posted on February 18, 2003 12:52:46 AM new
>I wouldn't think so, its a person own PERSONAL belief, and one's belief isn't a fraud. It doesn't EVEN compare
posted on February 18, 2003 06:34:15 AM new
The US is or was, (supposedly caught up in Dec. 2002 or the first part of this year) in arrears of payment because of a disagreements with the UN on issues of bad budgeting, disputes of policy and waste of funds.
As the largest CONTRIBUTOR, The US was upset about this wasted funding and disputes over UN policies. The Helms/Biden Act was passed to get things back in order. http://www.cunr.org/priorities/Arrears.htm
As stated. Our percentage of funding to the UN is still the largest and this doesn't include and costs of US involvement and Armed Forces. Not to mention the costs to New York City and New York State
As someone stated, New York City nor the country would miss the UN's leaving this country.
My opinion of the UN. is just that, an Opinion. One that many agree with.
Last and not least. You're A. Joker. Feel better Now?
Amen,
Reverend Colin
.
posted on February 18, 2003 02:12:55 PM new
Not quite sure what you mean by that last bit. But you have an interesting interpretation of history. If you'd been following the issue, you'd know that the United States starts getting sniffy about "wasted money and UN policy" whenever it's amassed a big bill it doesn't want to pay, but the claim is false. The UN general operating budget is actually less than the budget of the City of Atlanta, and it accomplishes a heck of a lot more.
Borillar, Sorry I spoiled your fun. You'll get 'em next time. (I liked your hammer/wrench analogy.)
posted on February 18, 2003 06:00:47 PM new
>Borillar, Sorry I spoiled your fun.
Nada Problemo! The point is that these Uncivil Anti-Libertarians are all alike in their weaknesses and it is both easy and fun to exploit those weaknesses with facts that create public ridicule for them. They get their opinions not from facts and/or rational, logical thinking, but from Radio Entertainment talk show hosts and FoxNews and the Political Blather-Hype Machines which TELL them what to think. So when they spout off their "opinion", simply call their bluff by asking them to expain themselves, then afterwards, showing them the true facts.
Bashing the United Nations has been a long-time game for the Republicans. Not because they never were aware of the oportunities presented by diplomacy and share economics, but because the Democcrats believed in the lofty ideals of the UN and held it in such high esteeme.
Bad mouthing and outright lies are easy for politicans to tell when they do not control any of the branches of government. But now that they DO control all three branches of government, they are faced with thirty years of outright lies and negative propaganda and do not have a clue as what to do with the United Nations. They need the UN and badly, but they have screwed themselves because of their lies over the years.
If Revenge is a dish best seerved cold, then a cold dish of Revenge served to themselves is only Justice as the Republicans slide all the way down into Hell.
posted on February 18, 2003 07:18:58 PM new
My feeling exactly,
Amen,
Reverend Colin
September 24, 2002
The moral authority of the U.N.
Mona Charen
What happens in the Security Council more closely resembles a mugging than either a political debate or an effort at problem-solving.
— Jeanne Kirkpatrick
The United Nations is one of those institutions, like the Women's National Basketball Association, that sails above its failures because it just seems to so many people like a good idea.
Despite its corruption, bias, indolence and waste, the U.N. retains so much moral authority that former President Bush felt he had to appeal to the U.N. in order to get Democrats to authorize the Gulf war in 1991. And today, George W. Bush had to punch his ticket in Manhattan before being able to count on support from a number of U.S. allies abroad, as well as the same Democrats in the U.S. Congress his father had to worry about. (It's worth pausing to note that the current President Bush struck just the right note at the U.N., challenging the institution to enforce its own resolutions.)
The United Nations, like the League of Nations before it that crumbled at the first challenge from armed thugs, is an exercise in utopianism. It embodies the hope that the nations of the world can cooperate to eliminate scourges like dysentery and river blindness, and settle their differences over polished conference tables rather than with machetes and M-16s. The U.N. can boast some modest success in battling disease and poverty, but its record on peace and reconciliation is abysmal.
