US: An explosive battle is looming in the US Congress following the decision of a Republican-dominated Senate panel to send to the full Senate two controversial nominations for promotion to the federal appeals courts in the face of a threatened filibuster by minority Democrats.
The move heightens tensions on Capitol Hill, where the business of government has been overshadowed by bitter partisan rows over the nomination of John Bolton as US ambassador to the UN and ethics charges against House majority leader Thomas DeLay.
The fight over the two judicial nominees - Texas judge Priscilla Owen and California judge Janice Rogers Brown - could bring the Senate to a grinding halt. In President Bush's first term Democrats used the filibuster to block 10 of Mr Bush's nominees, including Ms Owen and Ms Brown, while not opposing 205 others.
Since re-election Mr Bush has resubmitted the names, and this time the Republican leadership in the Senate has threatened the "nuclear option" - a ban on judicial filibusters - to allow a straight "up-and-down" vote. It takes 60 votes in the 100-member chamber to stop a filibuster but an outright ban requires only a simple majority, and Republicans have 55 seats.
Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid has countered that he will bring routine Senate business to a grinding halt if the ban is voted through - which is by no means certain as a handful of Republicans are unhappy with scrapping a device they might need themselves in the future.
With the nuclear clock now ticking, Senate majority leader Bill Frist plans to deliver a taped message to Christian conservatives on Sunday accusing Democrats who block nominees as being "against people of faith".
A third renominated judge, Willia Pryor, a conservative Catholic, will also be sent to the full Senate by the judiciary committee, which has a 10-8 Republican majority.
Democrats have accused the three judges of imposing pro-business and anti-abortion personal beliefs.
Meanwhile, President Bush renewed his appeal yesterday to the Senate to confirm John Bolton as ambassador to the UN. However, a key Republican senator, Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, said he was troubled by Mr Bolton's behaviour and wants to discuss it with other Republican senators.
"John's distinguished career and service to our nation demonstrates that he is the right man at the right time for this important assignment," Mr Bush said.
The committee is asking for new testimony from CIA officials about claims that Mr Bolton tried to fire analysts who disputed his intelligence assessments of Cuban weapon capabilities.
More details of abusive behaviour by Mr Bolton emerged yesterday with the publication on websites of the text of a letter to the committee by Texas woman Melody Townsel, a Democrat and head of a public relations firm in Dallas.
In the letter she said she worked as the subcontracted leader of a US Aid project in Kyrgyzstan officially awarded to a US contractor. After months of what she described as incompetence and inadequate funding she complained to US Aid officials and was confronted by Mr Bolton, who was legal counsel to the contractor.
"My hell began," she wrote. "Mr Bolton proceeded to chase me through the halls of a Russian hotel - throwing things at me, shoving threatening letters under my door and, generally, behaving like a madman."
She said she had to retreat to her room for two weeks, during which Mr Bolton routinely pounded on the door and shouted threats. She added she returned to Kyrgyzstan to find that Mr Bolton had spread false stories that she was under federal investigation.
In other matters, in the House of Representatives House Republicans yesterday proposed an investigation of their majority leader Tom DeLay, but Democrats have refused, saying Republicans must first reverse their recent decision to change the rule to favour the majority party.
Democrats have accused Mr DeLay of taking foreign trips paid for by lobbyists.