Voinovich in the cross-hairs

After Senator Voinovich's astounding decision to "listen to [his] conscience" and demand further hearings into Bolton's ineptitude, abuse, and undermining of his bosses at State, it sure didn't take long for the Right-wing attack machine to swing into action. The Center for American Progress points us to those wonderful folks who brought us the Gray Davis recall and the effort to derail the Reagan miniseries. They already have an ad created to attack Voinovich's loyalty to the Republican party.

I guess Fred Kaplan's musings yesterday have been answered.

So, President Bush must choose between his two most trusted advisers, Cheney and Rice. Cheney is a fairly cold-blooded politico. Maybe even he will realize that the cause is no longer worth saving. Bolton has caused a mess, and it can only get messier. The Democrats might beat him in the Senate, and once they win one contest they will only get more aggressive on other, more important contests to come. "It's not personal, John, it's business," Cheney might say, as he stretches the cord and wraps it around Bolton's neck (metaphorically, of course).

It's a good guess that one of two things is going to happen in the coming days and weeks: Either Bolton goes down—or we start learning a lot of unpleasant things about Sen. George Voinovich.

Should be interesting to see if Bush permits the GOP to eat one of its own on behalf of a creep like Bolton.