Rdtf
CNO
Joined: 13 May 2004
Posts: 2209
Location: BUSHville
|
 Posted: Mon Apr 18, 2005 6:29 pm Post subject: New Bolton Accuser Is a Liberal From 'Mothers Opposing Bush |
 |
|
http://www.nysun.com/article/12353
| Quote: | New Bolton Accuser Is a Liberal From 'Mothers Opposing Bush'
BY ELI LAKE - Staff Reporter of the Sun
April 18, 2005
WASHINGTON - The latest accusations of abuse aimed at the president's nominee to be America's ambassador to the United Nations come from a self-described "liberal Democrat" who in 2004 helped organize the Dallas chapter of "Mothers Opposing Bush."
The woman, Melody Townsel, alleged that John Bolton chased her through the halls of a Moscow hotel throwing objects and screaming threats at her in August 1994, according to a letter circulated Saturday by the spokesman for the ranking Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Senator Biden of Delaware.
The committee is scheduled to vote tomorrow on Mr. Bolton's nomination. Until this week, the panel's vote appeared likely to be split along party lines, assuring that the nomination would be forwarded to the Senate floor by a 10-to-8 margin.
But over the weekend, the support of one key Republican who was in Mr. Bolton's camp last week appeared to be wavering. On CNN yesterday, Senator Hagel, a Republican of Nebraska, said at this point he would vote for Mr. Bolton but added, "I have been troubled with more and more allegations, revelations, coming about his style, his method of operation." In the interview, Mr. Hagel, a member of the Senate committee, referred to the letter from Ms. Townsel as one of those recent allegations.
In an interview yesterday, Ms. Townsel said she sent a letter on April 8 to all 18 members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee through the panel's Web site, detailing an incident more than 10 years earlier when she was working as a subcontractor for USAID through a contract in Kyrgyzstan. At the time, Mr. Bolton was a lawyer representing Black, Manafort, Stone & Kelly, the firm that hired Ms. Townsel's company to publicize privatization projects in the Central Asian country. Ms. Townsel complained about Black, Manafort to USAID, and Mr. Bolton was hired to represent them.
According to Ms. Townsel, Mr. Bolton went to great lengths to harass her. "For nearly two weeks, while I awaited fresh direction from my company and from USAID, John Bolton hounded me in such an appalling way that I eventually retreated to my hotel room and stayed there. Mr. Bolton, of course, then routinely visited me there to pound on the door and shout threats," the letter said.
Mr. Bolton's chief of staff, Fred Fleitz did not return an e-mail asking for comment.
In the interview yesterday, Ms. Townsel said, "There is no question that I have been a vocal and outspoken critic of this administration and I am a very liberal Democrat. But it is equally no secret that I had a run-in with John Bolton."
When asked why she did not make this matter public in 2001, when Mr. Bolton's nomination for his current post as undersecretary of state was being considered by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, she said that at the time she had retreated from politics and was raising young children.
She also said there were no other eyewitnesses to what in the letter she said was a pattern of abusive behavior, but that others working on the project were familiar with her account.
"There were people aware of the harassment, but they are not willing to come forward because they have existing business with the government," she said.
Ms. Townsel's allegations appeared over the weekend in the Los Angeles Times, the Houston Chronicle, and numerous Democratic-leaning Web sites, such as Daily Kos and The American Prospect's web log, Tapped.
"My story seems to track so closely with other people," she said. "I really thought this would be a small log on the fire, I did not think it would be this big. Nothing in my story is all that out of track with the other stories out there." She also said she was contacted on Friday by the minority counsel of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
In the last two weeks, the panel's Democrats have investigated three cases of Mr. Bolton's alleged intimidation of lower-level staffers. So far, the committee has looked into allegations involving a State Department analyst, Christian Westermann; a national intelligence officer for Latin America, Fulton Armstrong; and a State Department nonproliferation analyst, Rexon Ryu. Mr. Ryu is now on Mr. Hagel's staff.
To the minority party, the allegations are part of a pattern they say proves Mr. Bolton sought to use his bureaucratic power to punish employees who disagreed with him. In a statement released last week, the second-ranking Democrat in the Senate, Richard Durbin of Illinois, issued a statement that said, "The Senate Foreign Relations Committee has explored the charges that Undersecretary of State Bolton abused the intelligence process by seeking to have those who dared to dissent removed. I find these charges to be disturbing especially since we will be living with the consequences of poor intelligence and unfounded allegations regarding Iraqi weapons of mass destruction for years to come."
During a hearing last Monday, Mr. Bolton was only queried about Mr. Westermann, whom he said he sought to have stripped of his portfolio because he followed an improper procedure in vetting language for a May 2002 speech on the proliferation activities of rogue states. Mr. Westermann, according to Mr. Bolton and his chief of staff, Fred Fleitz, was asked to clear classified material with the CIA, not to offer his own take.
Yesterday on "Fox News Sunday," the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Richard Lugar of Indiana, said, "I do not believe that the judgments of members of the committee, even if there are additional facts or persons coming forward, are likely to change." He said he planned to move forward with his plans to call for a vote on the nomination hearing.
On the same program, Mr. Biden said the panel's Democrats had not yet decided whether they were going to demand more hearings on the nomination and were awaiting responses to more questions to Mr. Bolton. |
|
|
FAQ
Search
Memberlist
Usergroups
Register
Profile
Log in to check your private messages
Log in
