Steve Clemons: “HARRY REID FINDS HIS GROOVE: SAYS TO WHITE HOUSE ‘NO DOCUMENTS, NO BOLTON’ — [T]he White House must concede on documents if it wants a Bolton vote.” (more below)
Laura at War & Piece: “The LA Times’ Mary Curtius on continued administration foot-dragging on Senators’ demands for documents on Bolton. And it appears that the White House is still two votes short for cloture.”
First, a nice summary on the latest Bolton news from Amy Goodman — she knows how to write it up, doesn’t she — at Democracy Now!:
Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid said yesterday that Democrats will not allow a vote on President Bush’s nominee for U.N. ambassador unless the White House hands over records of communications intercepts Bolton sought from the National Security Agency. Reid told CNN, “If they want John Bolton as ambassador to the United Nations, give us this information. If they don’t, there will be no Bolton.” Senators Joe Biden and Christopher Dodd have demanded the Bush administration produce ten National Security Agency communications intercepts that Bolton requested since 2001 as the State Department’s undersecretary for arms control.
More from Steve Clemons:
Supporting Bolton now has profound negative political consequences for a number of Senators.
Reid put the state of battle simply to the White House — which has been obstructing the process on getting Bolton documents since mid-April.
As reported by CNN:
“You can’t ignore the Senate. We’ve told them what we’ve wanted. The ball is in his court,” Reid, D-Nevada, told CNN. “If they want John Bolton as ambassador to the United Nations, give us this information. If they don’t, there will be no Bolton.”
The Senate fell four votes shy of the 60 needed to cut off debate on Bolton’s nomination in May after two Democrats on the Foreign Relations Committee urged their colleagues to hold the issue open.
Cheney’s wing of the White House could still potentially get Bolton to the United Nations despite the best efforts of this blog and others in this debate — but only if it concedes defeat on the evidence requests. Will the Cheney-Bolton wing concede? There is no evidence of it yet — and if this never happens, then Bolton hovers in purgatory for a long time.
The heavy-handed tactics the White House has used in the Bolton battle have weakened the resolve of moderate Republicans to support or push Bolton.
If the Dems stand strong — and slowly pick off Republicans — those opposed to Bolton will win an up-down vote.
We have the time to accomplish that now.
— Steve Clemons
My reaction: This is Bush stonewalling because he’s a spoiled child. This is Cheney stonewalling because the information in those docs tracks directly back to him and his secret, almost certainly illegal, activities within government and is likely more explosive even than the Downing Street minutes.
Time for a terra alert!!!
Those two are spoiled … nobody says no to them in their spheres.
Maybe a terror ATTACK might be best now. We’re being lulled to sleep by the alerts.
Oooh, Susan. Wash your mouth out with soap, little girl. I fear an attack not because of what an outside force would inflict on us but because of how it would be used by the maladministration.
Love the diary title. It makes me think of How Stella Got Her Groove Back.
Harry as our cool chick. Love it. 😉
LET ME BE THE FRIST TO SAY IT!
HARRY IS A HUNK!
Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
Know what else?
HOT HARRY would make a great president.
Susan wanders in a lonely circle carrying her “Give ‘Em Hell Harry for President.”
as a resident of a prime target city, who lives about about 30 blocks from a big hole in the ground, reading that just freaks me out.
But your larger point about the lulling effect of the alerts is dead on.
I’m sorry. But I was thinking what they might be thinking, as they plot diabolically.
I’m very vulnerable too… besides being near Seattle, we’re also very close to Bremerton, home to I-don’t-know-how-many nuclear submarines.
Every once in a while, we have to wait to cross the Hood Canal bridge while one of those all-black subs passes through (at surface).
No problem.
This reminds me of the irony of the last election: the thing I first noticed on Nov 3rd was that all three states (well 2+DC) affected by 9/11 all went to Kerry. Red states = no al-Qaeda targets there.
Oklahoma doesn’t count?
I almost typed “terrorist attacks” and qualified it with “al qaeda” specifically because of Ok.
As I said a few weeks ago, I think there has been a momentum shift — Republican unity on the hill doesn’t seem to be the quite the slam-dunk it was during the first Bush term <cough *lame duck* cough>.
Another thing: If Frist loses this vote, I think he’s done as majority leader.
I will never forget the look on Frist’s face when the “Gang of 14” did him in. Priceless.
