Gold Star to Voinovich
Kudos to a gutsy senator willing to buck his own party. Ohio Republican George Voinovich, who sits on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has indicated he will vote against the Bolton nomination for UN ambassador. In calling Bolton "the poster child of what someone in the diplomatic corps should not be," Voinovich's decision means the full Senate will vote on the nomination without an actual recommendation from the Foreign Relations Committee.
The New York Times reports:
"The committee had been expected to endorse Mr. Bolton today, 10 to 8, along party lines. But as the session began, Mr. Voinovich signaled that he would not vote to endorse him. And in a corridor during a break a short time later, he said he would vote against him when the full Senate took up the nomination.
"There are 55 Republicans in the Senate, so Mr. Bolton would win confirmation if all except Mr. Voinovich remained loyal to Mr. Bolton and, by extension, President Bush. But three other Republicans on the committee have also expressed reservations about the nominee.
"Needing a simple majority, Mr. Bolton could win confirmation with as few as 50 votes, since Vice President Dick Cheney would then break the tie in favor of the White House."
That ain't easy, especially when you know the White House, sensitive to any chinks in the armor, undoubtedly has executed a full court press on behalf of the Yosemite Sam-lookalike. After all, Rhode Island Sen. Lincoln Chaffee, another moderate Republick'n on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee who had expressed misgivings about Bolton, caved to the pressure; and the nomination is likely to win approval, so it must be a rather lonely spot for a GOP senator who knows he is losing significant political stroke with the leadership of his own party.
posted by Chase McInerney @ 12:52 PM
1 comments
1 Comments:
Finally, something as an Ohioan to be proud of. Our state legislature is a mess--run now by less college-educated people than it was 40 years ago. Our governor was named one of the worst in the nation. And in Cleveland -- which has the potential to be a thriving bio-industry city -- there is no vision, only a leadership chasm deep enough to drain Lake Erie. Ohio, I'm afraid, has only its Glory Days to cling to. Voinovich, for those of you who don't know, cleaned up Cleveland's mess as mayor following the havoc caused by then-boy Mayor Dennis Kucinich. Afteward, Voinovich cleaned up the state budget as Governor. He maintains his moderate republicanism in an age that seems only to represent the different ends of a political teeter totter. I don't always agree with his agenda, but I respect his consistency. During the 1980s, for example, he opposed Ohio's lottery...and now, for the same reasons, he is opposing the Cleveland mayor's push to bring casinos to town. Today, as part of the Bush team's military reconfiguration, Cleveland lost 1,200 good jobs (white-collar jobs...people who handled all military benefits). In recent weeks, Cleveland's Nasa-Glenn Research Center not only learned it would lose 700 existing jobs, it also found out it was passed over for for a new facility that would have created 400 to 600 jobs. Could there be a connection? Who knows, but the Republican party has been running attack ads against Voinovich in his own district. Yikes. So as you cheer for Voinovich, keep Cleveland in mind. We may be paying a price for all of you who oppose Bolton.
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