The UN's record on human rights

[I miss Reagan]

I think that's the kind of "generosity" a lot of foreign countries can live without.

Really? Who is it the world first calls on for help when something goes wrong? It isn't the UN. How does Germany feel that US troops are leaving?

"That has all kinds of repercussions, especially for the economy" Dennis Phelps of the American-German Business Club told DW-WORLD. "There is a whole American infrastructure here -- American houses, American schools -- when the military pulls out, these things close. It also means that soldiers are spending money in local shops or paying local landlords rents."

Japan certainly appreciates the US presence. How about ethnic Albanians? South Koreans? Afganis? How bout the Kurds? Could they live without the US gnerosity? Even you yourself owe your freedom to the USA while you live under their protection.

[Black Dog]

Really? Who is it the world first calls on for help when something goes wrong? It isn't the UN.

Oh yeah: I forgot how America stopped the genocide in Rwanada, boldly forged ahead in the Sudan, and stood up to the Russians in Chechnya.

Heck those Americans are so great, sometimes they don't even wait to be asked....

How does Germany feel that US troops are leaving?

I imagine the prostitution industry is pretty distressed.

Japan certainly appreciates the US presence. How about ethnic Albanians? South Koreans? Afganis? How bout the Kurds? Could they live without the US gnerosity?

How about Iraqis? Columbians? Chileans? Salvadorians?

Even you yourself owe your freedom to the USA while you live under their protection?

How do i owe my freedom to a country that's never lifted a finger in my defence and is not currently protecting me from anybody? In fact, they're making my life more dangerous these days.

[Black Dog]

A closer look at U.S. generosity:

"Tied Aid" strangling nations

[Njoki Njoroge] Njehu [director of the 50 Years is Enough campaign] cited the example of Eritrea, which discovered it would be cheaper to build its network of railways with local expertise and resources rather than be forced to spend aid money on foreign consultants, experts, architects and engineers imposed on the country as a condition of development assistance.

Strings attached to US aid for similar projects, she added, include the obligation to buy products such as Caterpillar and John Deere tractors. “All this adds up to the cost of the project.”

Njehu also pointed out that money being doled out to Africa to fight HIV/AIDS is also a form of tied aid. She said Washington is insisting that the continent's governments purchase anti-AIDS drugs from the United States instead of buying cheaper generic products from South Africa, India or Brazil.

As a result, she said, US brand name drugs are costing up to 15,000 dollars a year compared with 350 dollars annually for generics.

...

AGOA [African Growth and Opportunity Act, signed into US law in 2000] is more sinister than tied aid, says Njehu. “If a country is to be eligible for AGOA, it has to refrain from any actions that may conflict with the US's ‘strategic interests.’”

“The potential of this clause to influence our countries' foreign policies was hinted at during debates at the United Nations over the invasion of Iraq,” she added.

“The war against Iraq was of strategic interest to the United States,” Njehu said. As a result, she said, several African members of the UN Security Council, including Cameroon, Guinea and Angola, were virtually held to ransom when the United States was seeking council support for the war in 2003.

“They came under heavy pressure,” she said. “The message was clear: either you vote with us or you lose your trade privileges.

Keep in mind that more than 70 per cent of all U.S. aid commitments are tied to the purchase of goods and services from the U.S.

Aid stinginess isn't limited to the U.S.. Every year, more money is sent from poor countries to rich one sthan the other way around.

[I miss Reagan]

I forgot how America stopped the genocide in Rwanada

Great point! Wasn't that a UN operation? Exactly why the US is the first to be called like Haiti.

Sudan

Lol. Ya the UN is doing a great job there as well . BTW the US has been trying to light a fire under the UN to get involved. Unfortunately they don't consider the situation "genocide". Another great point!

stood up to the Russians in Chechnya

Would you really like the US to become antagonistic to a relatively less than stable country with a lot of nukes? And which Chechens would you like them to stand up for? The ones who killed innocent teenagers at a rock concert? The ones who took hostages at a play in Moscow? or perhaps the brave and oppressed Chechens who killed mothers, children and babies on their first day of school in Beslan.

I imagine the prostitution industry is pretty distressed.

What a cop out.

How about Iraqis?

Ya how bout the Iraqis? The ones waving their ink dyed fingers after risking their lives to vote? Those Iraqis? Or better yet how about the Kuwaitis? Did I ever tell you about the lunch I had with the ignorant Ontarians bloviating about the awful US occupation in Iraq only to be chided by the Kuwaitis sitting next to them who were celebrating the US ouster of Saddam Hussein. Columbia?

Ya the government enjoys the hundreds of millions in aid the US gives them for counter terrorism. Nepal appreciates the help as well against the Maoists.

