Wednesday, July 26, 2006
Bolton’s Bubble: U.N. Ambassador Skips All Security Council Foreign Travel
Well, I think that’s why it’s so important to work not only in New York…but to work in capitals as well. It is the phenomenon that sitting up there at Turtle Bay, that you operate in a little bit of a bubble. …
So that’s why this effort, I think, really does require a lot of attention not just in New York. If we left it only in New York I think we’d have the bubble problem and trying to break through that bubble should be one of our main diplomatic efforts.
According to the U.N. Security Council (UNSC), there have been four UNSC trips since Bolton was recess appointed as ambassador in Aug. 2005 — to Central Africa, Ethiopia and Eritrea, Chad and Sudan, and to the Congo. He did not attend any of them.
In early June, Bolton passed up the delegation trip to Sudan because he had a “full platter here.” In reality, Bolton was giving a lecture at the Centre for Policy Studies, a right-wing think tank in London.
ThinkProgress repeatedly attempted to confirm Bolton’s foreign travel with his spokesman, Rick Grenell. Grenell insisted we were “wrong” — that in fact Bolton had attended UNSC trips — but refused to say where Bolton went with the UNSC. Grenell also told us if we publicized the fact that Bolton had not attended UNSC trips “we’ll just blast you out of the water.” ThinkProgress also sent an e-mail to Bolton’s press office with our request, but have not yet received a response.
Bolton’s confirmation hearing is tomorrow. Maybe a Senator could ask him about his foreign travel and Bolton could blast us out of the water himself.
