The Unofficial John Kerry Blog: Kerry Critical of Bolton Nomination

Tuesday, March 08, 2005

Kerry Critical of Bolton Nomination

Kerry slashes Bush’s new UN pick; Reid offers more muted critique

In a release issued this afternoon, former presidential candidate Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) said President Bush’s nominee to be ambassador to the United Nations was “baggage we cannot afford,” RAW STORY has learned.

“I recognize John Bolton’s long service to our country, but this is just about the most inexplicable appointment the President could make to represent the United States to the world community,” Sen. Kerry will assert.

“If the President is serious about reaching out to the world, why would he choose someone who has expressed such disdain for working with our allies?” Kerry will tell the press. “Mr. Bolton once said ‘if the U.N. secretary building in New York lost 10 stories, it wouldn’t make a bit of difference.’ Mr. Bolton once celebrated our failure to win the U.N.’s support for the Iraq invasion as ‘further evidence to many why nothing more should be paid to the U.N. system.’ Now we’re supposed to believe he’s the right person to represent the United States at the United Nations?”

Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice defended Bolton’s record at a press conference Monday.

“The United States is committed to the success of the United Nations, and we view the U.N. as an important component of our diplomacy,” Rice said.

Kerry strongly disagrees.

“As under secretary of state for arms control and international security for the past four years, Mr. Bolton has achieved little in the way of either of these vital aims,” Kerry continues. “We secured more nuclear materials in the two years before September 11th than in the two years after. North Korea and Iran are burgeoning nuclear states. At this critical time in our history, he is not the best person to rally the world together in our common goals of defeating terrorism and making the world safer from the threat of weapons of mass destruction. ”

“Quite simply,” Kerry concludes, “Mr. Bolton’s nomination carries with it baggage we cannot afford.”