Bolton, US ambassador to the UN?

Yoda · 02-06-2005 10:00pm #1

http://websrvr20.audiovideoweb.com/avwebdswebsrvr2143/news_video/boltonun_56k.mov

Quantum · 02-06-2005 10:09pm

Please post the substance of what you want to discuss and your opinions.... who has the time to analyse your link and guess at the point you are trying to make...?

daveirl · 02-06-2005 10:47pm

This post has been deleted.

dahamsta · 02-06-2005 11:05pm

daveirl wrote:

This post has been deleted.

I agree completely with Dave, and to demonstrate how well it would work I would like create a roughly equivalent situation by nominating Ian Paisley as a member of Sinn Féin.

adam

daveirl · 02-06-2005 11:11pm

This post has been deleted.

Yoda · 02-06-2005 11:15pm

Quantum wrote:

Please post the substance of what you want to discuss and your opinions.... who has the time to analyse your link and guess at the point you are trying to make...?

Give us a break, Quantum. The link was just to let some people on this community know just how creepy Mr B is.

Memnoch · 02-06-2005 11:28pm

an organisation can only be as good as it's members.

The problem with the UN is the security council, and the fact that the permenant members only consider the UN as a tool to further their ends. It's ridiculous and hypocritical that countries like america criticize the UN for being unable to effect real change, when they are one of the main reasons for the problem.

You want to reform the UN? I'm all for it. Make it a body with some REAL power that can hold all in the world accountable. Not just a forum where those with power can exercise it more efficiently.

America's problem with the UN is basically that it refused to endorse it's plundering and pillaging of Iraq. But off course they managed to push that through eventually.

dahamsta · 02-06-2005 11:44pm

daveirl wrote:

This post has been deleted.

<de niro mode>Are you talkin' to me?</de niro mode>

I doubt there are many people in the UN who don't believe it needs reform. The bossman certainly does. There's a difference between criticism and what Bolton does though, as you said yourself he's way over the top and he's not going to stop being way over the top.

I don't think the topic is whether or not Bolton is correct in (some of) his criticisms. I think the topic is what the hell is the point of him being involved. He's going to right the wrongs? Yeah, right.

adam

dathi1 · 03-06-2005 8:39am

Bolton along with his NeoCon Zionist mates are war criminals. The debates on his qualifucations for the UN job are a side show to this fact.

toiletduck · 03-06-2005 9:01am

dathi1 wrote:

Bolton along with his NeoCon Zionist mates are war criminals. The debates on his qualifucations for the UN job are a side show to this fact.

:rolleyes:

Anyways, i think it's perfectly logical for an administration that doesnt like the UN in its current form, to nominate a leading critic of that organisation.

toiletduck · 03-06-2005 9:04am

dahamsta wrote:

I agree completely with Dave, and to demonstrate how well it would work I would like create a roughly equivalent situation by nominating Ian Paisley as a member of Sinn Féin.

adam

i think a more apt analogy would be Robert Kilroy-Silke being elected to the European Paraliament!

Quantum · 03-06-2005 9:21am

Yoda wrote:

Give us a break, Quantum. The link was just to let some people on this community know just how creepy Mr B is.

i was only expressing my opinion. I just don't see the point in starting a completely new discussion thread - with a single web link and no comment, no description and no opinion on the contents of the link.
If you have nothing to say about it then how can you expect others to have anything to say ?

No sweat

Quantum · 03-06-2005 9:29am

daveirl wrote:

This post has been deleted.

The issue of Bolton's opposition to the UN structure etc is irrelevant and hasn't been the main bone of contention.

The reasons for the opposition to his appointment are his appalling attitude to his colleagues and to those working below him, his pressuring of intelligence people to change their reports to suit his own agenda, as well as his professed belief that the UN has no purpose and should be done away with.

His belief that the UN be a tool of the US is fair comment. The UN should be a tool of every nation that joins it. That's what it is there for. The US is entitled to fight it's corner in the UN as much as anyone else is.

His over the top criticism is a minor issue that he shares with many others around the world.

bonkey · 03-06-2005 9:58am

Quantum wrote:

The issue of Bolton's opposition to the UN structure etc is irrelevant
...
The reasons for the opposition to his appointment are ... as well as his professed belief that the UN has no purpose and should be done away with.

Aren't you contradicting yourself there? The opposition is, or is not, at least partly based on Bolton's own attitude towards the UN. You appear to be saying its both.

His belief that the UN be a tool of the US is fair comment. The UN should be a tool of every nation that joins it. That's what it is there for. The US is entitled to fight it's corner in the UN as much as anyone else is.

But I don't think thats what Bolton was saying. His attitude has struck me as being that the UN's purpose should be whatever the US wants it to be - that it would be a US tool, not an impartial or independant tool that all nations including the US could use.

His over the top criticism is a minor issue that he shares with many others around the world.

Its not a minor issue at all.

The appointment may be what Bush wants, but a lot of the Democrat opposition is based on the belief that Bolton's attitudes will prove counter-productive in the mid-to-long term, whereas Bush doesn't seem to be looking that far - he's apparently more interested in what happens during his term of office.

The scary stuff about how he treats people etc....suich allegations should invalidate the man from any position, not just the UN, if they were the issue. They're not. They are the ammunition to try and prevent him getting the position, but they're not the primary reason that Democrats put forward why he shouldn't be given the job.

Of course, its also possible that they've changed tehir position over time as more and more evidence has emerged about just what a saintly figure Mr. Bolton isn't, and that his practices have become the major issue.

jc

toiletduck · 03-06-2005 10:06am

bonkey wrote:

The scary stuff about how he treats people etc....suich allegations should invalidate the man from any position, not just the UN, if they were the issue.

what are these allegations you speak of?

bonkey · 03-06-2005 10:30am

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=bolton+allegations

The type of stuff that comes up from that.

More specifically: Bullying, up to the point of alleged physical violence (throwing objects at staff, if memory serves), would tend to be the main one.

There's also his apparent "Taiwangate" (google if you haven't heard of it), but whether or not thats a real issue, I'm not qualified to say. Basically (again from memory), the guy made pro-Taiwan depositions to the US government without revealing that he was effectively receiving monies from Taiwan to do so.

David Corn has gone on about him at length too, but I find Corn goes overboard on his one-sidedness, so I wouldn't know which stuff there is genuinely issue-worthy, and which stuff is just him finding any sorta imperfection and blowing it outta order.

jc

Bolton, US ambassador to the UN?

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