And why did we ask him, again?

The BBC reporter said to Nicholas Burns (Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs) that John Bolton is pessimistic about the Annapolis conference. Burns' response was quick, dismissive, and comprehensively so: John Bolton is not someone who has been involved in peace in the Middle East, nor is he an expert in the area, nor does he know anything about the problems, so he doesn't think Bolton is someone we should listen to.

That's a paraphrase - he was talking while I was feeding the cat and I couldn't get the words precisely - but the spirit of the quote is accurate. I have to admit I wondered why the hell Bolton's opinion was being sought by anyone. But then, there are so many people who have been involved with this administration - people who have been demonstrably wrong about everything for the past six years - whose opinions are eagerly sought by the media everyday while those who were right are ignored.

As far as Bolton is concerned, his MidEast record is filled with things like being "confident that Saddam Hussein has hidden weapons of mass destruction and production facilities in Iraq," "damned proud of what we did" to prevent an early ceasefire in the Israeli-Lebanese war last year, and stating that "life is about choices. The choices between an Iran with nuclear weapons or the use of military force. I think you have to look at military force." But he's a go-to guy for quotes about America's attitude toward the peace conference?

Yah, Condi has a chance to get Bush engaged here...

But I'll leave you with this Burns quote:

"I think there are better people to quote than John Bolton."