How do i owe my freedom to a country that's never lifted a finger in my defence and is not currently protecting me from anybody?

Ya I know, there is no terrorist threat. That whole cold war thing was blown way out proportion as well. The Soviets never would have touched us if the US wasn't

there right?

[Black Dog]

Great point! Wasn't that a UN operation? Exactly why the US is the first to be called like Haiti.

A UN operation that the US oppossed and handicapped (f'r instance, by refusing to jam radio broadcasts inciting the violence)

Lol. Ya the UN is doing a great job there as well  . BTW the US has been trying to light a fire under the UN to get involved. Unfortunately they don't consider the situation "genocide". Another great point!

Nobody but the U.S. considers it genocide. It's a deplorable situation fo rsure, but the U.S. is making a fuss because they want the curent regime out. It has nothing to do with humanitarian concerns.

Would you really like the US to become antagonistic to a relatively less than stable country with a lot of nukes? And which Chechnyians would you like them to stand up for? The ones who killed innocent teenagers at a rock concert? The ones who took hostages at a play in Moscow? or perhaps the brave and oppressed Chechnyans who killed mothers, children and babies on their first day of school in Beslan.

So the US won't stand up to anyone who's not a third-rate pisspot, dirt poor backwater? ooh..tough guys!

You clearly know nothing of Chechnya.

Ya how bout the Iraqis? The ones waving their ink dyed fingers after risking their lives to vote? Those Iraqis

Or how about the fallujans living in tents and makeshift camps because they have no homes to go to? How about the children who's parents were gunned down as they drove past a U.S. patrol? Or the mothers of children born deformed from exposure to depeleted uranium.

Or better yet how about the Kuwaitis?

Ah yes, another shining victory for democracy, that.

Columbia?

Ya the government enjoys the hundreds of millions in aid the US gives them for counter terrorism.

Money which funds paramilitary death squads that make the country safe from unions, indiginous persons and anyone else who gets in the way of Occidental Petroleum and the CIA's drug business.

There's more going on in the world than what you see on Fox, boy.

[I miss Reagan]

There's more going on in the world than what you see on Fox, boy.

Typical cop out from one of Chomsky's sheep.

[I miss Reagan]

is making a fuss because they want the curent regime out. It has nothing to do with humanitarian concerns.

"Proooove it boyo"

[August1991]

The only possible response to this thread, other than getting into the nitty gritty details which I may well do at some point, is to point to the evidence:

To wit, Maoism longer exists. Trotskyism also. Marxist-Leninism has basically disappeared. The only places these ideas exist anymore is in western university faculties and on Internet forums.

The basic ideas embodied by the US work. The ideas presented by the Left over the past 100 or so years don't work.

Please don't tell me that I'm confusing "democratic socialism" and "state capitalism" or some such. All the same ideas argued by the Left were used also by the Red Guard in China.

IOW, the basic US model of free market economics and accountable democratic government is successful.

The US won the Cold War. It didn't win because it was stronger (although it was.) And the US didn't bring communism to its knees, as such.

The US won when Deng Xioaping said that "It doesn't matter whether a cat is black or white as long as it catches mice." The US won when Mikhail Gorbachev started glasnost and perestroika. The US won when UK voters rejected James Callaghan, Harold Wilson and chose Margaret Thatcher.

The modern 2005 Canadian left basically realizes all of this. It is already a long way away from what it was 30 years ago or certainly 70 years ago. The best the "progressive" movement can come up with now is "gay rights". A position that is closer to the American ideal of individual freedom than any collective ideology.

As to the topic of this thread, the UN is this weird Statist entity created in a different time and place. In 50 years, it will not exist as we know it now.

[Michael Hardner]

Well, I agree that the 5 states with veto power need to lead a reform, but I don't see the new organization being any more palatable to the US somehow.

And...

Please don't tell me that I'm confusing "democratic socialism" and "state capitalism" or some such. All the same ideas argued by the Left were used also by the Red Guard in China.

IOW, the basic US model of free market economics and accountable democratic government is successful

Many nations with strong state presence, mixed with capitalism still survive and are strong. Are you including these as part of the 'basic US model' ?

[Black Dog]

Typical cop out from one of Chomsky's sheep

Yawn.

To wit, Maoism longer exists. Trotskyism also. Marxist-Leninism has basically disappeared. The only places these ideas exist anymore is in western university faculties and on Internet forums.

The basic ideas embodied by the US work. The ideas presented by the Left over the past 100 or so years don't work.

I would certainly take issue with characterizing the Elightenment ideals of democracy, equality and frredom (inasmuch as these words have been debased) as American inventions.

