The UN<The Articles of Confederation

[Aenivae_Ikeda]

Yeah so another thread made me think about what a failure the UN is. It's the modern day equivalent of The Articles of Confederation, so needless to say nothing really gets done.

 

So what do you do to make the UN effective?

 

I've heard good arguments pertaining to a standing army, that way the US isn't being the world police and fucking things up for everyone, and it keeps UN policies better enforced. Also instances like the Darfur genocide can be quelled quickly. Although the only way to fund a standing army it seems would be through some means of privatization.

[budious]

US wouldn't have to try and be the world police if the UN was capable of doing the job it was organized to do. At this point it should be disbanded... as far as the US goes I'm tired of defending our gov't at this point. It goes beyond the Bush administration, the whole system has failed miserably. The injustice done to Ignacio Ramos and his fellow border guard, who are serving 11-12 years respectively in prison for doing their jobs as border patrol guards. They shot a drug smuggling mexican illegal in the ass, the mexican gets immunity, a green card, a $5 million dollar compensation suit from US gov't and these two fine border patrol agents get thrown in the federal pen. Our national guard on the border have orders not to engage armed mercenaries (politically correct liberal press' phrase for describing well-armed drug smugglers) even on US soil. Nancy Pelosi can grand stand in front of Congress all day calling for stricter emmissions on US carbon dioxide levels to prevent global warming... the only restrictions on emissions we need are on the BS coming out of her mouth.

 

Point was back to topic... the US is capable, but unwilling to secure our own borders at home. I don't think it needs to be disputed that were not doing any better abroad.

 

Oh... the over half of this bash. The general public of the US probably doesn't even have much breadth of knowledge or substance about this case or how disfunctionally our gov't is handling the border the situation but that's because I spent 3-4 hours today trying to find a cable news broadcast that hasn't been offering wall-to-wall "Death of Anna Nicole Smith" coverage... OMG - ANNA - NO!!! /insert sarcasim US press totally fails to cover the issues just due the fact that either people don't care or the reporter's personal bias.

[Evaders99]

The UN needs to be disbanded; recreated with just the countries who are democracies and put freedom and liberty first. Why do we give voice to dictatorships - those countries who say one thing but act against the ideals of the UN. We put countries in spots like "human rights" that are no friends of human rights - creating a place for a platform against only one country: Israel (an actual democractic country). We have situations like in Kosovo that the UN dealt with, after everything was done. We look at what led to US action in Iraq... it was part of UN's inability to enforce its own resolutions after 12 years. Further the International Criminal Court claims jurisdiction to try any person, in any country - whether or not they agree to it.

 

The UN is in a sad shape - I think FDR and Churchill would be appalled at what it has (and has not) done over this 50+ years.

[Darth_Rob]

I agree with you Mad. There are many countries who have a voice in the UN that definitely don't deserve it. But at the same time, the UN acts as a sort-of kind-of diplomacy arena and what not.

[budious]

Perfect example, Hugo Chavez shows up at the doorstep of the UN in NYC. The US as the host country of the UN headquarters has to put on good face and allow the dictactor/enemy to enter our country freely. Hugo comes in, offers free heating oil for poor US citizens, bashes Bush, and the UN celebrate his visit. Ack Med Automad, or whatever the hell name president of Iran gets the same previledge to visit UN and share his rhetoric. The UN cares nothing of solving the worlds problems, they only exploit politics and try to give the little guy a helping hand, regardless if he is friend or foe. They only delay the inevitable and are an inadequate solution as peace keepers. Look at their roles in African war zones, they stay camped up in their little UN compounds and the UN forces are not allowed to interfere in a fight right outside their doors. Unless they come under direct fire, armed UN forces do nothing to enforce "peace" in the regions they occupy. It is a continous waste of resources and left-winger optimism left over from a post WWII era.

[Jahled]

Emm.. I think we can all agree the UN as it is now is in a sorry shape, and ineffectual at preventing or interveining in areas of conflict. Whilst I agree in princible to excluding dictatorships that's not a realistically practical suggestion surely? To many of these dictators are at present regional allies, or simply to big to throw out of the UN, like China.

 

Edit: *removes crap example*

Edited February 9, 2007 by Jahled

[budious]

Or simply to put, there is no need for the UN because - While technology and time progress, human nature simply does not. ~ me

 

How the hell do you apply the UN to a stateless enemy such as radical islam? There are no methods to supress human nature and any given thought that you can control it is just disillusion. I think everybody agrees on the principles of religous freedom (unless of course you are an islamic radical) but it does not necessarily have to be inclusive of religious integration. If you don't like me, and tell me this in my home, you can damn well go back to yours. I don't think the USA is any where near that point (yet) but from all that I see in the international press, the UK has a mess on its hands and needs to start deporting some radicals before all hell breaks loose.

