Given the recent passage of UN Security Council resolution 2334 condemning Israel for its settlement policy, I look forward to the US putting forward fair and even handed resolutions in the Security Council regarding the settlement of people. That would be perceived, rightly, as trolling on the part of the Trump administration.
There’s a good amount of potential here.
There are the religious fatwas condemning the sale of PA land to infidels. Separately, selling to Jews is officially a death penalty crime.
Then there’s the two tier refugee system of the UN itself where all refugees except for Palestinions are processed under one set of rules while Palestinians have a separate and unequal system. It will be fascinating to see how the double standard is defended by people who claim to view even handed and fair treatment as a core value.
Then there’s the insistence that all Jews currently living in PA territory leave without exception even for those whose historical ties to the area predate the creation of Israel.
The point isn’t to actually pass any such resolutions but to destroy the shield of silence held in protection over these existing positions and practices that would have trouble surviving honest scrutiny. Who would vote in favor of maintaining a double standard for refugees? We actually don’t know right now because we don’t call out the double standard and force people to take a position. The double standard is just the way things have always been.
The hypocrisy and treachery of the UN can no longer be tolerated. The are an instrument of tyranny and a tool used to support terrorism. The United States needs to withdraw from this criminal organization immediately, stop all funding as soon as possible, and expel all operations and officials from American soil.
I just can’t see the value in participating. The UN stopped being a serious organization back when the Tutsi Rwanda massacre occurred.
Time to tell them to pack up and leave.
Mike K – Any organization with that big a pot of money and responsible for that many things has value in participating, even if only to safely extract the important bits that should continue from the dysfunctional and evil actions that make the overall group bad.
Grurray – Do you even know what the UN is? What are its principal components and what specialized components are rattling around in the system that don’t fit into these principal components? Should we kill off the WMO? How about the ITU?
I don’t even pretend that I know all the relevant components much less have made the analysis necessary to separate the good from the bad so our killing off the UN is a positive event for the world. Have you done so? Do you know anybody who has because I’d like to shake their hand.
I’m waiting for a Diplomad 2.0 post he’s working on.
However, I see a three step process.
1-cut funding severely.
2- Withdraw. That can be done with some functions that are useful maintained.
3- Kick the UN out of NYC.
UNRRA has perpetuated the Palestinian problem just as LBJ’s War on Poverty destroyed the black family, It is the worst aspect of the organization.
The Human Rights aspect is a joke.
The only time The Security Council has been useful was when the Soviets walked out.
The International Court of Justice is probably the source of more mischief than anything but UNRRA.
The WHO, I believe, predated the UN and will stand alone.
Who knows what Trump will do. I really dislike religious states, for obvious reasons.
“How about the ITU?”
You mean the International Telecommunications Union that wants to turn over control of the internet to China, the Arabs, George Soros, or some combination, all thanks to Obama surrendering authority to them? Yes, suspend all operations until we can sort out the full extant of the treasonous crimes perpetrated by the current administration and bring the culprits to justice.
Just remove their diplo immunity for parking violations.
“Any organization with that big a pot of money and responsible for that many things has value in participating”
Um, that’s our money. We could do plenty more good in the world if we directed where it goes ourselves, rather than let these jackals handle it.
Mike K – I would suggest that the method of cutting funding would be best done in a differentiated way so it is crystal clear that it is not international cooperation we are rejecting but operations that do more harm than good.
Grurray – If you actually care about the Internet getting turned over to inappropriate forces, I have a technical solution for that. Write me privately. There’s a business in fixing that and I don’t have time to execute on it.
Brian – Actually that’s about 22% out money. The other ~78% is somebody else’s money.
Somebody suggested a Trump sponsored resolution for New Zealand to give back Maori territory it holds.
Withdrawal of 22% would make a point. Jesse Helms got a lot of attention for merely suspending it.
Senegal could also feel the Trump pen and phone.
In Senegal, USAID has invested over $1 billion in a wide range of projects since 1961 — an average of nearly $30 million each year — to tackle constraints to national development.
I would predict it will be gone.
PenGun says: Who knows what Trump will do. I really dislike religious states, for obvious reasons.
So tell us what you think of the 57 member religious states of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation.
You read a lot of commentators speculating that Obama might aspire to become Secretary General of the UN. Past practice has been that the SG hasn’t come from the 5 members of the permanent Security Council, as each of the 5 permanent members holds the power of the veto. Wouldn’t it be delicious if Obama were nominated to succeed the current idiot, only to be vetoed by the Trump administration. Booya!
