-By Frank Salvato
There are many disturbing issues to contemplate in the world. From the dangers of aggressive Islamofascism to the pomposity and arrogance of the American elected class (and those vying to be included) the world stands witness to myriad threats and power grabs. But two power grabs opens the door for the United Nations to both amass sovereign rights and to fund and assemble a military force under its own banner.
That the United Nations is a corrupt and ineffective institution is an understatement. The list of illegal activities and instances of institutionalized bigotry are so numerable that they weave a tapestry of embarrassment that would incite any governmental body with integrity to disband. Truth be told, they can‚t even agree on a definition for “terrorism.” As they say, absolute power corrupts, absolutely.
An example of the UN‚s corrupt leadership can be seen in the Oil-for-Food scandal, one of the larger blemishes on the face of the organization. Alas, it is a blemish that the secular-progressive press failed to expose in detail. You see, a few corrupt world leaders ˆ we‚ll cite Jacque Chirac as a prime example ˆ were utilizing their seats on the UN Security Council to hold the United States and aligned coalition countries at bay while they violated the resolutions put in place by that very organization. Their actions defrauded the Oil-for-Food program of millions if not billions of dollars and enriched Saddam Hussein in the process.
For the press to have investigated this bilking of the world‚s taxpayers would have been to frame the UN as a fallible entity, an organization capable of being wrong, dead wrong. With the “peace at all cost” contingent running roughshod over the media organizations of the free world, it was unacceptable to diminish the reputation of the UN, especially at a time when the Great Stan himself, President George W. Bush, was keeping his post-9/11 pledge to go after terrorists and those nations that aided and abetted them in their endeavors.
Then we have a plethora of examples of the United Nation‚s ineptitude. From peacekeeping missions to global problem solving, their number of victories pale in comparison to the number of disasters.
In locations from Congo, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Somalia to Darfur and most notably in the 1994 Rwandan genocide, the United Nations has been a dismal failure in providing security and keeping the peace.
In Rwanda, the UN peacekeeping force commander, Lieutenant General Roméo Dallaire, pleaded with his “superiors” at Turtle Bay at that time the peacekeeping division of the UN was overseen by none other than Kofi Annan to allow him the authority to circumvent the impending genocide. His repeated requests would be denied.
Dallaire described Annan who would become UN Secretary General as being “overly passive in his response” to the reports of a possible genocide. In his book, Shake Hands with the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda, Gen. Dallaire explicitly states that Annan not only held back UN troops from intervening and from providing more tangible support, but that he failed to provide any responses to Dallaire‚s repeated communiqués begging him for access to a weapons depository with precious arms and ammunition, something that could have helped save tens if not hundreds of thousands of Tutsi lives.
In hindsight, US President Bill Clinton shared his “regret” in his lack of action saying he believed if he had sent just 5,000 military personnel to the troubled area more than 500,000 lives could have been saved.
Today in Darfur, we are seeing a reconstitution of the same inane policies and lack of definitive action as in Rwanda circa 1994. As opportunistic Islamofascist elements capitalize on the disorganization of the Sudanese government in an attempt to establish an enclave beholden to Sharia Law, they manipulate the lethargic diplomatic process employed by the UN and all its subordinate organizations. The result, once again, is genocide.
And while many of those who support the charitable efforts of the UN tout their humanitarian missions, i.e., their efforts to feed the starving and treat the diseased, the fact is that most often the food and medicine provided by the UN literally serves to empower the oppressive elements of those affected regions. Food and medicine routinely sit idle at the drop-off locations only to be used by warlords and militias as leverage against the very people the supplies were meant to benefit.
Today, with all these many failures to show for its tenure, the United Nations is now attempting to expand its potency in an effort to create authority beyond its chartered mission statement:
“The stated aims of the United Nations are to maintain international peace and security, to safeguard human rights, to provide a mechanism for international law, and to promote social and economic progress, improve living standards, and fight diseases.”
Nowhere in the UN charter does it give the international body the authority to impose any kind of tax on its member nations or the citizens thereof. Additionally, its charter does not give the body the authority to redefine especially in a time of peace the sovereign borders of any nation, regardless of the economic benefit. Yet two initiatives championed by the United Nations establish these authorities.
