Bolton thrown out by US Senate

The US Senate, yesterday evening, refused to accept the "up-down" vote to confirm John Bolton as the US Ambassador to the UN. Cloture on his nomination debate was rejected 38 against, 54 for. It requires a minimum of 60 votes for cloture to be accepted. Since the Republican Senate Leader, Bill Frist, did not vote against cloture, as he did last time round, he cannot call for another cloture vote without going through the process of a few days.

This means that the White House malAdministration is intending to go to a recess appointment of John Bolton to the UN.

The reason for those in the Senate not voting for cloture was that the Bush malAdministration "refused to be transparent" with regard to the documents requested by the Senate regarding John Bolton!!

It was interesting to read what Bush had to say about John Bolton and the reason for his nomination to this post:

"The U.N. is an important organization and the American people, I think, will understand how important it is when the U.N. is reformed and is held to account. And so we want more accountability and transparency and less bureaucracy. And John Bolton will help to achieve that mission," he added.

I think it is now time to start thinking seriously about moving the UN to a more acceptable setting. Since the US has decided to withold funding and reduce it by 50% till the UN is treformed, the UN has to be sited at a location where it can balance its budget. This means it has to be located in a lower cost economy where every Euro spent will give more value.

This would also ensure that the US intrusion into the privacy of UN diplomats is ejected from the equation, allowing all world politicians to work more freely rather than under the "Big Brother" scenario, as at present.