The UN: Smoke and Fire

You're really barking up the wrong tree here. The Left isn't running US foreign policy or deciding whether or not to use the UN... the Bush Administration and the State Department are.

Mark, this IS Michael's blog, he can bark up any tree he wants.

Besides the Left (when in power) had set up much of the foriegn policy that contributed to where we are today. Ala Madeline Albright dealing with N. Korea giving them nuclear capability, bombing after bombing of U.S. facilities without serious reprecussions on people behind despicable acts, Clinton pulling out of Mogadishu giving Bin Laden confidence that U.S. doesn't have the stomach to fight back.

Why can't we go back to the ways when Reagan slammed Iran, Russia with the iron fist? He got things done.

Mark, I'm going to start referring to you as Mr. Encyclopedia. You act like you know everything about everything.

Can sheep bladders be employed to prevent earthquakes? I'd be fascinated if you could answer me that.

DD: Pot? Kettle? Black?

TF: Of course it's MW's blog and of course he can bark up any tree he wants. That doesn't change the facts, though.

The terrorism you've mentioned is something that the 9/11 Commission report already addressed: before 9/11, no one in America took terrorism seriously... including President Bush. It's also disingenuous of you to blame current problems with North Korea on past administrations... when the reality is that North Korea was going to develop nuclear weapons no matter what we did... either then or now.

That's somewhat separate from the UN, though. If you are against our involvement with and funding of the UN.. fine. The decision now, though, rests entirely in the hands of the Bush Administration. They're running the show... and they have to decide whether (and when) we work with the UN or not.

Mark: Nice how you try to project a "nana-nana-so-are-you" effect into the argument, but really, you are one of the most arrogant people I have ever seen trolling a blog.

FYI, I'm not the one visiting blogs obsessively and throwing around arrogant criticisms directed at the author. You act as if Michael's site is the bane of your existence, yet you keep coming back. Why is that?

DD: You're the first person to level such insinuations on me here. Why do you think that is?

Michael's site is definitely *not* the bane of my existence. There's little point in reading the opinions of those with whom you, more often than not, agree with... which is why I'm a regular reader of this blog and regularly post comments on it.

At any rate, I'm not sure how saying that Michael is "barking up the wrong tree" is an "arrogant criticism directed at the author"... but whatever.

If MW wanted only those with whom he agrees or who agree with him to post comments, he would have deleted my comments a long time ago.

The point was that the left WANTS to have the UN control our foreign policy. That is precisely the problem that was being pointed out. If you were paying attention, the current admin is not at all interested in leveraging the UN now or ever. It is corrupt and ineffective in everything it does. At least this administration recognizes it and marginalizes it. The left wants to embrace this corruption as the standard by which we should behave.....nice.

Actually, the current administration is indeed leveraging the UN.. or considering doing so.. with Iran in particular.

As for your assessment of what the Left "wants"... I think you're putting words in the Left's mouth.. especially your last sentence: "The left wants to embrace this corruption as the standard by which we should behave". That is simply not true. It may be your spin on things, but that doesn't make it true.

Mark,

Bush, Rice and other past and current admin officials have on several occasions, before 9/11, said that terrorism was indeed a big problem, in fact even mentioning Al Queda, Bin Laden, and the state sponsored terrorist states overseas.

What i find ironic is that here you say that America didn't take terrorism seriously, yet you seems to take sides with the U.N. and here we are, well after the fact of 9/11, the U.N. still doesn't still seem to take terrorism seriously. Yet we are supposed to let them lead the world? Without security you cannot have the freedoms and productive economy which affects everything else. I see the U.S. moving forward while the U.N. continues to step in their own pile of d.U.N.g.

Maybe N. Korea was going to develop their nuke program, but it was the Clinton admin that gave them the big headstart in doing so. That falls back on Albright and Clinton, whether you feel it's disingenuous or not, the facts are the facts.

My point of mentioning the terrorist acts of the past is that the U.N. didn't step up to the plate and take action, in fact, they defended those nations responsible. So why should America trust the U.N., especially now with all the other scandals uncovered? Which is partly what 6 Kings pointed out, that the corrupted U.N. is the very body that the Left wants lead the world.

Mark, let's hear your rationalle by which we should trust the U.N. to lead us and the world?

TF: Your premise would be correct if it were true that I fully support the UN. I do not. I support using the UN when/where it can be effective and ignoring it when it's in our national interests to do so.

You are mincing words when it comes to terrorism. The 9/11 Commission report clearly says that: "Terrorism was not the overriding national security concern for the U.S. government
under either the Clinton or the pre-9/11 Bush administration."

