Just a Freelancer, or the Voice of the Administration's Id?

Former temporary US envoy to the UN John Bolton has used his post-envoy period to become a popular talking head, more so, oddly, in the UK even than here. That headhood reached an apotheosis Sunday when he was invited to speak to the Conservative Party conference. This is the British opposition party which never opposed Tony Blair's war policy, and is still trying to find its way out of its long-term electoral hole. Enter Bolton, to scare the horses, calling for limited military strikes on Iran to deal with its (purported) nukes as well as for regime change, to get rid of the "source of the problem, Ahmadinejad":

The US once had the capability to engineer the clandestine overthrow of governments. I wish we could get it back," he said.

In case any new people have recently wandered into the room, let's review those wonderful days gone by: the US overthrew at least three governments I remember, all three of them (how odd!) democratically elected: in Iran (things have gone so well there since then), Guatemala (ditto), and Chile. The latter regime change brought to power Gen. Pinochet, who recently died just as he was about to stand trial for the murder of thousands of his countrymen. Most spectacularly, one of those murders took place on the streets of our own capital. Yeah, I miss those kinds of balls, too.

Is Bolton just a wondrously goofy free-lancer? Or, in taking him semi-seriously, do the Brits perceive something we don't, that he's the unrestrained, uninhibited id of the Bush administration, wishing for what his brethren still in power are planning?

Longer view: what makes Bolton and his ilk so bizarre is that, on the one hand, they are the primary believers in American exceptionalism, the notion that something or somebody (God? Satan?) imbued this country with inherent moral good, so that we're immune to the evils and ills that plague all the other nations, no matter what we do (to argue otherwise, they say, is to engage in "moral relativism"). Yet, on the other hand, they most eagerly ignore those very elements -- painstakingly woven into the fundamental document of the nation by our founders -- that sought to keep this country from succumbing to the same ills -- meddling in the affairs of others, centralizing power in the executive -- that drove them to revolution, and to try to make this a nation apart..

But then, ids aren't supposed to be rational.

Comments

[unitron]

"...callin­g for limited military strikes on Iran to deal with its (purported) nukes as well as for regime change, to get rid of the "source of the problem, Ahmadineja­d..."

Isn't that like saying that the source of all that's wrong about the Bush administration is the Postmaster General or the Secretary of Agriculture?

Ahmadinejad doesn't run Iran, and I'm sure that Bolton knows it.

[LeoMarvin]

Harry,

I believe you accidentally ommitted Bolton's name after "UN" in the first sentence of your post.

[mrcontinental]

John Bolton, another Skull and Bones maniac. What do they do to these guys at Yale that makes them lose their minds 30 to 40 years down the road?

[lthuedk]

I didn't know that.

But the original sin may have been envisioned by Paul Wolfowitz.

http://www.light-to-dark.com/genocide_forgiven.html

[lthuedk]

File Bolton under treason, election 2000, and vast right wing conspiracy to overthrow the U.S. Government.

We kinda know him, and his unAmerican kind.

http://www.light-to-dark.com/the_third_act.html

[Senzasord]

For his advocacy of crimes against humanity perhaps Mr. Bolton would enjoy a bit of extraordinary rendition to some unnamed hell hole where he could be treated to the tortures of the damned he so richly deserves. Surely there is a blackwater counterpart that can arrange this.
Sauce for the goose...

[Troubledgoodangel]

There is no need to attack Iran. When Mr. Ahmadinejad is voted out of office (and Putin), the things will brighten up for the world! Remember France? It's better now under Sarkozy, isn't it? What needs to be done, in the meantime, is to build a huge "Radio Free Europe II" somewhere on Iran's border, and start beaming Democracy to them! Second thing to be done, is to offer Iran European Union membership in exchange for French-run safe nuclear power. Mr. Sarkozy could arrange that. Finally, we should demand that China take more responsibility than she has so far, and convince Mr. Putin to impose stiffer inspections in Iran. My feeling is that Mr. Ahmadinejad is a bad dream which, like all bad dreams, will pass away!

[BritPatJax]

Please don't be in any doubt that the average Brit would see Bolton as the epitome of the so called 'Ugly American'. How you guys could even allow him to be your UN representative is truly beyond me? I can only assume that Bolton was invited as 'cannon fodder' by the Conservatives? Just as I listen periodically to Hannity and Limbaugh, one needs to stay in touch to ascertain just how despicable they really are. Winston Churchill put it famously that it is sometimes better to have your adversary IN your tent peeing outwards than 'outside' your tent peeing inwards? Bolton is a dinosaur and America in the hands of the new breeds of leadership surely would not give this guy a station even in Outer Mongolia? Change, change and change guys?

