Euros Love Kofi

Jeff Taylor | December 7, 2004

The overseas press reveals the conviction that UN chief Kofi Annan is somehow getting a raw deal from "Texans" who hate peace. Dumb Americans, obsessed with power, corruption, and the power of corruption.

Comments

|12.7.04 @ 10:51AM|#

Damn Euros! Give me one good reason why they should be skeptical of charges made by the United States regarding the actions of Saddam Hussein's regime. Just one.

|12.7.04 @ 10:54AM|#

Gag. Lecture after lecture about the virtues of democratic decision making and the unimpeachable goodness of UN mandates on the one hand, blatant support for despots and violation of one own dictates on the other. Oh, the persecution! I hope his holiness survives this crown of thorns ...

|12.7.04 @ 10:56AM|#

joe:

Reading through UN mandates regarding Iraq, one would almost come to believe that it wasn't just the US who thought atrocities were being committed. Thanks for clearing that up.

|12.7.04 @ 10:59AM|#

Ah, but our hands are clean in this, so very clean...after all, when Jesus is your co-pilot at the helm of the ship of state, how can we go wrong?

|12.7.04 @ 11:00AM|#

Why did Danforth resign so suddenly with no explanation? Isn't it related?

|12.7.04 @ 11:02AM|#

The first link requires registration. Also, its an Australian news source. Is it an editorial in favor of Kofi? If so, shouldn't the title be "Euros and Aussies Love Kofi?"

From the Sun-Times article is pretty fucking silly or down right ignorant at several points:

The Oil for Food scandal has received scandalously little attention in the European media even though major European figures are plausibly alleged to have taken bribes from Saddam.

I don't read German or Italian media, but it has received considerable attention in Le Figaro, indeed, as much or more as I see in the U.S. press.

...asserting the novel doctrine that the use of force was permissible only with the backing of the Security Council...

Its not a particularly novel doctrine, indeed it is partly implied in the actions of Truman vis a vis the Korean war (and this itself has been commented on since that time) and has been discussed in academic circles for decades.

What we have in the U.N. system is a body that is not accountable democratically...

It was never designed to be "democratic," indeed, how could it be? Are we supposed to directly elect our UN representative or something?

...in charge of significant resources...

Not really; the U.N. is a gnat.

|12.7.04 @ 11:03AM|#

Let's see, Bush's hyper-interventionist, Ariel Sharon first, neocon foreign policy agenda vs. the UN's world government, sovereignty robbing, international tax agenda. This is an easy one.
A PLAUGE ON BOTH THEIR HOUSES!

|12.7.04 @ 11:09AM|#

Ah, yes. "Atrocities being committed." That was what the UN resolution was based on. That's what Colin Powell staked our country's credibility on.

Quick, JL, change the subject again.

|12.7.04 @ 11:25AM|#

"... United States regarding the actions of Saddam Hussein's regime."

I took this more broadly than intended. Okay, let's focus Iraqi compliance.

UN, hands up everyone who was willing to go on the world stage and assert either A) That Saddam had complied with the umpteen existing UN mandates or B) That Saddam had no WMD. Anyone? Anyone?

EVERYONE agreed that there was a problem of compliance and blatant violation of previous UN mandates. Powell made the mistake of throwing every piece of potentially incriminating evidence out in front of the world, but the point being made was that it is not the obligation of the rest of the world to second guess Saddam, it is Saddam's obligation to completely comply.

France, for one, certainly felt that war was justified prior to the debate over the last resolution. We are guilty of laying out a mountain of circumstancial evidence and trying to make the case to a completely inept and corrupt body that their obligations are to enforce their own mandates. US credibility would not have been damaged if we had not bothered. These are serious blunders on our part, to be sure, and we would do well to learn the right lessons from them.

|12.7.04 @ 11:36AM|#

From the Sun Times article:

"They[Americans] look at the multiplying scandals around the U.N. and wonder how the man in charge can avoid being held responsible for any of it by other countries."

Yeah, Americans are accustomed to administrators taking the fall for scandals. Case in point: The Bush administration and Iraq's scandals.

|12.7.04 @ 11:44AM|#

Jason, when I suggested you change the subject again, I was joking. But thanks for the cooperation. Do you understand what the word "credibility" means?

