When George Bush was reelected president last November he cam out saying he would spend his "political capital". All indications were he was not going to back off his principles. Three recent appointments to key posts show he means what he says.

John Bolton will become the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nation. Bolton is a a conservative much like former ambassador Jeanne Kirkpatrick. Expect a no holds approach to the moribund United Nations. Bush's long time confidant Karen Hughes has been appointed under secretary of state for public diplomacy. Hughes is sometimes called the presidents alter ego. And thn last week Paul Wolfowitz was nominated to head the World Bank.

All three of these public servants will represent the ideas of President Bush on the world stage. Perhaps that is the most critical thing to understand about these appointments. The president has been pushing the ideas of freedom, liberty and democracy since the war on terror began. He sees that to defeat terrorism you must go to the heart of the beast and cut out the cancer. He has done that in Afghanistan and Iraq. Now he is moving with these appointments to slay the ideological forces arrayed against the gift of freedom he sees as coming from God.

Fred Barnes has a piece on Opinionjournal .com today that sums up the credentials of all three of these people. Here is his conclusion:

The nominations of Messrs. Bolton and Wolfowitz produced shock and awe around the world. Ms. Hughes's didn't. But what's significant is that all three have agendas that reflect the president's own worldview. Or, put more precisely, their agendas stem from Mr. Bush's shake-up-the-world view.