John Bolton visits Yale (hee hee)

[whometense]

http://www.yaledailynews.com/article.asp?AID=30127

Bolton agitates audience

BY JESSICA MARSDEN
Staff Reporter

It was a bittersweet homecoming for United Nations Ambassador John Bolton '70 LAW '74, a former chair of the Conservative Party who returned to the Yale Political Union Monday evening amid a chorus of hisses and politically charged questions.

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The audience interrupted Bolton throughout his speech with loud banging on desks and hissing, the typical YPU expressions for approval and disagreement. When asked about the abuse of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib in Iraq, Bolton said the U.S. -- not other countries or international organizations ­-- should hold its own citizens accountable for possible abuse.

"We don't need anybody else to judge us," he said. "We judge our own."

The answer prompted loud hissing from the audience, but Bolton offered students a question of his own.

"I'm just curious, those of you who are hissing, who do you think will judge better than us?" he asked the audience.

Most YPU officers, including party chairs, said they appreciated Bolton's candor and his willingness to answer contentious questions after his prepared address. But Liberal Party chair Kirstin Dunham '07 said she would have preferred a chance for students to respond if they disagreed with his answers.

The lecture's organizers said they did not predict the degree to which Bolton's words would divide the audience.

"If we had known he was going to be this provocative, we would probably have tried to have a student debate to hash out the issues," YPU Speaker Goran Lynch '06 said.

Some students said they thought Bolton was too controversial and combative, reflecting U.S. Senate Democrats' concerns about his ability to be a successful diplomat. Congressional opposition forced U.S. President George W. Bush '68 to appoint Bolton in a recess appointment this summer.

"He was extremely rude, extremely belligerent, everything the Democrats called him in confirmation hearings," Jed Glickstein '08 said. "He was all those things, but in the end he won the debate."

Yeah, right. :cry: They hate me, they really hate me.