And this:
The Consequence to Bill Frist’s Ambitions if He Loses Another Bolton Vote
Frist called for cloture on John Bolton’s confirmation vote because he thought he had the votes. They thought they were so in the clear that they did not need Arlen Specter on hand for the vote.
However, the next vote — when it occurs — will be much more deadly potentially for either of the losing sides of the Bolton Battle. …
[………………..]
This is no longer about Bolton. It is about Frist’s presidential chances — and whether he wants to gamble his national identity on win/loss records on judges or John Bolton. The White House is invested in Bolton; Frist is not.
The Dems and Republican moderates need to use that simple fact to their advantage in this stand-off.
Bill Frist — smart guy that he is — needs to learn quickly that his own political ambitions are best met if he wins most of these judges and then theatrically fights the fight on Bolton to the point where it won’t go further and lets Bolton languish for months in limbo, unresolved, stuck in Senatorial purgatory. . .with lots of other “internationalist” Republicans telling the White House that Bolton needs an alternative assignment.
Steve Clemons
Should be fun to watch.
Can’t wait. What’s the date?
If you mean the Bolton vote, I’m not sure there is one, yet. Any hill insiders registered whom we might ask to speculate on the timing of this? I’ll have C-SPAN2, a big bowl of popcorn and a six-pack of Franziskaner ready for that one.
Reid and the Dems are making me proud! I predict a loooong stalemate for this one–which I think would be counted as a win for us. Sweet.
Last I checked, CNN.com’s frontpage poll asking whether the Bolton issue is about “politics” or “principles” had “principles” winning, 70-30. Could people finally be beginning to distrust Bushco, and giving Dems the benefit of the doubt?
As fabulous as it would be to see Bolton go down in a floor vote with Republicans helping, it probably won’t happen. If the whip count is not good, Bush’s handlers will pull Bolton, like when they refused to have a vote on the second UN resolution on the Iraq invasion.
If they do pull the nomination, Democrats should demand that it go to an up-or-down vote, just as Bush wants for his judges.
Sorry to use this thread as kind of an open thread, Susan, but there’s not a recent one up… I don’t want to waste my right to post another diary entry today…
Mini-Rant: damn but this stuff pisses me off…
I refer you to today’s NYT article “Report Details F.B.I.’s Failure on 2 Hijackers” … All well and good and interesting info, but…
Hmmm…
Reporter Bluelight: “Thank you for the information finally Mr. Fine, but I have to ask, why now? Released one day after your bosses “Moe Bush” and “Curly Cheney” hit the campaign trail to promote support for the Patriot Act… Ya gotta admit this looks a little disingenuous… especially since the majority of the report is still redacted and there’s no new information… Our readers are gonna want to know…”
Fed to the MSM on a Friday to make the political talk shows over the weekend and bolster the arguments for increased Patriotic Action…
Kiss My Democratic Ass
Do you think we could get Harry onto this, too?
Ben Masel diaried this last night:
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2005/6/9/181142/1232
But the San Diego paper had a different take on it:
“According to a report released yesterday by the Justice Department’s Inspector General, the FBI office in San Diego erred by focusing too much on drug investigations before Sept. 11, 2001.”
hmmm. Did the NYT leave out the part that they were too busy with the drug prohibition to deal with terrorists?
I’ve had all of an hour in the last couple of days to read anything… maybe susan can delete it…
it’s cool .. this way, i found out about Ben’s diary, which I’d missed, since we were gone all day yesterday.
No worries. I’d read the whole thing and wasn’t quite sure it was the same! I had to go back and look. Things fly by so quick, it’s difficult to keep track sometimes.
It’s actually good to get the chance to reconnect the issues and this one bears repeating, especially if they’re ignoring or downplaying the drug war angle in the NYT.
no access to the CIA database, where all terrorist information was cached, at the time the terrorists
(who flew the plane into the Pentagon) were in San Diego taking flying lessons.
Looks like the Justice Department I.G. was hoping to pin this on the San Diego FBI field office, but the San Diego office ain’t takin it lying down.
Those horrible drugs are also the reason the Bush Administration gave the Taliban 40 million bucks back in May of 2001.
So, not only were they too busy with the Drug War to concentrate on terrorism, they supported terrorism as part of the Drug War!
I was a big skeptic at first, and didn’t like the idea of a pro-lifer from Nevada running our side of the Senate.
Boy was I wrong.