Though blue-helmeted U.N. peacekeeping forces have been deployed around the globe, they have proved highly vulnerable to political manipulation — in other words, they've been useless. In 1967, U.N. forces were summarily ejected from the Sinai Desert — where they were theoretically keeping the peace between Egypt and Israel — when President Gamal Abdel Nasser waved them off with a flick of his wrist. In 1991, when the Croats counterattacked against the Serbs, the blue helmets were left standing impotently in the dust as tanks and APCs rolled through.
The fantasies of the U.N.'s founders were limitless. Franklin Roosevelt's secretary of state, Cordell Hull, imagined the U.N. would rid the world of "spheres of influence, alliances, balance of power, or any of the other special arrangements through which, in the unhappy past, the nations strove to safeguard their security or to promote their interests."
It isn't the fault of the U.N. per se that the unrealistic hopes pinned on it have been punctured. The U.N. reflects its membership. Before the end of the Cold War, the great blocs that held sway there consisted of communists and a variety of other criminals, potentates and presidents for life. In those days, the Commission on Human Rights was always looking into the situation in Puerto Rico and Tel Aviv, but never in Havana or Moscow.
Even today, when more of the world's nations are free and democratic than ever before in history, China still holds a seat on the Security Council and the Arab nations still comprise the largest bloc vote. Israel has been condemned countless times (though Israel is not, as callers to talk radio and C-SPAN constantly assert, in violation of Resolutions 242 and 338), but the Security Council has never once condemned Arab terrorists, far less the Chinese occupation of Tibet, the massacre in Rwanda, the Indonesian occupation of East Timor, Russian conduct in Chechnya or Serbian acts in Bosnia.
And yet, most Americans and an overwhelming majority of Europeans believe the moral imprimatur of the United Nations is necessary before any military action can be contemplated. When people tell pollsters what high regard they have for the U.N., they are forgetting about the "Zionism is racism" resolution; the orgy of America and Israel-bashing at the Durban conference on racism; the instant pronouncements by U.N. personnel that Israel had committed an "atrocity" in Jenin (only to be contradicted by the facts later); and so on. They are engaged in the same sort of utopianism that motivated the U.N.'s founders.
But the world does not and probably never will run on cooperation, peaceful dispute resolution and friendship. Peace is maintained today as it always was, by armed force and balance of power. We are fortunate to live in a time — most unusual in human history — when the good guys also have the biggest guns. That is the source of our security and the world's hope, not the fond figment on the East River.
posted on February 19, 2003 12:39:54 PM new
Thank you for printing out that article, Colin. It really is a summary of the ignorance thought by many people who are not aware of what diplomacy and the United Nations is all about. If someone were to write up all of the lies, deceit, and misinformation, both intentional and unintentional about the United Nations, this is as good an article as I've ever read.
In Colin's article, one can clearly see how the author shows a total lack of understanding about the role of the United Nations. I mean, that primer that I put on the first page would be shocking news to her! With the incrediably ignorant remarks that she tries to use to make non-existant points, she shows the depth of her lack of understanding of what diplomacy is and how it works (which is why the UN is so important.)
I think I'll keep a copy of that article on hand to show other people just how ignorant, stupid, and vicious people can be when they are trying to talk about things that they know nothing about. Thanks, Colin!
posted on February 19, 2003 02:43:36 PM new
Borilla,
I stated on another posts "I've thrown my hat [blah,blah,blah) into the ring," and I'm running for President.
I was thinking you would be a good person for my "Minister of Propaganda."
The way you can mold and rework fact's and comments is amazing to say the least.
Your superior intelligence and God like stature make you my first pick.
"Borilla, Borilla he's our Man. you can't double talk, No one can."
posted on February 19, 2003 02:45:26 PM new
I'm just going to pick out a few things....
She marvels at the fact that China is "still on" the U.N. Security Council. Which leaves me to ponder ... has she ever looked at a map? (I don't know if I would have given China MFN status ... but anyone who tries to deny that they're a major player on this planet is on drugs.)
As other posters have pointed out, you never "achieve" peace. You try to maintain it. It isn't always possible. Saying the UN's peacekeeping efforts are unsuccessful because in some areas fighting did eventually break out is an embodiment of a false expectation.
