In case you need convincing

Just bumped across a June article in Slate that I bookmarked in case anybody needed convincing that John Bolton was a bad choice for U.N. ambassador, and it seems timely again in light of this week's recess appointment (simultaneous nose-thumbing at both international and domestic communities).

Nominating John Bolton as ambassador to the United Nations is a little like nominating Jeffrey Dahmer for surgeon general.

heh. Beyond the snark, there's lots of good, if now rather depressing, analysis.

It's not enough to seek allies when suddenly some multilateral project is really important to you; you have to have built alliances by helping allies on projects that are important to them. Building international support, like building social support, is a long-term project, best left in the hands of people who understand this.

There are a lot of basic aspects of national and international functioning that our current leaders appear not to understand. Sigh. The clean-up could take generations...

(originally via kos)