Scrutinizing the Bolton Nomination

Re “Where’s the Old Bolton When We Need Him?” Commentary, April 19: This is to assure Eric Posner and John Yoo that they need not worry about the softening of John Bolton, President Bush’s nominee to be U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. Bolton is who he is, not who he says he will be after he gets the job. This will come as a shock, but in politics people say whatever they think will get them the job.

Bolton, if confirmed, will be every bit the anti-ambassador he is cracked up to be.

Posner and Yoo discuss the failure of the U.N. in terms of being unable to keep the peace in Korea, India/Pakistan and Taiwan/ China, but no mention of America’s “success” in those missions.

They excoriate the U.N. for its absence in the effort to “remove Saddam Hussein.” Right again. The U.N. condemned the effort, and the organization was right. However, the war was not about removing Hussein; it was about obliterating his weapons of mass destruction. Remember those?

The whole world is in turmoil. Americans are reviled everywhere except in America. Posner and Yoo think what we need is more divisiveness? What does this philosophy serve? Not mankind, not our brave soldiers, not the planet, certainly not the future.

Michael Valente

San Clemente

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Predictably, The Times editorial board wants Bolton to “step aside” (editorial, April 20). The ludicrous attacks by frustrated State Department functionaries add up to no more than whining about someone pounding on a hotel door in 1994. This is bureaucratic guerrilla warfare brought to a high art. Sen. George Voinovich (R-Ohio) looks like a fool after missing the hearings and then allowing himself to be stampeded by the Democrat minority. Except I think it’s a put-up job. The voters in Ohio may consider a primary opponent for him one day. In the meantime, try to remember that President Bush won the election.

Michael Kennedy

Mission Viejo

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Bolton has remarked that it would make no difference if the U.N. lost its top 10 floors. Is not that statement a terrorist threat? Will Homeland Security investigate Bolton for making threats against the U.S.? Bolton’s nomination should be withdrawn and another name submitted for consideration. No doubt, the administration has an endless supply of neocons it can nominate to replace Bolton.

William Richardson

Van Nuys