Opinion: First Rummy, now the dummy?

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Fresh off the departure of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, it looks like President Bush’s second most boneheaded appointee is about to vanish in a sulphurous cloud as well. In a last-ditch attempt to save his unpopular U.N. ambassador, Bush resubmitted John Bolton’s nomination to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee today. The committee makes the decision whether to submit the confirmation to the full Senate for a vote, and its incoming chair, Democrat Joe Biden of Delaware, despises Bolton. Bush had hoped to get the confirmation through now while he still has a friendly Senate, but outgoing Sen. Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island is having none of it. That means Bolton will soon join Rumsfeld in opting to spend more time with his family.

Bolton hasn’t been a total failure. There have been a few important U.N reforms under his tenure, but most of them have come despite Bolton rather than because of him. His hamfisted attempts to bully other nations into accepting U.S. policy goals and the American vision of the proper U.N. structure have alienated our allies, while turning what was already a big gap in trust between rich northern nations and poor southern ones into a yawning chasm. Diplomacy is better practiced by diplomats than by table pounders, something Bush should keep in mind in the search for Bolton’s replacement.