John Bolton's Flaw: Loyalty to the President

The editors at National Review have written a good piece which accurately describes the incredibly weak charges that the Dems have thrown at U.N. Ambassador nominee John Bolton, and have equally accurately described the real problem the Dems have with Bolton: he's loyal to Bush. For some reason Republican presidents are required (by the Dems) to appoint people to senior positions who disagree with them and oppose their views. We heard the same arguments when Condi was nominate - she was "too loyal" to the president and wouldn't challenge his policies.

Of course, this was never a requirement for Dem presidents; they can have whoever they like in senior positions, the more loyal the better. Bottom line: Opposing the president = good; supporting the president = bad. National Review sums it up this way:

Once all the nonsense is stripped away we are left with this: Democrats oppose Bolton because he loyally served President Bush in his current job and will continue to do so at the U.N., unapologetically seeking to reform the world body and, to the extent possible, push it into serving U.S. interests. We can't believe that the Senate Foreign Relations Committee's Republican weak sisters — Voinovich, Lincoln Chafee, and Chuck Hagel — will, at the end of the day, say that Bush cannot have the nominee he wants at the U.N., especially one whose manner (blunt) the president has compared to his own. This has been a vexing process and one deeply unfair to John Bolton. The sooner he is confirmed, the sooner he can begin to make some good of it at Turtle Bay.

The vote comes up this week and my predition is he'll finally be passed out of committee and after a raucus floor debate, will be confirmed.