As for N. Korea, the regime is the one to blame. No it's the Clinton Administration's fault, you say? Fine... then it was the Reagan Administration's fault that the arming and training we did of Osama and his ilk way back during the Russia-Afghanistan war led to the rise of Al-Qaeda.

The N. Korean regime betrayed the efforts of the Clinton Administration and used what they were given for nefarious purposes. Was building reactors for them a mistake? Probably. But there's little that can be done when the regime that controls N. Korea refuses to do what's in our best interests. Invade and remove the regime, you say? Sure.. go right ahead. It won't be easy (and wouldn't have been any easier back then) and would cost a lot more than Iraq did.

Mark,

Ok. We can go round and round about all this.

9/11 report mincing words? When some members of the panel were directly responsible for stonewalling information and comprimising security, while others on the panel had it in for Bush (at least publicly)...c'mon, 9/11 wasn't our fault. By your standards, it was the regime that did it to us. Correct?

But i digress. Let me just ask you to state when/where you think the U.N. has be effective.

TF: The "regime" of Al-Qaeda and terrorism, yes.

The only part of the 9/11 Commission report I mentioned was the part where it says that terrorism wasn't the primary national security focus before 9/11... which is true. I didn't say 9/11 was our fault.

The UN has had success in various (and relatively small) peacekeeping efforts. The UN was also effective with weapons inspections in Iraq.

Another thing which demonstrates that the Bush Administration values the UN is all the UN resolutions it lists when making the case for this or for that... and the option, that's currently still on the table, for UN sanctions against Iran.

Mark: I'm the first, I suppose, to level such accusation because I have a tendency to not mince words. But really, why do you keep coming back and reading and commenting on nearly every post, when it appears you disapprove of and disagree with nearly everything MW writes?

DD: I already answered that up above. There's no point to reading or commenting about things with which you already agree.

If you never read alternative opinions, you become too brainwashed by one side or the other.

Mark: I think your positions on the world are far more rational than are the positions of most leftists -- at least the positions they publically espouse. For instance, the anti-war left continually harped on the Iraq was as "illegitimate" for all sorts of reasons, not least of which was their contention that it wasn't authorized by the representatives of tyrants at the UN (despite innumerable resolutions). Now, it may be the case that the left was only using the UN as a prop to harangue the President, but at least publically they claimed to believe that only the UN and its kleptocrats had the "moral authority" to approve a war.

Most of the left specifically denounces the idea of going to war purely for our own national interests, forcing the President (wrongly, in my opinion) to construct a facade of nation-building nonsense. Yes, it's great that the Iraqis have democracy, but the main reason we did it is because they're much less of a threat to us now than they were when they were a dictatorship.

MW: Seek rational Leftists and you will find them.

Mark: I don't really want to find them. Even the rational left is terribly misguided, and if they get their way it will be a disaster for our nation and our world.

MW: Aww.. and I was thinking our honeymoon was just around the corner.

Even the rational right is terribly misguided, and if they get their way it will be a disaster for our nation and our world.

See? I can spin yarns of BS with the best of 'em.

To see you speak of the Left (or what you see as "most" of it) in the way you do strikes me as rather naive.

Nothing is well-represented by its newsworthy extremes.

What you see as a belief held by "most" of the Left is really only held by "a few"... the few that show up most vividly on your narrow-range radar screen.

Mark: You speak of not becoming brainwashed, yet your comments do not suggest you are trying to read MW's posts in an open-minded way. Conversely my friend, you take an aloof stance and cut down MW's ideals just like the most narrow-minded liberal I can find wandering around the streets of Hollywood at 2am. A truly open-minded person would not cut down each and every ideal; they would try to find the reason behind it.

Mark: Most of my friends and acquaintances are leftists, so I hardly get my information only from media.

DD: The broad strokes with which MW paints "most" Leftists is not something that I agree with. It's simply not true that "most" Leftists think as he says they think.

"cut down each and every ideal", eh? Hmm.. maybe MW should weigh in on whether he feels "cut down" by what little-ol'-Mark says. I read MW's posts in as much of an objective way as I can. When he's within the ballpark on things and doesn't get too carried away with his generalizations about the Left, sometimes I post an acknowledgement or statement of agreement.

MW: Over what geographic area can your Leftist friends and acquaintences be found? LA? Southern California? If it's either one of those, I'd say you don't have a good idea of what a cross-section of the Left looks like.

Thank you for your explanation, I think I understand where you are coming from.