[sk8sonice]

Don't forget we engineered the Russians out of Afghanistan to great effect and put Pervez atop a flagpole in Pakistan, put the Shah in place, tried to kill Castro and Khadaffi, aided the Contras, and spent 50 years keeping the strife just right between Yasir and Ariel. And got conservatives last month elected in France. Ahhh the good old days of covert moronic despotism. Now its overt.

[NewsNag]

Id makes sense. I'd like to see a picture of Bolton's face talking out of Bush's ass.

Lots, lots more US-engineered, funded, and armed coup d'etats. A few that come to mind are Brazil in 1964 or so with U.S. Navy poised just offshore, Indonesia in 1958 and the early 1960s, all of the Central American nations, some repeatedly, many of the South American nations (Bolivia as recently as the cocaine coup of the 1980s), various Caribbean nations, Greece in the 1950s and 1960s I think, funding guerilla insurgencies in Angola and elsewhere in Africa, etc.

I don't have time to go further, but all resulted in thousands, and in some cases hundreds of thousands killed. Most involved lists of "internal enemies" provided to the new junta by the local CIA minions, and these "enemies", who mostly were people working for democratic rule, ended up dead or fleeing. Our proud history.

Even in post-Yugoslavia, just when the newly de-Sovietized Yugoslavia was beginning to make up its mind what to do about its various nationalist regions, the U.S., along with Germany, France, and Britain, were encouraging secession by Germany's World War II ally Croatia, and some of the other provinces. So even the breakup of Yugoslavia into Serbia, was instigated and supported by the U.S. Funny but now a major brand new pipeline carries (or soon will be) central Asian oil through Kosovo, oil that formerly would have been directed through Russia, our old/new rival.

Bye.

[realitytrumpsbull]

Bolton's a programmed mandroid from Altair VI...

[backhandpath]

And does he dream of electric sheep?
If so...(I don't want to go there:)

Still since you brought it up, I had already began to wonder about the frighteningly prophetic story scenarios, previously laid out by certain Science Fiction authors, which describe our current American Dream (Nightmare) of shock doctrine--post 9/11, post criminal Flooding of New Orleans and throughout the current Iraq/Iran war without end.

Chiefly,
*Philip K. Dick [Blade Runner{Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?}, Through A Scanner Darkley, Penultimate Truth},
*George Orwell [1984]
*Richard Condon [Manchurian Candidate]
*William Gibson [Neuromancer Trilogy]
*Richard Hamilton [Greg Mandel series]
*Bruce Sterling [Heavy Weather, Karate Kid]
*Niel Stevenson [Cryptonomicon, Zodiac, Snow Crash]
{And last, but by no means least}
*Jules Verne [20,000 Leagues Under the Sea]

[disintaGreatNation]

Wonderful piece, Mr. Shearer. Thanks.

[Tunthelionman]

Bolton should be in line for the dock in the World Court in the Hague behind Bush, Cheney, Blair and the rest of the Stooges, Yesmen and Enablers that need to tried for War Crimes.

[parryisle]

How much success would the Neocons and their ilk have had if they were not accorded unlimited media access. Listening to Podorhoretz the elder on C-SPAN's Booknotes talking about "World War 4" when we haven't even finished with the one played major role in luring W. into. Our ship of state is likened to the problem the USS Caine had with a deranged captain on the bridge or the HMS Titanic streaming at a record setting pace through the icebergs.

[coloneblog]

Instead of giving Cheney/bush nutheads a forum for spewing their venom, how can we encourage the international courts to bring these crazy people up on charges of "crimes against humanity." Cheney, bush and their vicious accomplisis are not only poor examples for the human race, they are also a shameful embarrasment to America.

[hoopoe]

heartily agreed.

[TheIndependenceParty]

When Bolton's recess appointment could not be followed with the "up or down vote" so popular back then among the Reich, he was set free from the limitations of being our official ambassador to the UN, and became unofficial ambassador against the world. The diplomatic equivalent of Timothy McVeigh, he runs amok on our behalf saying and doing those things the American Empire Institute, Cheney, and Bush can not, or will not, say themselves.

For his part, Bolton seems happier, less constrained, a bit more manic, and, as long as they can continue to do the on camera interviews without the four-point leather restraints showing, ... his caretakers have said he can continue to make such appearances from his hospital room. They feel that these appearances are cathartic in some way, ... and might lead to a full and complete recovery over the long term.

We all wish him well, I feel certain.

[fuzzwald]

Ha ha! Thanks for a good piece of writing!

[backhandpath]

Yeah really. I wish I could swing it like 'dat.