The Law of the Sea Treaty, which President Ronald Reagan brilliantly shunned for the fact that it ceded US sovereignty to the United Nations, allows for the encroachment of UN authority over sovereign US soil and associated waterways. The US Senate is keen to ratify this treaty and President Bush has indicated that he will sign it. Proponents suggest that the treaty solidifies safe passage for our naval vessels throughout the world. Statements this obtuse are seldom heard. That the United States Navy is the best trained, best equipped and most potent military force in all the oceans of the world is guarantee of safe passage enough. We shouldn‚t be giving away offshore mineral rights to satisfy a addiction to unnecessary diplomatic endeavors.
But the most disturbing and the most dangerous initiatives presented of late are the initiatives surrounding the junk science of manmade global warming.
Many will be moved to kneejerk reaction by that statement. That they are so moved serves as testimony to their status as spineless, misinformed, uneducated followers; not a leader among them.
To declare that the scientific debate on mans role in the global warming and cooling cycle is over, a consensus reached, is to promote a blatant lie. The only consensus that exists is entered into by those politicians and scientists who believe man is a major element in the current global warming cycle. Those who agree that man is a significant cause of global warming have formed a consensus.
Responsible scientists, devoid of political pressure and eco-agenda, have been feverishly attempting to bring forth information that debunks mans influence on the naturally reoccurring global warming and cooling cycles. They have been thwarted every step of the way by not only the Green movement, environmentalists and that entrepreneurial opportunist, Al Gore, they have been rendered voiceless by the counter-culture eco-generation of the 1960s, now in control of mainstream media and the United Nations hierarchy itself.
A shadow of doubt is cast over the legitimacy of the science presented by the UN and its manmade global warming proponents by basic scientific dogma. A scientist is taught to systematically “rule out” detractor arguments and possibilities in their quest for a theory‚s validation. In essence, a consensus should never be reached unless it is a consensus that a group of scientists cannot disprove a theory. In the case of manmade global warming there is a sizable contingent of scientists who can disprove manmade global warming but they are being silenced by the eco-community, even to the extent of being banned from the most recent climate conference in Bali.
I had mentioned that the manmade global warming hoax was a dangerous one. When we examine the economic impact any global limitations on industry and energy might have we can certainly see that the world‚s economic system would be manipulated. That in itself is good enough reason to look at all aspects of the issue before calculating any actions.
The bigger issue here is less about the imposition of economic limitations on first-world nations inequitably and more about the establishment of the United Nations as a taxing body.
A panel of UN participants at the United Nations climate conference in Bali ˆ the same conference that the aforementioned scientists were banned from ˆ urged the UN to create a global tax on carbon dioxide emissions to help save the Earth from catastrophic man-made global warming. The panel said the adoption of a tax would represent “a global burden sharing system, fair, with solidarity, and legally binding to all nations.”
Let me state this as clearly as possible, the United Nations, an assembly of representatives from sovereign nations, should never be given the ability to impose taxes on any nation or group of people, ever, period.
Once the precedent of the United Nations as a taxing body is established it opens the door for independently funded entities and missions, entities and missions that could be employed without the consent of the majority of member nations and, quite possibly, without the consent of the Security Counsel.
Should the United Nations be given the power to tax the peoples of the world, to amass an independent financial stream, what is to keep them from raising a military force? The possibility is not far fetched.
Consider that many in the international body would push for self-sufficient peacekeeping forces so that nations‚ militaries would not be depleted for peacekeeping missions. Once that genie is out of the bottle, the questions of its utilization and the catalyst for deployment all become subjective.
Don‚t get me wrong, I believe that we should be as kind to our planet as possible. I believe we should be moving away from an oil-based energy system as fast as possible, if not for environmental reasons then for the fact that petro-dollars are used by Islamofascist nations to fund Wahhabist ideology and terrorist organizations. To that extent the enviro-fundamentalists and neo-cons actually have a common ground to work from. But to allow a corrupt and inept international body the authority to raise an independent financial stream when in all actuality the institution‚s performance warrants cessation…
It was a travesty when Al Gore won the Nobel. It would be an unrecoverable disaster should the UN be allowed to become a taxing body.
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Frank Salvato is the managing editor for The New Media Journal . He serves at the Executive Director of the Basics Project, a non-profit, non-partisan, 501(C)(3) research and education initiative. His pieces are regularly featured in over 100 publications both nationally and internationally. He has appeared on The O’Reilly Factor, and is a regular guest on The Right Balance with Greg Allen on the Accent Radio Network, as well as an occasional guest on numerous radio shows coast to coast. He recently partnered in producing the first-ever symposium on the threat of radical Islamist terrorism in Washington, DC. His pieces have been recognized by the House International Relations Committee and the Japan Center for Conflict. He can be contacted at oped@newmediajournal.us