http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=stor.../un_ambassador

It'll be interesting to see what the fallout is, if any.

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Man up.

Senate?? We don't need no stinkin'senate!


Thanks for the news, Raytri.
PolFor rocks! Interesting news bits plus good entertainment value

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"When I'm in command, every mission is a suicide mission!" -Capt. Zapp Branigan
The United Church of the Latter Day Tangential Tarts

I believe that should be "steenkin' Senate."

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Man up.

"Under the Constitution, a recess appointment during the lawmakers' August break would last until a newly elected Congress takes office in January 2007."

Under the Constitution...

I believe that says it all.

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"Victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory however long and hard the road may be; for without victory, there is no survival."
Winston Churchill

The role of the Senate is advice and consent. The Senate failed. The Senate failed in doing their Constitution duty to bring Bolton to a vote. That is their job. They didn't do it. If you wish to place blame on anyone, it is the Senate.

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"Victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory however long and hard the road may be; for without victory, there is no survival."
Winston Churchill

No, that says it's legal. It doesn't say there won't be fallout from Senators irritated at being bypassed.

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Man up.

"...Senators irritated at being bypassed."

They weren't bypassed!!!! They simply failed to do their job!!!

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"Victory at all costs, victory in spite of all terror, victory however long and hard the road may be; for without victory, there is no survival."
Winston Churchill

I'm sure you said the same thing when the Republican Congress held up Clinton's judicial nominees for years.

The Senate has the power to approve the President's choices. Nowhere in the Constitution does it spell out how to do that, or how long it should take. The answers to those questions are up to the Senate. If Bolton does not have enough support to get confirmed, then the Senate, is, in fact, doing its job; they're just not doing it the way the administration would like.

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Man up.

The Senate's job is to confirm or deny the president's nominees and the decision should take place in a reasonable amount of time. If the Senate refuses to do its job, then it is perfectly appropriate for the president to use recess appointments to fill positions.

The power of a president to make a nomination means nothing if the senate, in whole or in part, can place that nomination in a perpetual holding pattern.

It has always been wrong, it is wrong now, and it will be wrong in the future.

The senate has an absolute duty to give every presidental nominee an up or down vote. No legitimate argument can be made to the contrary.

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"George W. Bush surrounds himself with smart people the way a hole surrounds itself with a donut." —Dennis Miller

I don't disagree that in general nominations deserve an up-or-down vote.

But the framers left the details to politics. If the Senate wants to have rules that let a minority tie it into knots, that's the Senate's right. It's not abuse of power if senators then take advantage of those rules.

The Senate has the right to let nominations languish, at whatever political and practical cost that brings. The president has the right to make recess appointments, at whatever political and practical cost that brings.

I think there is a place for the filibuster, to prevent a simple majority of senators from enacting a radical agenda. I think it has more place in the discussion about judges, who are appointed for life, than it does for ambassadors, who serve at the pleasure of the president.

I just wish, for instance, that criticism of those who oppose the Bolton nomination would center around "the information you seek is not a valid reason for holding up the nomination" instead of "radical senators are destroying the very fabric of the Republic." Likewise, criticism of Bush's recess appointment should center around the political fallout of snubbing the Senate, rather than "an endrun around the Constitution and the legislative process."

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Man up.