If we had limited our assertions to "Saddam is not in compliance," our credibility wouldn't have suffered. But Bush and his people mislead the world about mobile labs o'death, about existing stockpiles of chem and bio weapons, about ongoing nuke programs, yadda yadda yadda. They stood up in front of the world and said stuff that wasn't true, and said we had proof, which also wasn't true.

The fact that Saddam was lying TOO is irrelevant to the question of our credibility. We got caught crying wolf, and now you're bitching that people don't come a-running as fast as you'd like when we cry wolf again. That, Jason, is why you don't cry wolf when there's no wolf there.

Unhappy with what's going on at the UN and among European governments? Wish we had more influence, and our concerns were being taken more seriously? Me too.

|12.7.04 @ 12:19PM|#

[i]If we had limited our assertions to "Saddam is not in compliance," our credibility wouldn't have suffered.[/i]

I believe that is exactly the approach that Bush followed initially as evidenced by his September speech in front of the UN in 2002. The UN responded with a combination yawn and "how dare he!" I'm not trying to excuse what the Administration did after that in the run-up to war, but it's not a stretch to conclude that the UN was unserious about tackling the Hussein problem. Given what we know about Oil For Food, it's no wonder.

|12.7.04 @ 12:47PM|#

Looks like your buddies over at the Democratic Leadership Council are crying wolf too, Joe.

http://www.ndol.org/ndol_ci.cfm?contentid=253050&kaid=131&subid=192&FREM=Y&sid=19513&mid=9981

Warren|12.7.04 @ 1:04PM|#

I find myself in near total agreement with joe.

I feel so dirty.

I'm going to take a shower.

|12.7.04 @ 1:34PM|#

DLC, joe: not buddies. Allies maybe. Not buddies.

"I'm not trying to excuse what the Administration did after that in the run-up to war, but it's not a stretch to conclude that the UN was unserious about tackling the Hussein problem."

Let's say this is true; does that make it any less harmful to our credibility that we got caught lying?

|12.7.04 @ 1:48PM|#

Joe,

Do you really not know the difference between lying and being wrong?

Should I ground my daughter for lying on her math test?

|12.7.04 @ 1:57PM|#

"Do you really not know the difference between lying and being wrong?

Should I ground my daughter for lying on her math test?"

Your daughter's being wrong on a test is not a life-or-death matter, I assume :)

Bush and Company's "mistake" was a pretty big one. I'm not apologizing for Saddam, but the White House was chomping at the bit in the first place. Big surprise that they made some "factual errors".

|12.7.04 @ 2:04PM|#

Just an honest, good faith error. Whoopsie, sorry about that!

Except that they had the information telling them the aluminum tubes couldn't be used for enriching uranium, they had the information that the balsa wood gliders couldn't reach the US, the reports were coming in from the inspectors that there didn't appear to be any ongoing weapons programs or existing weapons stocks - and they ignored all that, shut down the inspections, and said things they knew not to be true.

That's lying.

|12.7.04 @ 2:05PM|#

But on the merits, anvilwyrm, crying wolf because you honestly thought that squirrel was a wolf is just as harmful to your credibility as making up the wolf out of whole cloth.

|12.7.04 @ 2:28PM|#

Yup, here'a another example of the anti-American viciousness of those left-wing pinkos of Old Europe:

"The witch-hunt against Kofi Annan and the United Nations over the Iraq oil-for-food scandal is, quite simply, a scandal all on its own. The leaders of this lynch mob in the US Congress and the rightwing commentariat are not gunning for Mr Annan so much as aiming to destroy the UN as an institution. That would be a disaster - for all of us, including, especially, the US. ...
First, the oil-for-food policy was devised and run by the member states of the UN Security Council, not by the UN Secretariat. All of the roughly 36,000 contracts were approved by a Security Council committee dominated by the US and the UK. Of these, about 5,000 were held up. But objections were entirely about imports to Iraq that might have offered Baghdad dual-use technology with which to reconstitute its weapons programmes. There was not one objection about oil-pricing scams, although UN officials brought these to the attention of the committee on no fewer than 70 occasions. ...