Please don't tell me that I'm confusing "democratic socialism" and "state capitalism" or some such. All the same ideas argued by the Left were used also by the Red Guard in China.

Ah nothing like building your argument around a premise and then refusing to accept challenges to said premise. A sure winner everytime.

[August1991]

I would certainly take issue with characterizing the Elightenment ideals of democracy, equality and frredom (inasmuch as these words have been debased) as American inventions.

Americans could take credit for the French Enlightenment but I won't argue the case here. Instead, I'll say that Americans successfully embodied its ideas. America got down to business.

This inspired France, the UK, Europe and lately Gorbachev and Deng Hsiao-Ping.

Many nations with strong state presence, mixed with capitalism still survive and are strong. Are you including these as part of the 'basic US model' ?

When the US was founded, the general experience of "government" was a despotic sovereign. Too often, it became a tyrant. The 'basic US model' restricts government.

Michael, I don't argue that the US model is the final version. I mean that free markets with a price usually work well. When they don't, we have to find other solutions - for example, the "government".

As an institution, government is a work in progress. Family and clans are much older. So too is the market. But government is new. (So new, Hugo denies it should even exist. Yet some others believe it should do every thing.)

Please don't tell me that I'm confusing "democratic socialism" and "state capitalism" or some such. All the same ideas argued by the Left were used also by the Red Guard in China.

Ah nothing like building your argument around a premise and then refusing to accept challenges to said premise. A sure winner everytime.

BD, I thought of this comment because of two very readable books: Life and Death in Shanghai and Private Life of Chairman Mao.

If you read these books (both autobiographical, easy, fun, horrific, filled with gossipy tidbits), you will read every typical Left wing argument.

The Red Guards used all the rabble.ca type arguments. Difference? The Red Guards applied the arguments. (BD, have you heard the phrase "Red and Expert"?)

BD, I have constructed no premise in some arcane debate dependent on abilities to articulate using words such as construct. The Western Left does that.

[Guest eureka]

August, it could also be argued that the American experiment was a reaction to the Enlightment. It happened a century (almost) after the "Glorious Revolution" on Britain and the Bill of Rights. It gave itself a Constitution that was quite dileberately designed to be undemocratic.

It was a Constitution that gave no protection for individual rights and the first ten amendments did not correct that. They simply affirmed that the federal government could not interfere with the power of the member states to trample on civil rights.

America is the prime example of refusal to endorse the UN Covenant on social, political and economic rights. That was something agreed to by Roosevelt, Stalin, and Churchill. It was to be ratified by member states as and when they could afford to implement the requirements.

Only America in the first years after the war could afford to implement the Covenant, It did not do so, and, even to this day, it is the most flagrant violator of the provisions.

The USSR, incidentally did ratify. It chose that rather than the Charter. Of course Stalin's tongue was in his cheek but Roosevelt's was not. The implentation just does not fit into the "Free Market" and the oligarchical society.

Perhaps if the major industrial powers would put into action the UN's programs, the discussion of the UN would take a different path.

[moderateamericain]

as opposed to who? canada? i dont think canada needs to lecture the US on humanitarian add as we give 4 to 5 times more add then the next closest country. and as far as your statistic you posted i didnt really see a source on that. Another thing to consider is we are a country of 340 million plus of course thats going to spread the average amount donated per person out. your stastistics are misleading

[Guest eureka]

The US is close to the lowest in aid and it does not have 340 million people.

[moderateamericain]

The US is close to the lowest in aid and it does not have 340 million people.

n pure dollars the U.S. is the largest donor of foreign aid in the world. In 2003 the U.S. gave over $15 billion as measured by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). As a percentage of GNP, however, the U.S. ranks far down in the list of donors at number 21. That same $15 billion was .14% of the GNP in 2003. Norway, giving just over $2 billion in aid was the leading donor by percentage of GNP at .92% in 2003. This has prompted many (especially outside the U.S.) to say that the America should do more. A large number of polls, however, (search Foreign Aid here) indicate many Americans both overestimate the amount of aid we give as a percentage of GNP and feel that the amount is too large.

so yes were are the largest donor of aid, if you go by percentage of GNP were 21st. which is not the lowest theres hundreds of countries out there.

http://www.globalpolicy.org/finance/

The United Nations and all its agencies and funds spend about $10 billion each year, or about $1.70 for each of the world's inhabitants

so now what your feeble intellect is unable to grasp. the united states gives the largest dollar amount of any country in the world.

and i stand corrected are population is

http://ask.census.gov/cgi-bin/askcensus.cf...fcGFnZT0x&p_li=

293,382,953 people

[Guest eureka]

You should be careful when youwrite of "feeble intellects." You may have to be shown up.

