For those that do not know, today the Senate Foreign Relations Committee has begun hearings on whether to pass the nomination of John Bolton for the position of Ambassador to the UN, to the full Senate for a vote.

Since I am a political geek, I have been watching the hearings replay on C-SPAN all night. So I must keep this short, as I am still watching it. This is a VERY important issue. For those who are not familiar with John Bolton, and the position that he is nominated for, take a look at this link to an earlier blog post.

It has come to light that the nominee MAY, have tried to have two intelligence analysts removed because he disagreed with their intelligence analysis.

Bolton Faces Opposition from Government Officials

"President George Bush's controversial choice for America's ambassador to the UN faces possible rejection at Senate confirmation hearings next week as Democrats explore allegations that he bullied US officials into supporting Washington's foreign policy positions.

...Democrats on the committee who oppose him began researching claims that Mr Bolton may have more than once pressured officials at the State Department to support administration views on Iraq and other issues."

This is extremely upsetting to me, at a time when there have been serious questions about how this administration possibly distorted intelligence on Iraq's WMD, that this man who possibly has bullied intelligence analysts into changing their assessments, would be nominated to the U.N., not to mention his obvious disdain for the U.N. as well.

"Among those accusing Mr Bolton is Carl Ford, a former chief at the department's bureau of intelligence. He is expected to tell the committee that Mr Bolton distorted intelligence gathered on Iraq's weapons programmes and other matters to make it fit the administration's goals.

Senators will also hear allegations made by another State Department official, Christian Westermann, that Mr Bolton ignored his advice that testimony he was about to make to Congress two years ago warning that Cuba was developing biological weapons went beyond available evidence."

If these accusations are true, it is DEEPLY disturbing that this president would nominate someone like this to head the U.N..

That's all I have to say at the moment, I am going to go back to watching this hearing.