Michael, this isn't a criticism, I swear unto God... but are you absolutely, positively sure that you're a Leftist? :)

I'm kinda hoping that the answer is 'yes', btw: the more broad-spectrum pressure that gets put on the UN, the better.

Moe Lane

Why only eventually? Why not right this minute? It seems to me that plenty of things are afoot in international affairs that are too important for the UN in its current form to fuck up. Fix 'em now, before they do (more) real damage.

Moe: First, I think you meant, are you sure he's a liberal, not leftist.

Second, of course he's a liberal - a conservative would say, "The Federation of Planets is the U.N., and therefore must be stopped!"

Now excuse me, while I wait for Tacitus or Den Beste to start flaming me...

It's not a 'left,' 'liberal' or 'right' thing when the tools of liberal (traditional meaning) civilization are corrupted, gamed cynically or otherwise subverted by totalitarians and gangsters posing as statesmen. Seems that tolerating this sort of abuse -- either out of a misplaced notion of inclusiveness or an unwillingness to confront it -- fits the definition of providing the rope with which to hang us.

"Moe: First, I think you meant, are you sure he's a liberal, not leftist."

No, Leftist, as in, "Left of the Center*". It wasn't really a serious comment, anyway: I was just bemused at this demonstration that a big breakfast UN-despising isn't just for Righties anymore. :)

Moe

*I've seen people distinguish between Leftists and liberals to the detriment of both the former and the latter... ach, the joke gets steadily less and less funny, even to me. Nevermind.

Every source I've seen indicates that the Ba'ath Party was established in 1947, two years after the fall of Hitler. The U.N. gets enough grief without your having to use Godwin's Law. What next, kick Italy out of NATO because its Prime Minister belongs to a party with ties to the original Fascists?

What next, kick Italy out of NATO because its Prime Minister belongs to a party with ties to the original Fascists?

The Italians aren't still running around trying to exterminate Jews because Jews don't fit in with their image of racial purity. Let's not forget that half the Jews in Israel are refugees from the rest of the Middle East. Scratch any Arab propaganda and you get the distinct whiff of Goebbels.

Steve, every source you have seen was misleading, even if they were arguably correct. The first convention of the party was in 1947, marking the OFFICIAL founding of the party. The party goes back to the 30s, when it was a cell based thug group like the brownshirts. Take a look at this timeline.

Steve,

Go to Google and type in this search phrase: "baath party" founded

My sources are Paul Berman and Bernard Lewis, but Google helps.

Moe,

George is right. I like Star Trek's Federation, and the UN ain't it.

Michael -

The United Nations might be reformed, but it needs exactly two things: (1) the ability to distinguish "good" nations from "bad" nations, and (2) the will to back up their intentions with force.

#2 is the easy one. The UN can use its member nations and NATO when it wants, as being demonstrated in Liberia and other African nations. The "blue hat" forces need to go away, and the UN needs to work with the members and NATO exclusively.

And I think #1 isn't so tough either. The UN published the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, laying out exactly what criteria the member nations should be judged against.

All we need to do is hold them accountable to this list. The Islamist and Nazi-Baathist countries would not live up to this list. We would have to grant them access to UN functions or deny them access to UN functions based on their grade.

But Michael, the problem with the UN is the problem with all diplomacy. It's hard to keep a channel open with a country you don't agree with. Unless the UN is willing to (a) hold countries accountable for their human rights records, and (b) attack those countries which fall below a certain criterion, I'm not sure how else to conduct diplomacy in the world.

"George is right. I like Star Trek's Federation, and the UN ain't it."

Did I ever say that I disagreed with you about the UN? As for the Federation... ehh. Kirk's looked like it could be fun: Picard's was distinctly unappealing. No chances for profit, no baseball* and too much of a hassle to get real booze. Not much room for adventures, either.

Of course, somebody once defined adventure as 'somebody else in deep sh*t a long ways away', so I suppose that the Federation did the job it was designed for. :)

Moe

*As for hockey and/or real football**... unlikely in the extreme.

**That is, 'not soccer'.

Moe,

I meant George is right that I'm a liberal because I like the Federation. (I don't care for the silly anti-capitalist bit and the Prime Directive, but the rest works for me just fine.)

Ah. I stand abashed and corrected and revealed as a pedant. Sorry about that...

Michael,

Admit it. You've learned to much. You are being assimilated. You're joining the dark side. You criticized the UN. There is no going back.

OK, I checked, and we're both right. The Ba'athist Party was founded in both 1943 (as a movement) and 1947 (as a political party). It seems to have had stronger ties to the Soviet Union than Nazi Germany during WWII, although several key figures in pan-Arabism prior to the founding of the Ba'athist Party were affiliated with fascist groups(in that sense, the comparison with Berlusconi is apt), less due to support of Aryan superiority than just the plain fact that the Germans were fighting their colonial overlords. As far as I can tell, though, there is no evidence that Hitler, Bormann, et al established up the Ba'athist Party.

Here is an outstanding summary biography of Michel Aflaq, the Sorbonne-educated intellectual who was instrumental in founding the Baath party, and brought the party to Syria and Iraq (Weekly Standard, Nov 11, 2002).

This article is a must-read. It's by David Brooks, who was just hired as an op-ed contributor in a surprise move by the New York Times.