The United States is one of the lowest in foreign aid - as your own figures show. Total aid does not excuse its parsimony. And, as Balck Dog detaiked and I have said, the aid is largely aid that is tied to its own interests; not to the interests of the recipients.

In other words, much of the US aid is returned to the US. Their aid program is a disgrace.

[I miss Reagan]

Eureka,

You ignore the personal contributions of Americans. They donate far more than any other country. This is a philisophical difference. The nanny state attitude of liberals dictates tax and make decisions for the people rather than incentive and giving people a choice. You also ignore the expense of the military contributions of the US. As much as you disparage US foreign policy, someone has to do the dirty work.

[moderateamericain]

so regardless of how much we send, if its not over .92 percent of are GNP we are pathetic? what logic you display. as it cleary states first in dollars 21st in percentage. that is clearly not last. A is A, A cannot B. How you come about your logic is beyond me. I find it amusing that you would get upset about the fact that we donate to are advantage, why wouldnt we? Austrailia was the largest donater after the tsunami and you know why? its one of there largest trading partners. Human nature is such that you will do things to your advantage. i find it striking that even though we dontate more cash money than any other country in the world its considred bad donors, i feel as an americain its like a child throwing a temper because they didnt get that toy they wanted at the store. maybe the world should appreciate what we do donate and not bash us for what we dont

[Guest eureka]

IMR, I am not ignoring that. Black Dog, earlier, gave the breakdowns and they were not flatterung to the US. Othere countries also give as indiduals in large amounts so that is not an excuse.

One problem with individual giving, too, is that it is rarely targeted to other than specific issues - usually to tear jerking situations. It is not all that effective in bringing the recipients to a higher rung on the ladder to self support.

This is the same argument that some make about charitable giing internally in the US as an acceptable alternative to the government programs that we have. Only it isn't. It is a fraction of the need and is indiscriminate and uncertain.

[Guest eureka]

moderateamerican, look back to Black Dog's explanation of tied aid or to my references to it. I did not explain it but BD did.

It really is not aid at all. It is returned through trade of a nature that prevents the recipient from developing its own capacities.

[moderateamericain]

moderateamerican, look back to Black Dog's explanation of tied aid or to my references to it. I did not explain it but BD did.

It really is not aid at all. It is returned through trade of a nature that prevents the recipient from developing its own capacities.

i dont disagree with it, why shouldnt we make them pump it back into are economy its basically a form of paying us back. to be honest they are lucky to get anything at all. because we asked that you buy from US comanies AFTER you recieve your donation surprises you? regardless of what your opinion on that is, we are still giving the money, money that was made from american workers.

also a quick question, are we basing this off soley governmental donations, or what companies donate as well?

[I miss Reagan]

I don't really trust sources like Noam Chomsky and other radical internet sources so you'll have to forgive me for not relying on BD's sources.

One problem with individual giving, too, is that it is rarely targeted to other than specific issues - usually to tear jerking situations. It is not all that effective in bringing the recipients to a higher rung on the ladder to self support.

This is what I'm talking about. I'm confident in my own ability to choose who deserves aid and who doesn't. Why should the government decide for me. This is the philosophical difference between libs and cons. The left would rather the government make their decisions for them. For instance I give to a charity that takes virtually nothing for operating costs. It's not an ideological organization and everything is strictly volunteer. I'd much rather give to charities like these rather than the government making political contributions where corrupt dictators skim off the top or the UN where the aid may go into some type of oil for food boondogle or paying Moroccan soldiers who rape the natives etc.

[Guest eureka]

Then you misunderstand the purpose of aid. Foreign aid is meant to help less fortunate countries develop and attain self sustenance and prosperity. That can only be acheived through untied gifts, or loans, that are used for development purposes.

Unless you increase your individual donations tenfold and stop dictating what specific suffering children receive the gifts, you are entrenching poverty and only relieving some suffering.

Even then it will not got to all the needy nations but only to those areas where some charitable organization is acrive.

The same problem lies with internal charity. It solves no problems and relieves only certain situations. There is little permanent benefit except to make the donor feel a little less guilty about his more fortunate lot in life.

[moderateamericain]

whats to understand? i work, pay taxes, they give them to foreign countries. all we ask is that you buy medical goods or food or whatever it is your country specifically needs from the US. I dont see what the problem is here. Were helping them and they have zero right to bitch about the manner of aid that we give. think of it this way, if your dad loaned you 50 bucks and said you can have it but you have to mow the lawn later. would you then complain about it. Hell no, youd mow the lawn.

[Argus]

Keep in mind that more than 70 per cent of all U.S. aid commitments are tied to the purchase of goods and services from the U.S.

Canada's foreign aid has similar requirements, as does Japan's, and probably most other nations.