Blusterin' Bolton update

Muscular diplomacy is one thing. But John Bolton has been all muscle and no diplomacy as the United States ambassador to the United Nations. Now he's threatening to hold up its entire two-year operating budget unless his demands for major reforms are met almost immediately....

...Mr. Annan made a promising start earlier this year at building a consensus for reform, only to have it derailed by Mr. Bolton. Soon after taking over the American mission this summer, he issued a long list of last-minute demands. As a result, a special international summit meeting that had been organized to adopt real reforms ended up endorsing a document that was mostly fudge and mush.

Mr. Bolton's latest threat, to block the next U.N. budget, is likely to be equally counterproductive. America's most successful U.N. ambassadors, whether they served Republican or Democratic presidents, have known how to harness American power to patient, skillful diplomacy. Regrettably, Mr. Bolton has failed to profit from their example.