Mike K – Sure, withdrawal of 22% would make a point. Notice that it’s quite a bit different than what Brian said. My point regarding UN withdrawal is to plan well and if you’re going to make changes, make sure you know the likeliest consequences of those changes and that the result will likely benefit the United States on net. Trolling the UNSC leaves us in the room, in control of the conversation, and having to be dealt with. This is very different than the United States that Barack Obama wants.
“So tell us what you think of the 57 member religious states of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation.”
I don’t like religious states. I have no preference actually, I think the very idea is to control people with fear. I don’t like that.
I wonder how Obama will feel if his little fit of petulance leads to the defunding and possible withdrawal of the US from the UN. He will have truly succeeded in transforming not just America, but the world. I hope he has a long time to consider the consequences.
Trtump is sure to look like a success as he has such small shoes to fill.
Cruz and Graham have both announced opposition to UN funding unless the vote is reversed.
I don;t see how that can be done. Any reversal vote will be vetoed by China and Russia.
Huh. I thought we paid closer to half. Still, 22% is a healthy chunk of their budget. Zero percent sounds more like it. There’s nothing the UN does that the US can’t do unilaterally or via other partnerships, which wouldn’t entail letting the vipers and jackals at the UN skim off the top.
Brian – I checked and the situation is worse than I thought. The 22% figure isn’t wrong but it’s certainly incomplete.
http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2015/06/16/america-pay-way-too-much-for-united-nations.html
“I don’t like religious states. I have no preference actually, I think the very idea is to control people with fear.”
Tell me which government governs not with fear.
The UN, as with many (most?) social welfare organizations, has betrayed its lofty goals by falling victim to its own system of massive spending with minimal accountability.
Its primary goal of fostering peace in the world, as played out by interposing its volunteered troops between warring factions is belied by the accusations of child abuse and other transgressions lodged against its blue-helmeted troops/representatives, such as in Rwanda and in Srebrenica. It is the literal “paper” tiger — issuing condemning resolution after resolution, while powerless to stop villainous countries like North Korea and Iran from persecuting their own “dissident” populations. What the UN seems to excel at is treating some member representatives with the equivalent of ruffles and flourishes (i.e., a rich & comfortable living seldom found in their own poor countries) during their terms spent in the U.S.
Kofi Annan was perhaps the worst UN Sec General on record (think: Oil for Food), but we know of his excesses possibly only because a few honest people sought to expose his perfidy. See here: http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2006/12/kofi-annans-legacy-of-failure
…but I’ll dare to suggest that the level of corruption has not diminished under Ban Ki-Moon. It simply is likely that no one, despite the best intentions, could clean this Augean Stable of an organization. We do not, however, need to continue to support it.
Note: some will claim that UN sub-sets like WHO or UNICEF do some good. Fine. There should be a way to create support for those as independent systems, with rotating leadership among a few countries, using local in-country staffing on a temporary basis for sunsetted programs, and accountable financial records and reports. We should be able to measure some “return on investment,” which has been 100% lacking in the UN as a whole. And no programs should be authorized for a decades-long term without re-justification and re-authorization being necessary. See UNHWA, which has been enabling the Palestinian “refugees” since December 1949. I’ll do the arithmetic for you: that’s 67 YEARS.
Sorry, that’s “UNRWA”.
“See UNRWA, which has been enabling the Palestinian “refugees” since December 1949. I’ll do the arithmetic for you: that’s 67 YEARS.”
First, ““Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket.”
Eric Hoffer, The Temper of Our Time
Second, the Palestinians are clients of UNRWA and, like so many “charitable causes” must become immortal lest the cause administration become unemployed.
“The March of Dimes” did not dissolve when polio was cured. It found another cause and went on. It carefully selected a cause, birth defects, unlikely to be as amenable to cure.
Social workers probably did not conspire to keep blacks as a dependent class unable to make their way in society but they did adopt practices that made it happen.
Another quote: “Nothing more wonderfully concentrates a man’s mind than the sure knowledge he is to be hanged in the morning.”
-Samuel Johnson
The UN needs concentration.
The only reason we have the name Palestine is because the Greeks and then later the Romans tried to re-brand the territory when faced with Jewish resistance. The British revived the name during World War I in order to encourage the Bedouins to join the revolt against the Turks. Mark Twain described the West Bank as desolate and deserted, and I’ve found other books and accounts by missionaries in the early to mid 1800s that confirm that description. All the land belonged to the Ottoman Sultan or their governors. Private ownership didn’t exist. The land along the coastal plain and Jordan Valley was purchased from the Ottomans by Jewish settlers.