Posted on 12/04/2016 7:20:37 AM PST by rktman
...... let us see how four candidates fare: Governor Mitt Romney, General David Petraeus, New York mayor Rudy Giuliani, and Ambassador John Bolton.
Romney, Petraeus, and Giuliani would not hit the ground running day one. By the time they are up to speed, more than likely several months later, State's career diplomats will have figured out how to maneuver around whatever changes might come their way. This would happen because the local team inherently has a field advantage over the visitors. As former U.N. ambassador, Bolton knows State as well as Mattis knows the Pentagon.
(Excerpt) Read more at americanthinker.com ...
Bolton defended himself recently from the ‘neocon’ charge by suggesting that President Trump would be better served by have a range of opinion from foreign policy advisors.
Bolton knows the State Dept. hierarchy and is well suited to change it...he also doesn’t present himself as a political rival to Trump like Romney would or Gen. Petraius might.
I’d be inclined to go with Ambassador Bolton over the other three names, although I’d like to hear more about the chairman of Exxon Mobil.
Talk about driving the final nail into the left’s screaming meemeies. That’d do it. Of course for the past 8 years we’ve been constantly reminded of what an idiot she must be by the radical alt-left extremists.
All of that matters, but it’s much more basic than that. The fact that he is a convicted criminal probably explains almost every other flaw in his track record.
She’s been out of the public sector for a long time, and her family situation really makes me question her fitness for any responsible position.
The fact that Romney is #2 on my list despite all of those flaws is a reflection on just how poor this list of candidates is -- not an endorsement of Romney.
He thinks differently. I like that and I’d think Trump would too, but for some reason Bolton is not a no-brainer for him.
Evidently he is looking for something that Bolton lacks. My guess would be trade negotiation skils, more from a business-finance side than as traditional diplomacy.
But of all the candidates I think Bolton is the most agile and smartest, thus best equipped to learn and adapt.
That is a valid point, and that is why I wouldn't discount the possibility of having Bolton serve in some advisory capacity or consulting role. He just has no business in the Secretary of State post, in my humble opinion.
Like a track record that isn't diminished by his support for some of the most disastrous foreign/military policy decisions the U.S. government has made since the Vietnam War, for example.
My sense of John Bolton is he wants the job so badly that he will do anything for it. If that means saying “yes boss” and sticking to the script, he’s on board. Just a gut feel I have about the guy.
I admire Petraeus for his service and military genius, and could forgive him for joining with Obama and even for his personal foibles. But mishandling classified information makes it a no-brainer: there should be no place for him in any position of trust within the US government. Just like Hillary, he knew the rules and he broke them anyway, so the price for that has to be paid, and not just overlooked when it’s convenient to do so.
in your opinion
OK ... so?
This should disqualify anyone from consideration for any role in a position of public trust.
The last prominent person we discussed here on FreeRepublic who fit this description to a T was named Hillary Clinton.
I prefer Bolton but if Trump chooses another, you can bet it will include a riot act set of terms to keep whoever reigned in and IAW his agenda.
Bolton. He has the background, the intelligence, and the sheer stones for the job. He won’t take any crap from any nation that Odungo used to literally bow down to.
To be clear, as a preliminary, I am no Palin-bot. But I do not judge a person mainly by association, even if the association is family. As for being out of the public sector, that is formally true, but she has done a fairly good job of keeping herself in the public eye as well as performing public service, under conditions that I think just about anyone would consider very daunting. Perhaps you can point to something specific that you feel might disqualify her (I could at least consider something specific).
Back to being out of the public sector, I note in passing that Bolton has been out since 2006, 3 years longer than Palin. Romney has been out since 2007, two years longer than Palin. And Trump himself has never held public office at all.
I want Rudy. He has a lot of success. Bolton has none. Name one thing he did as head of UN? Nothing!!!!!! He made that crap organization stronger when he was supposed to close it down. I can’t stand him!!!
Bolton is not a globalist. He is anti UN, anti international law, anti foreign governments and he is pro American and pro US sovereignty.
Sarah Palin's track record is already thin -- both inside and outside public office. She was a small-town political figure for ten years, then governor of Alaska for less than three years. Other than that, her political career was a brief flash as a charismatic VP candidate for an old hack who should have retired years ago.
Outside public office, she's been little more than a media figure and political advocate.
There's nothing wrong with any of this, but it hardly qualifies someone to serve as the U.S. Secretary of State. I would usually consider a lack of public-sector experience an asset rather than a liability, but Palin hardly has a track record of private-sector success that Donald Trump brought to his first political campaign.
If Palin is a credible candidate for U.S. Secretary of State, then you could find thousands of successful business owners all over this country would be better suited for this role.
John Bolton has spent his entire career pushing a foreign/military policy agenda that is not in the best interests of the citizenry of the United States. That makes him a “globalist” in my mind. It has nothing to do with what he thinks about the United Nations, international law, etc.
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