Bolton delay is a blow
to the administration

How much of discussion around Bolton is just politics?  Are the Democrats really digging for problems with accusations of ‘abusive behavior’ stemming back more than a decade ago?
By most accounts this isn’t just politics. This is one of the few committees that is rarely, if ever, political. The [members] usually work together in a bipartisan way. With very few exceptions on this committee, there are few people who are overtly political.

Joe Biden has joined the administration on numerous issues, including the war in Iraq. So his objections were not really viewed as “just politics.” And certainly the concerns that George Voinovich expressed yesterday were not politics.

If anything, Republican members such as Chuck Hagel were being a little bit political in saying that they were willing to go along with this choice, even though they were not happy with it, because politically they were not willing to take on their own White House and go against the president.

With the allegations against Bolton piling up, would the White House ever withdraw the nomination?
In the past what we’ve seen happen is that these kinds of allegations pile up and if they are not answered strongly and definitively by the nominee, then you could envision a scenario where John Bolton takes himself out of contention.

Or at the White House, perhaps in a heavy news period when no one is paying much attention, or late on a Friday afternoon, you might see a withdrawal down the road. But, we are not at that stage yet. The White House is still hoping it can get him confirmed.   

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