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I thought I responded in post #33
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You did. My sincere apologies. I missed that response.
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I see no question of merit above. The question listed is of the nature "senator, when did you stop beating your wife"?
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When a senator beat his wife in the past, doesn't the question become valid? I stand by my question as valid.
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It is a poor question
if the beating of the wife is in dispute.
If you want to claim your opponents are not looking at the big picture, using a "when did you stop beating your wife" style question is not the way to do it. It is an empty rhetorical attack that should be ignored, or at best replied with "I have always looked at the big picture".
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It doesn't ask a question, but rather implies that people who disagree with you are not looking at the big picture. If it asks anything, it asks for people to agree with you that anyone disagreeing with you is wrong.
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The question was directly related to the OP. There is in fact a bigger picture. Our advesaries have used our division in this country to advance their agendas. So, I wonder what is being celebrated? We have taken a step in the wrong direction. Perhaps if the Democrats had been more diplomatic, they could have gotten Bolton to resign without the US taking a step in the wrong direction.
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The way you avoid division isn't "do it my way or else". You avoid division by
taking the positions and opinions of both sides into account.
If someone is putting forward the position "do it my way or else", the response of any free people with any self respect should be "I'll take else".
Anyone who says "we must all unite behind my ideology" is not to be trusted.
The President has the unilateral power to make temporary interm appointments, for the purpose of filling vacancies that the Senate doesn't have time to confirm. If he chooses to use this power irresponsibly,
it is the responsibility of the Senate to call him on it, and upbraid him for his abuse of power.
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Lack of detail in the question. As far as I can tell, the only way to answer this question is to provide an exaustive list of situations in which the you should be insulted personally, and when you shouldn't give a flying fuck.
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I agree here. I was thinking of the last time Bush addressed the UN, followed by the leaders of Iran and Venezuela. I don't care who the President is - those speeches were disrespectful in my view.
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Sure. On the other hand, when your head of state calls a nation "a member of the Axis of Evil", you should not expect politeness from their diplomats towards that head of state.
The Venezualian government seems to believe that the USA regularly overthrew democratically elected governments in Latin America over the last 100 years or so, and that the same thing could quite possibly happen to him. He sees, in the current US government, indications that it would be willing to do it again. As far as Venezualian government is concerned, the USA is the axis of evil, and the greatest threat to their security.
That is what happens when one's government is willing to invade other nations on false pretenses. Nobody can trust the government to leave them alone, and you will be viewed as an imperialist war monger of a nation.
If the problem with the UN is that "people attack the USA for using false pretenses in invading other nations", and the problem with the US congress is that "members attack the President for using false pretenses to invade other nations"... Does the US Congress need be reformed just like the UN needs to be reformed?
Is the UN perfect? No. It was put together with the hope that the "Security Powers", with veto abilities, would use their military might to guarantee the borders of every nation in the UN. The Cold War -- a cold battle between two of the security powers -- ruined any hope of this working in the short term.
Now that the cold war is over...
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eems like this point is hypocritcal if it comes comes someone critical of Bolton's stlye, because it is the same as Bolton's stlye. Bolton goes in and bluntly says what he thinks about the UN. Those opposed to Bolton go in and bluntly say what they think of him and how he was appointed.
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I'm not a diplomat. Just because I think a Professor shouldn't have sex with his undergrads doesn't mean I shouldn't have sex with his undergrads.
After insulting Bush and Bolton, I would think I would be a poor person to be placed in a position to negotiate/laise with Bush and/or Bolton.
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Why yes. Bush took a step in the wrong direction by not seeking the advice and consent of the Senate into account, and instead repeatedly relying on out-of-session appointment. This made his appointments provisional, not final. Appointing someone to the UN who has been quoted as saying the UN should be dismantled should not be done without the advice and consent of the Senate, because the Senate is well within it's rights to view such an appointment as temporary, and the end-run as an abuse of Presidential power.
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Open to the possibility that some in the Senate were paying political games with the appointment?
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Sure, some people will be playing political games. Open to the possibility that the President plays political games with the choice of his appointees? Open to the possibility that Bolton was central in an organization that generated biased intelligence to decieve the American public about Saddam's WMD programs? Open to the possibility that Bolton signed multiple documents pre-9/11 putting forward American Imperialist strategies to conquor Iraq for the then-professed purpose of oil security? Open to the possibility that Eisenhower was right in his farewell address, and we possibly have run into the very trap he warned the USA about?
(Eisenhower, President and General. Re-armed the USA following WW2 in response to Russian buildups and aquisition of nukes.)
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It would be equally stupid for the Senate or Congress to make major policy decisions that the President has veto power over without consulting the President. Ie -- Congress declairing war with another nation without asking the President to agree to go along with it first.
Sheer idiocy and bad governance.
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This to me, seems to be a naive veiw given the adjectives used and the absolute nature of the statement.
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Clarify? I'm saying that, if you want to have a united face to the world, you don't skip the consultation phase.
If you skip the consultation phase, you are doing so at the price of having a united face to the world.
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Bush, at that time, would have gotten the same response from Democrats regardless of who he nominated. Sure I can't prove it, but you have to agree that Bolton was in step with Bush and odds are if he nominated someone else in-step with his view he would have received the same sophomoric response from the Democrats.
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In the interests of reducing political division, could he not have comprimised, and picked someone who would have enough support in the Senate to gain Congressional support?
Or is the kind of "lack of division" actually "do whatever the President says"?
The President is the commander and chief of the US military forces. The President is not the commander and chief of the Senate, or the House, or the American people.
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I am not aware of the past "issues" concerning Bolton.
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John Bolton was Undersecretary of State for Arms Control.
He blocked OPCW from negotiating with Iraq about Chemical Weapons inspections by getting the head of the organization fired.
Thielmann, Bolton's daily intelligence liason from INR:
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Bolton seemed troubled because INR was not telling him what he wanted to hear ... I was intercepted at the door of his office and told, 'The Undersecretary doesn't need you to attend this meeting anymore.
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According to current and former coworkers, Bolton withheld information that ran counter to his goals from Secretary of State Colin Powell on multiple occasions, and from Powell's successor Condoleezza Rice on at least one occasion
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...2005Apr17.html
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Bolton attempted to have the chief bioweapons analyst in the State Department's bureau of intelligence and research and the CIA's national intelligence officer for Latin America reassigned. Under oath at his Senate hearings for confirmation as Ambassador, he denied trying to have the men fired, but seven intelligence officials contradicted him.
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http://www.alternet.org/columnists/story/21841/
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Bolton is alleged by Democratic Congressman Henry Waxman to have played a role in encouraging the inclusion of statement that British Intelligence had determined Iraq attempted to procure yellowcake uranium from Niger in President Bush's 2003 State of the Union Address. These statements were claimed by critics of the President to be partly based on documents later found to be forged. Waxman's allegations have no visible means of support as they are based on classified documents.
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http://www.democrats.reform.house.go...2122-90349.pdf