 

Of mankind we may say in general they are fickle, hypocritical, and greedy of gain. ~ Niccolo Machiavelli

[Jahled]

Fair enough. I'm having one of those days.

[budious]

I'm always having one of those days... still drunk and writing fictious entries on urban dictionary between random forum postings across the internet... it's 9am so think I'm going to shower and goto bed.

[turtle]

The concept of the UN worked 50 years ago when it was just starting up, but those concepts have changed.

 

Since the values, needs and problems have changed what the UN needs to do is to change it's values and it needs to change how it works.

 

If Star wars has taught us anything it's that senates/governing bodies when they encompass hundreds of different values and points of views and they try to sit down and debate how to resolve a situation just doesn't work cause there are too many voices, too many opinions and too many surgestions. In the end all that happens is talk or argue.

 

The UN needs to turn away from trying to be a 'world governing body'.

[DarthTex]

I got this in an e-mail awhile back. I don't know if it's accurate or not, but it definitely fits ...

 

You gotta love Robin Williams......Even if he's nuts! Leave it to Robin Williams to come up with the perfect plan. What we need now is for our UN Ambassador to stand up and repeat this message.

 

Robin Williams' plan...(Hard to argue with this logic!)

 

"I see a lot of people yelling for peace but I have not heard of a plan for peace. So, here's one plan."

 

1) "The US will apologize to the world for our "interference" in their affairs, past & present. You know, Hitler, Mussolini, Stalin, Tojo, Noriega, Milosevic, Hussein, and the rest of those "good 'ole' boys", we will never "interfere" again.

 

2) We will withdraw our troops from all over the world, starting with Germany , South Korea, the Middle East, and the Philippines. They don't want us there. We would station troops at our borders. No one allowed sneaking through holes in the fence.

 

3) All illegal aliens have 90 days to get their affairs together and leave We'll give them a free trip home. After 90 days the remainder will be gathered up and deported immediately, regardless of whom or where they are. They're illegal!!! France will welcome them.

 

4) All future visitors will be thoroughly checked and limited to 90 days unless given a special permit!!!! No one from a terrorist nation will be allowed in. If you don't like it there, change it yourself and don't hide here. Asylum would never be available to anyone. We don't need any more cab drivers or 7-11 cashiers.

 

5) No foreign "students" over age 21. The older ones are the bombers. If they don't attend classes, they get a "D" and it's back home baby.

 

6) The US will make a strong effort to become self-sufficient energy wise. This will include developing nonpolluting sources of energy but will require a temporary drilling of oil in the Alaskan wilderness. The caribou will have to cope for a while.

 

7) Offer Saudi Arabia and other oil producing countries $10 a barrel for their oil. If they don't like it, we go someplace else. They can go somewhere else to sell their production (About a week of the wells filling up the storage sites would be enough.)

 

8 ) If there is a famine or other natural catastrophe in the world, we will not "interfere." They can pray to Allah or whomever, for seeds, rain, cement or whatever they need. Besides most of what we give them is stolen or given to the army. The people who need it most get very little, if anything.

 

9) Ship the UN Headquarters to an isolated island someplace. We don't need the spies and fair weather friends here. Besides, the building would make a good homeless shelter or lockup for illegal aliens.

 

10) All Americans must go to charm and beauty school. That way, no one can call us "Ugly Americans" any longer. The Language we speak is ENGLISH..learn it...or LEAVE...Now, isn't that a winner of a plan?

 

"The Statue of Liberty is no longer saying "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses." She's got a baseball bat and she's yelling, 'you want a piece of me?' "

 

 

 

 

I agree with you Mad...

Uh Rob, Mad hasn't commented in this thread. Do you mean someone else, or are thinking of something Mad said in another thread?

 

[ElvisMiggell]

Didn't the USA try splendid isolation a few years back and fail miserably?

[Darth_Rob]

@Tex- HAHAHA!!! For some reason, I called Evaders Mad.

[DarthTofu]

@Evlis: During the '40s we did indeed try. Then Japan bombed Pearl Harbor and everything went straight down the crapper. Granted, we were granting military aid to our European allies, but we weren't, strictly speaking, involved in foreign affairs.

 

I've gotta agree with J's logic on having to accept Communist countries: China, Russia (to a certain extent. They have a fascade Democracy IMHO)... Without them in the fold it's a rather sad world...

