Saturday, May 8, 2004
Tom Lantos, a Democrat Congressman who mostly gets it right on the War on Terror, and certainly on Israel and issues of antisemitism, urges sanity and caution in being too harsh on the UN, particularly in regard to the Oil-for-Food scandal. Why? "Because we need them."
I'm sorry, but the UN is a fataly flawed organization, and propping them up when they don't deserve it strikes me as akin to propping up a brutal dictator in the hope that he'll serve our interests. The trouble is, once someone is standing on their own two feet, they have the ability to walk their own way. Witness Egypt which hasn't exactly been helpful to our goals in spite of our support. They are a flawed government and society, and hoping for the best from them belies their nature as we see it right before our eyes. So too with the UN - a fatally flawed organization which we prop up at our peril - particularly if we need to delude ourselves in order to do so.
Investigate, Don't Incapacitate (washingtonpost.com)
Since the end of January, when an Iraqi newspaper alleged that a senior U.N. official had taken bribes from Saddam Hussein, the United Nations has been the target of unsubstantiated allegations involving potential mismanagement, unethical behavior and collusion with Hussein's despicable regime. The notion that a high-level U.N. official could have been on Baghdad's payroll is sickening, if true, and it must be investigated.
That being said, it has been just as sickening to see that longtime haters of the United Nations are using the bribery charge and other unproven allegations to discredit the world body when the case against it is far from clear. This campaign of slander threatens great harm to U.S. interests because it is aimed at undermining the United Nations' ability to help us in Iraq.
Based on my preliminary review of the oil-for-food program, it appears that the United Nations took action to prevent some of the abuses of which it is being accused, and that much responsibility for the problems that beset the program lies with the members of the Security Council, including our own government...
