The AP is confirming that Lincoln Chafee is effectively killing the Bush Admin's "in your face" re-nomination of John Bolton to be our rep to the UN.
One has to wonder what "spirit of cooperation" an un-bowed Bush means when he meets with Pelosi, talks to the press, then 15 minutes later pushes his most divisive foreign policy nominee back up for confirmation?
Steven Clemons, on his
Washington Note runs down the timeline:
The President's and new Speaker's comments before the press started at 1:04 pm today and concluded at 1:08 pm.
At 1:22 pm, the White House sent John Bolton's controversial nomination to serve as US Ambassador to the United Nations back up to the Senate.
Luckily, Lincoln Chafee would have none of it -- suggesting that such a nomination is clearly not in the spirit of what happened electorally in this country this week. By 2:15 pm, Chafee put an end to the Bolton confirmation process by fomalizing his previous "informal" opposition to Bolton in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
For his part -- and bless him -- Sen. Chafee said, "The American people have spoken out against the president's agenda on a number of fronts, and presumably one of those is on foreign policy," Chafee said. "And at this late stage in my term, I'm not going to endorse something the American people have spoke out against." (AP)
As Biden said the other day, Bush is only going to learn by getting "HARSH DOSES OF REALITY, REPEATEDLY ADMINISTERED."