U.S.
Representative to Sessions of the United Nations
General Assembly during his tenure of service as
U.S. Representative to the United Nations

[ProSense]

1. Thanks for posting!

I hope Bolten goes down!

[wisteria]

2. Me too, but my guess is he will get through without much pain. n/t

[TayTay]

3. There are rumors about this

One says that the Dems are one vote shy of a filibuster on Bolton. One more damn reason to toss Holy Joe from the Senate. Geesh, how can anyone want an obviously rabid John Bolton (the Bastard) to represent the US in the UN. (Seriously, he is rabid. He caught rabies when Cheney bit him a while back. If ever anyone was rabid, it's Darth Cheney.)

Hey, I heard that both Senators from New York might vote FOR Bolton. Damn, first the Yankees sweep the Red Sox, now their Senators are straying way off the reservation. Sigh!

[wisteria]

4. I read that a while back. I wonder if we can light a fire under

Senator Clinton. Although with the showdown with Iran coming at the end of Th's month, I can not predict what will happen. If we are calm for the moment, I see more opposing his, if we are not in a calm state than many Dem's will vote to make him permanent.

[karynnj]

5. Even if we're not calm, Bolton can stay if rejected

until the beginning of the new Congress. So, it's not like he would have to leave immediately.

[wisteria]

6. Oh great, can his name continue to be resubmitted continually? n/t

[ProSense]

7. Failure On A Grand Scale Overseas (lots of developments)

Saturday :: Sep 2, 2006Failure On A Grand Scale Overseasby Steve Soto

Here are several items for Saturday of Labor Day weekend.

Iraq

A closer look at the Pentagon report released yesterday that Mary and I have referenced earlier shows that Iraqi casualties have spiraled upward by more than 50 percent since the al-Maliki government came into power. The situation has driven thousands of Sunni Arabs to move north and seek a new life and safety in Iraqi Kurdistan, which will eventually force the Kurds to raise the drawbridge and stop the rest of Iraq from moving north. Two items of interest are that the Kurds have ordered that the Iraqi flag be pulled down and replaced with the Kurdistan flag, and al-Maliki met with Grand Ayatollah al-Sistani today.

Snip...

Iran

The Russians and the rest of the EU say that they will not support sanctions at this time against Iran, and want more time for diplomacy to work, even as Iran asserts that it has a right to peaceful uses of nuclear energy, which it does. The Bush Administration, Great Britain, France, and perhaps Germany want to take a tougher line against Iran now, so there is an insurmountable split in the world community that was inevitable from the moment Bush invaded Iraq and rewarded India for breaking the NPT. If the French, British, and Germans want to play hardball with the Iranians so much, they should be required to put their troops into harm’s way in Iraq and replace our troops. For that matter, every GOP officeholder who agitates for a tougher line with Iran should send their military-age kids to Iraq as well, like House Intelligence committee chair Peter Hoekstra, who has three military age kids. The truth is that Iran is making slower progress than was anticipated, so as the New York Times noted today there is room to fashion a broad-based solution. But until the United States recognizes that 1) Bush squandered any chance to do something positive about Iran years ago; 2) Iran is a regional player that has just as much of a right to a nuclear program as India does; and 3) Iran must be brought into a regional solution for Iraq and isn’t a natural ally of Al Qaeda, we will make no constructive progress here.

Afghanistan

The United States says that Afghan opium production is out of control. Whose fault is that nimrods? With only 20,000 troops in Afghanistan, the US can do little to stop this trade or bring security to the country, especially when 10,000 of those troops are covering an area of 30,000 square miles in some of the most inaccessible terrain on earth. Hell, we can’t find Bin Laden after Bush let him get away at Tora Bora, so why does anyone think we are committed to Afghanistan? And our best friend in the war on terror Pervez Musharraf is busy cutting self-serving deals with Islamic separatists for truces which free up these forces to infiltrate back into Afghanistan to assist the Taliban and fight American and NATO forces.

http://www.theleftcoaster.com/archives/008623.php

Kurdistan president replaces Iraqi flag
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=2807526&mesg_id=2807526