We had the happy news two days ago from Steve Clemons that the effort to get John Bolton confirmed by the US Senate as the US Ambassador to the United Nations is really finished. The report has not been picked up by any major news outlets so far, and when asked in the daily post-Security Council session stake-out by the press where his nomination stands, Bolton demures.

Could Bolton merely go out with a whimper, and not a bang?

Unfortunately, the bully may still get your lunch money. Indeed, there is a strong possibility that President Bush could not only reappoint Bolton to the UN Ambassadorship, but continue to send him the same paycheck, too.

Steve has pointed out that perhaps Bolton will receive a second recess appointment from President Bush, but agree to serve without pay. This speculation is drawn from legislation passed by the Congress on an annual basis stating that no funds may be spent on the salary of "any person for the filling of any position for which he or she has been nominated after the Senate has voted not to approve the nomination of said person." The provision was found in the previous legislative session under H.R. 3058, the Transportation, Treasury, and Housing and Urban Development, the Judiciary, the District of Columbia, and Independent Agencies Appropriations Act, 2006. It is also found in pending legislation for Fiscal Year 2007.

Perhaps the Bush administration would argue in response that the Senate never "voted not to approve the nomination" - in fact, it simply failed to bring the nomination to a vote, and that's not the president's fault.

But, this being the presidency of the unitary executive, they are taking it a step farther. On November 30, 2005, President Bush issued a 'presidential signing statement' noting the following:

Section 809 seeks to prohibit the expenditure of funds for the salaries of "any person for the filling of any position for which heor she has been nominated after the Senate has voted not to approve the nomination of said person." The executive branch shall construe this provision in a manner consistent with the President's constitutional authority to make recess appointments.

We critics of John Bolton's recklessly ineffective diplomacy have always known that his defeat in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee would likely be a symbolic victory. But now it appears that this administration could use its enlarged sense of presidential power to pay the salary of a man to represent the United States whom our Senate has failed to consent to twice.

Hopefully, the prospect of a collision on this issue will provide an additional focus for critics of the practice of 'presidential signing statements' both within the Congress and in the world of government watchdogs fearful of how these 'signing statements' distort our form of constitutional government. And maybe that apartment in the Waldorf-Astoria will prove itself too costly for America's least effective ambassador.