Bush Will Poison Roberts Battle By Installing Bolton Next Week

by Steve

Obviously, Condi Rice doesn’t have control over her own State Department spin machine, which can’t seem to keep from tripping over their own words.

John Bolton, President Bush's nominee for U.N. ambassador, mistakenly told Congress he had not been interviewed or testified in any investigation over the past five years, the State Department said Thursday.

Bolton was interviewed by the State Department inspector general as part of a joint investigation with the CIA into prewar Iraqi attempts to buy nuclear materials from Niger, State Department spokesman Noel Clay said.

The admission came hours after another State Department official said Bolton had correctly answered a Senate questionnaire when he wrote that he had not testified to a grand jury or been interviewed by investigators in any inquiry over the past five years.

"It seems unusual that Mr. Bolton would not remember his involvement in such a serious matter," said Sen. Joseph Biden of Delaware, the senior Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

"In my mind, this raises more questions that need to be answered. I hope President Bush will not make the mistake of recess appointing Mr. Bolton."

Well, guess what MBNA Joe?

President Bush may use a recess appointment early next week to install John Bolton as ambassador to the United Nations, two senior administration officials told CNN Thursday.

OK, bring it on. And don’t be surprised Mr. Bush if your action on Bolton imperils your “slam dunk” nomination of John Roberts to the Supreme Court also, especially now that it appears to many that the White House is hiding things about Roberts’ actions in the Reagan, Bush I, and 2000 Florida recount, and his real opinions about civil rights. And it was Ken Starr of all people who worked to undermine the exact claim of executive privilege that the Bush White House wants to use now to prevent the Democrats and the media from seeing what Roberts worked on for Poppy.

So if the Bush White House wants to poison the political environment in the capitol further with the Bolton recess appointment, then be prepared for an all-out fight on finding out what Roberts really thinks about civil rights, federal versus state powers, Roe v. Wade, as well as what he did as a conservative activist.