From
ABC News:
John R. Bolton planned to ask then-CIA Director George Tenet to help punish a government intelligence analyst who disagreed with Bolton, and then misled a Senate committee about the matter, says a Democratic draft report obtained by The Associated Press.
Bolton pushed for months to have the analyst removed from his job or otherwise disciplined, but testified under oath at his confirmation hearing to be United Nations ambassador that he "made no effort to have discipline imposed" on the man, the report said.
"Bolton's effort to minimize the significance of his efforts is disingenuous," said the report from Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
More below..
His name was Fulton Armstrong, a CIA employee who was the government's leading analyst on Latin America with the National Intelligence Council, though this information is officially unacknowledged, per ABC.
This time, Bolton went directly to Tenet to get action on Armstrong. And as with Westermann, nothing happened.
As yet unreleased emails and other documentation the Senate Dems reportedly have will demonstrate that Bolton has been deceptive in his committee testimony.
Democrats allege Bolton would not take no for an answer when the analysts dissented from policy positions he wanted to take. Their report includes allegations about three analysts, at least one of whom was interviewed by the committee.
In the Armstrong case, the report refers to e-mails and other documents that have not been made public. One e-mail indicated Bolton worked for some time to get Armstrong transferred, an outcome that Democrats say would have been a huge black mark on the analyst's career.
An e-mail provided to the committee "indicates that Mr. Bolton had lost patience with the delay in seeking the removal of the (analyst) and that he did not 'want it to slip away further,'" the report said.
The report said Bolton's office spent four months working on letters that Bolton and another top State Department official would send to CIA officials to try to get Armstrong pushed out. The report does not say whether the letters were ever sent.
I don't have any delusions that this information will sway many GOP votes, except possibly nudge Voinovich and Chaffee, who are probably leaning against Bolton anyway.
But hopefully this information will clarify the head count and make it clear that a filibuster will make Bolton DOA.
...unless of course now Frist is dropping the "judicial" qualifier from his nuclear threat.
