Bush to install Bolton as UN ambassador: US official

Frustrated by Democrats, United States President George W Bush will on Monday circumvent the Senate and install embattled nominee John Bolton to be ambassador to the United Nations, a senior administration official said.

Bush has the power to fill vacancies without Senate approval while Congress is in recess. Under the Constitution, a recess appointment during the lawmakers' August break would last until the next session of Congress, which begins in January 2007.

In advance of Bush's announcement, Democrats said Bolton would start his new job on the wrong foot in a recess appointment.

"He is damaged goods. This is a person who lacks credibility," Senator Christopher Dodd of Connecticut, a senior Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said on 'Fox News Sunday.'

Bush, he said, should think again before using a recess appointment to place Bolton at the UN while the Senate is on its traditional August break.

But Republicans appearing on Sunday's news shows said Bolton was the man the White House wanted and he was the right person to represent the US at the world body.

Bolton's appointment ends a five-month impasse between the administration and Senate Democrats.
The battle grabbed headlines last spring amid accusations that Bolton abused subordinates and twisted intelligence to shape his conservative ideology.