'As I survey the situation, I think the Republican field is wide open,' John Bolton said. Bolton eyes 2012 presidential run

No, it's not just an attention-getting stunt. John Bolton is seriously considering running for president.

Bolton, the fiery, archconservative former United Nations ambassador, sees an opening in the 2012 Republican field. And his case, while far-fetched, is not altogether implausible.


"As I survey the situation, I think the Republican field is wide open," Bolton told POLITICO. "I don't think the party's anywhere close to a decision. And stranger things have happened. For example, inexperienced senators from Illinois have gotten presidential nominations."

Bolton’s explorations are attracting some notice on the right. He’s on the cover of the forthcoming issue of National Review, the influential conservative magazine.

Editor Rich Lowry said the magazine made Bolton its subject because of his rising profile in conservative circles.

"He looms quite large," Lowry said. "There are so few voices on foreign policy [in Republican politics]. John has that expertise, and he's on Fox, I would guess, once a day at least. He's writing what feels like, to me, an op-ed a week or more for fairly substantial outlets."

The case for Bolton is a straightforward one: He would be the national security candidate. As he sees it, there wouldn’t be any meaningful competition for that designation. Republican primary voters would cotton to his confrontational style and his ability to target what conservatives see as a major vulnerability for President Barack Obama.

Bolton would benefit from the contacts acquired over his long career in government: He started at the U.S. Agency for International Development during the Reagan administration and held ranking positions in the State Department under both presidents Bush. Yet, he would also carry the appeal of being a nonpolitician, someone who has never previously run for office and whose reputation, at least on the right, is as a speaker of unfiltered truth to power.

"I'm obviously aware that people are quite focused on the economy rather than foreign policy issues, but that is something that should and can be altered as people see the nature of the threats around the world that we face," Bolton said. "Nearly all the experts I've talked to have told me that candidates, in the early days, need a discriminator — something that distinguishes them from the rest of the candidates. I'm just not Generic Governor A or Generic Governor B."

Bolton acknowledged the conventional wisdom that holds that foreign policy doesn't generally motivate voters. "But I think the American people look at national security policy as a surrogate for larger characteristics in their presidential candidates: leadership, judgment, vision."

If the 62-year-old Bolton registers in voters' minds, it's likely the distinctive sight of his baleen-like white mustache and round-frame eyeglasses. (In a recent interview with Townhall.com, he pointed out that he would be the first mustached president since Taft.) That's the image, beady-eyed and glowering, caricatured on the National Review cover, accompanied with the headline, "Speak Boldly, And Carry A Big Stick: The Phenomenon of John Bolton."

Though Bolton has been labeled a neoconservative for his interventionist rhetoric, Lowry disputed that notion.

"He represents an unhyphenated, flat-out, traditional conservative view of the world. No neo-, no paleo-, just a traditional conservative nationalist who puts our national interest above all else and is skeptical of ambitious plans to remake the world."

While Bolton is indubitably hawkish, Lowry said, he's never gone in for the sort of idealistic rhetoric about transforming the world through freedom and democracy that marked the true neocons.

Bolton's combative style could prove attractive to the same conservative base that has embraced New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Lowry said. Like Christie, Bolton can be "confrontational with people in a way you're not used to seeing a politician be. There is an appetite for that."

Bolton's verbal clashes are legend, especially his 1994 quip that getting rid of 10 stories of the 38-floor United Nations tower "wouldn't make a bit of difference." (He later defended that statement as advocating the trimming of a bloated bureaucracy.) Vice President Joe Biden, among many others, has called him "a bull in a china shop."

Given that attitude, Bolton's nomination for U.N. ambassador by President George W. Bush was widely seen as a middle finger to the institution of the U.N. and the notion of multilateralism. Critics also accused Bolton of picking and choosing intelligence data that supported his preconceptions.

The Senate voted down Bolton's nomination in 2005. Bush got him in as a recess appointment, but after the 2006 elections, when it became apparent the newly Democratic Senate wouldn't confirm him, Bolton's resignation was accepted.

After leaving the administration, Bolton began his current career as a thinker and pontificator, frequently criticizing his former boss. In a 2008 op-ed on North Korea policy, he said the Bush presidency was "in total intellectual collapse."

Some inside Bushworld, including the former president himself, are said to harbor substantial bitterness toward Bolton. They see him as having turned against a president who went to the mat for him and took quite a bit of heat for doing so.

Asked how he spends his days now, Bolton responded, deadpan: "Talking to reporters." He was only partly joking. He's a regular Fox News commentator, writer of opinion pieces and giver of speeches across the country. He's a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where he keeps his office, and is affiliated with the Kirkland & Ellis law firm.

If Bolton did decide to run, it's not clear to what precincts of the Republican realm he'd look for support. There is no campaign infrastructure to speak of: He repeatedly declined to name his advisers, his potential allies or supporters or even people who might have nice things to say about him.

"I'm going through the process of talking to people who've been involved in national campaigns, fundraisers, tea party people, friends and people I've known over the years," he said, adding wryly that, "WikiLeaks notwithstanding," he remains at this point a private citizen under no obligation to disclose his contacts.

Even some of Bolton's admirers might not support a presidential run. Former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer told POLITICO he's a "big John Bolton fan," lavishing praise: "He pushes the envelope, he typically turns out to be accurate, he reminds people about the bottom-line realities of what a tough and dangerous world this is. John was covered in quicksand [at the U.N.] and still spoke truth to power."

But as for running for president, Fleischer said, "I hope he doesn't do that. John has great intellectual firepower, but he's never run for office before, and, as a matter of principle, I don't like symbolic runs for the presidency."

Fleischer said flatly that Bolton was "not ready to be president" and would therefore be a sort of vanity candidate. "I just don't see this as real or credible," he added.

Former Bush National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe agreed with the idea that a Bolton candidacy would be too niche to break into the mainstream. "He appeals to a very narrow constituency in the Republican Party, primarily because he is solely focused on foreign policy," Johndroe said. "Voters look for a president who can walk and chew gum at the same time — get the economy going and deal with problems overseas."

Johndroe also disputed the idea that the other Republican contenders would be deficient in this area. "I think that all the other Republican candidates are going to be strong enough on national security, and that it will take away any advantage that John Bolton might have in that area," he said.

Bolton said he wouldn't run just to make a point. "If I run, I will run to win," he said. "A lot of people have said to me, 'That's a great idea, running for president. You'll get booked for more speeches. You can write a book.' That's not the reason I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this because I think national security is central to America's safety and well-being, and I don't think this president understands that."

Though he declined to criticize other potential candidates by name, he said those currently in the field weren't capable of presenting a stark enough contrast to Obama.

"Let's face it, Obama gives a good speech," he said. "He will have been commander in chief, in name at least, for four years. He'll be able to do a good imitation of a commander in chief. If the Republican nominee isn't able to show his inadequacies, we'll be in real trouble."

Bolton described his economic views as "free-market-oriented." He expressed enthusiasm for dramatically shrinking the federal government and supported the tax deal that just passed in Congress. He said he is opposed to abortion, except in cases of rape or incest, but supports legalizing gay marriage and repealing "don't ask, don't tell."

While he lacks experience running for office, Bolton says he knows his way around the political process dating back to his days as a 15-year-old knocking on doors in Baltimore for Barry Goldwater. (Bolton and his wife currently live in Bethesda.) And he doesn't think he would have any trouble raising money.

"I don't think I would have to run a campaign that's financed like General Motors," he said. "You don't need to spend tens of millions of dollars on political consultants to tell you what you think when you already know what you think."