"If the independent inquiry headed by Paul Volcker, the former Federal Reserve chairman, finds any UN official complicit in Iraq's roughly $4.4bn oil price skimming, then that person should have his diplomatic immunity lifted and be prosecuted. But there is nothing here to be laid at the door of Mr Annan, even though the lobbying activities of his son Kojo, who was still receiving severance payments from a company seeking Iraq's trade after oil-for-food started, will have hurt him."

Oh yeah, that was from that French (or is it German or Belgian) commie rag, the *Financial Times.*

And of course the same Republicans calling for Kofi to step down voted to keep DeLay even if he's indicted. (True enough, DeLay has not been persoanlly found guilty of anything. But neither as of now has Kofi Annan.)

|12.7.04 @ 2:33PM|#

joe - what if you cried wolf in an area where there are a lot of wolves, and that wolf just happened to be an angry husky that was gnawing on the tiny string that was tying it to a tree, keeping it from killing your kids for now, but likely to break loose any time?

|12.7.04 @ 2:38PM|#

Your analogy doesn't make sense. The "wolf" being cried was WMDs, and atomic weapons in particular. No such wolf was about.

|12.7.04 @ 3:03PM|#

Give me one good reason why they should be skeptical of charges made by the United States regarding the actions of Saddam Hussein's regime

Because kickbacks buy a lot of skepticism. :)

|12.7.04 @ 3:04PM|#

"Unhappy with what's going on at the UN and among European governments? Wish we had more influence, and our concerns were being taken more seriously? Me too."

Yeah, because WHEN THESE SCANDALS OCCURRED, we had sooooo much "influence", and were taken much "more seriously" with the UN. Too bad we were spending OUR influence bombing for blowjobs.

joe, only YOU seem to express interest (yet again) to stick your nose in where it doesn't belong: "among European governments"

Anyone else you care to lecture, joe?

|12.7.04 @ 3:25PM|#

This UN business is of minor importance. What really matters is that Andy is told "chomping at the bit" is not the correct expression he is thinking of. It is "champing".

|12.7.04 @ 5:12PM|#

"Oh yeah, that was from that French (or is it German or Belgian) commie rag, the *Financial Times.*"


Last I heard, the UK was still part of Europe.

|12.7.04 @ 5:54PM|#

"Do you understand what the word "credibility" means?"

I understand that no liberal who has ever drawn breath on this earth in the entire span of human history has ever been an authority on who does or doesn't have credibility about anything.

|12.7.04 @ 6:07PM|#

The first link requires registration. Also, its an Australian news source. Is it an editorial in favor of Kofi? If so, shouldn't the title be "Euros and Aussies Love Kofi?"

Actually it's an article about Tony Blair's defence of Kofi. I understand some people think of Britain as being in Europe. This, then, is an Aussie saying "Euros Love Kofi"

And I think the "Sydney Morning Herald" qualifies as "overseas press".

|12.7.04 @ 7:44PM|#

cbk: True enough, but Britain and eastern Europe are supposed to be "good", only French, Germans, Belgians, etc. "bad." Or at least the only "bad" British are supposed to be *Guardian*/BBC style left-liberals--which the *Financial Times* is not...

|12.7.04 @ 10:23PM|#

Or at least the only "bad" British are supposed to be *Guardian*/BBC style left-liberals--which the *Financial Times* is not...

It's hardly news that the Brits like the UN a lot more than we do. Blair's need for UN "legitimacy" was the primary reason why we bothered trying to convince them to sign off on the war in the first place.

It's probably better for America that Kofi stay in charge. If the UN actually cleaned house Americans might actually start thinking that the institution had worthy qualities. So long as its openly run by crooked Europeans and their token third-worlders the case for the United Nations will remain hard to make here in the States. It isn't like it matters who's running the show over there anyway.

|12.7.04 @ 11:16PM|#

"I understand that no liberal who has ever drawn breath on this earth in the entire span of human history has ever been an authority on who does or doesn't have credibility about anything."

LoL