[malarkie]

Malarkie's plan to fix the U.N.

 

1. Let their army do something other then distribute food in baby blue uniforms.

 

2. Set standards of conduct for client nations and commitees

 

3. Actually enforce the resolutions that are passed

 

4. Do something proactive

 

Or we could just continue to ignore it.

[SOCL]

I think the situation though is that the United Nations is not and was never meant to be an international governing body. Rather, it was established to be a medium by which to mediate and resolve disputes among all the countries of the world, democracy, dictatorship, or otherwise. It's an investment of hope in human nature and was never meant to dictate international policy. All the criticism people throw at the Secretary-General, for instance, I believe is unfair as the he is not a President or PM and is not afforded any of those powers. Better put, he is more a Chief Dispute Counselor who, by means if diplomacy, tries to resolve issues, which is a description that applies to the UN as a whole.

 

NATO is another instance where people expect too much. Unlike a government or the United Nations, NATO is a military alliance designed to combat the spread of Soviet expansion. It has never dictated policy and, like the UN, was never meant to govern those nations under its charter. The UN and NATO are to associations of nations formed in the hope that nations would cooperate, which most nations have proven they refuse to do, from the typified enemies of Iraq and Iran to permanent members of the Security Council and founders like the United States and the People's Republic of China. It's a matter of honor, something that cannot be trusted to happen among humans, especially on such a large scale. In truth, the United Nations serves its purpose as long as everyone agrees to play nice and fair. Since no one seems to want to do that any more, then the UN falters.

 

One more time: the UN's success is based on the cooperation and positive participation of its member states, not any decision-making body. This is why the United Nations is not a government and why each country only has one vote instead of more votes in accordance with population, as would be expected in a democratically-founded governing body. It was never meant to govern policy or direct nations around like the Federal Government of the United States can do to its States. Cooperation or bust is the motto, all based on everyone's willingness to play along. If everyone decides not to, then that's that.

[Darth_Rob]

In my opinion, and I've been saying this for many, many years, the only way the world will unite (and thus the UN will work very well) will be when we find alien life. Once the extraterristrials (sp) make contact, the world will be changed. We will not look at existence from a nation point of view, but from a planetery point of view. We will be Earthicans (thanks to Futurama for coining that phrase, though I prefer Earthians. Either one is better than "Earthling"), and the world's nations will unite to better the human race in general.

[SOCL]

On that, Rob, I truly agree with you. Throughout history, people have only united when there is a reason to unite, and in those instances, the most successful unifications have been those under threat from an outside force of some sort. Harry Turtledove, known for his alternative history novels, wrote a series of novels called "World War" about aliens invading Earth in the middle of World War II. It chronicles how the war ends and the nations of Earth (including the Third Reich) unite to fight the common enemy. Peculiar, but interesting, and the man writes quite well.

[Evaders99]

I've read some of Harry Turtledove, good stuff.

 

Also I recommend Ender's Game series... some politics in forming a triumvirate to conquer the buggers. And when they are no longer a threat, the nations fight each other until they are united by the Hegemon.

[Darth_Rob]

Now, in my theory, it isn't neccessarily due to an alien invasion, just alien contact. I have limited nerdiness in regards to Star Trek, but I remember seeing (and enjoying) First Contact, where they go back in time to ensure that the Vulcan notice them, make contact, and the future is a wonderful thing with the Federation and whatnot. But its like that. Granted, if the aliens are hostile, then of course we're going to unite to defeat them. But even if they "come in peace" the world will still unite as one planet rather than a couple hundred nations.

[malarkie]

I think that if the aliens come in peace that the major powers would try to trade exlusively or at least to an advantage.

[SOCL]

I think that if the aliens come in peace that the major powers would try to trade exlusively or at least to an advantage.

Makes sense. Look at how China (PRC) has risen from shunned nobody on the world stage to being the friend everyone wants to have. Not that I'm comparing or mean to seem to be comparing the PRC to space aliens; rather, a relative stranger to the world-stage appears as a player and everyone wants a piece.

[Darth_Rob]

Can you blame them? China is a HUGE country with the largest population in the world. Who wouldn't want to trade with them to bring home the bacon? I'm sure aliens would be the same case. Though we have to ask ourselves, what can we offer a race of aliens that have mastered the art of intergalactic travel? A free and steady supply of arses for probing?

[DarthTex]

... what can we offer a race of aliens that have mastered the art of intergalactic travel? A free and steady supply of arses for probing?

Remember the (original) Twightlight Zone episode? The one with the friendly visiting space aliens with the book ... To Serve Man?