And saying "the Arab nations still comprise the largest bloc vote," as if that meant something, is ludicrous. Each permanent member of the Security Council - the U.S., the U.K., the Russian Federation, China, and France - wields more power than any possible configuration of other member states. Even if they didn't, treating the Arab nations as a "bloc" when they are so politically diverse is just silly.
She grudgingly acknowledges "some modest success in battling disease and poverty" - a hilarious understatement. The UN is the vehicle through which the world responds to large-scale natural disasters, provides aid to refugees, helps restore services like sanitation and agriculture to war-torn areas, and yes, feeds starving children.
This article was not written to persuade anyone of her point of view. It was written to pander to people who already knew what they wanted to hear. That's why it's so easy to blow holes through her flimsy argument.
posted on February 19, 2003 05:08:43 PM new
>"Borilla, Borilla he's our Man. you can't double talk, No one can."
Thank you, Colin.
But truthfully, can you now see the problem with posting someone else's opinions in your post without pointing where and how you agree or disagree with it? Bear does this all of the time, simply posting an article with no personal commentary or summation and he gets ripped for it.
Colin, my suggestion for you is that when you find an article like that one you posted above, instead of how you made your post provide a link to it in your post and then provide just a quote from the article of what you feel is most likely to make your point, then make your point. That way, we can see what YOU are trying to say and anyone can simply go read the article for themselves. If the article is -very- short and to the point, post the entire thing, either accredit it or link it to the source, and then make your point.
I particularly liked the quote from Jeanne Kirkpatrick, United States ambassador to the United Nations from 1981 to 1985. A Democrat before becoming disillusioned with the party.
"What happens in the Security Council more closely resembles a mugging than either a political debate or an effort at problem-solving."
— Jeanne Kirkpatrick
I think you'll find this is happening at a much greater pace today then ever. The people are disillusioned with the Democrats leaning more and more to the left.
You may not like to admit it but the UN, in it's present form is out of date. I don't think it should be disbanded, I just think it would be better off in Europe somewhere. Better yet they can all go home, close the UN building down and all get a message board like this. It would accomplish the same thing.
It never bothered me if Bear left a link or not. If I wanted to look it up. I know how to find it. The only one it seems to bother is you. It's a petty thing to get upset about.
I thank you for your suggestion. I will try to keep my messages short and to the point.
Amen,
The next Emperor of the Universe,
Reverend Colin
[ edited by colin on Feb 20, 2003 01:35 PM ]
posted on February 20, 2003 11:23:54 AM new
As you can see, I didn't post a link but if I did I'd note it this way: This column appeared in the Washington Times - owned by Rev. Sun Myung Moon's Unification Church. (NOTthe Washington Post - One of the largest and most respected papers in the country.)
In fact, Charen is a syndicated columnist (through Creators, one of the largest syndicates in the world) whose work appears in many papers, including Boston, Atlanta, Baltimore and St. Louis, but not the Post.
Somebody said to me recently, "Next time you use Google, you may want to check a couple sites instead of just one. " It's good advice, but I don't need it. You can have it back.
posted on February 20, 2003 11:34:35 AM newBear does this all of the time, simply posting an article with no personal commentary or summation and he gets ripped for it.
He does? Lemme guess who does that.... Do the names start with a B or a an H?
Art Bell Retired! George Noory is on late night coasttocoastam.com
posted on February 20, 2003 01:13:45 PM new
Are you still here taking pot shots, NearTheSea? LOLOL! I'll do it my way, whatever that may be. Rip away!!!
I'm going out to feed the birds and the squirrels.
We prefer to have a longer personal commentary and a link to all information. To just say "Helen be careful, squirrels eat nuts" you leave your comment open to a variety of interpretations, some of which are not complementary.
You must watch out for that or you'll be ripped. LOL!
posted on February 20, 2003 07:56:17 PM new
“I stated on another posts "I've thrown my hat [blah,blah,blah) into the ring," and I'm running for President.
I was thinking you would be a good person for my "Minister of Propaganda."
Colin,
I think Borillar would do a fine job in the “Ministry of Truth” and Helen can co chair the job.
(I liked your hammer/wrench analogy.)