--- "Charlie Bell" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Flame away, please. Oh look, you are anyway.
Eh, you should have seen the first draft.
Skipping ahead, a bit....
> > Do you think that China (up for re-election in
2002)
> > is more deserving of a spot on the UNHCHR than the
> > USA?
>
> Nope. But I never said that, did I?
Very cute. So, are you going to answer the rest of
the questions, or are you just going to continue
playing rhetorical games?
By what standards do you consider a country worthy of
a seat on the UNHCHR? Moreover, how does this
standard disqualify the US, but not, apparently,
virtually the entire current membership of the UNHCHR?
> So 100% of the representative voted against
> the treaty. Did 100% of American
> oppose the treaty? The "World's Largest
> Democracy" isn't terribly
> democratic, is it?
Perhaps you've heard of representative government?
Last I checked, both Cyprus and the EU use it
liberally.
Before you criticize our system of government, why
don't you examine the flaws in your own. Do you
expect me to find that the percentage votes in
European legislatures always match the percentages in
the opinion polls? In fact, let's bring up your
favorite issue here - do you think that the percentage
of MP's in most European countries that support the
death penalty would match the percentage of Europeans
that favor the death penalty? And if not, why bring
up these irrelevant straw-man arguments? I'd like to
think that you're not just gratuitiously insulting
Americans - but that's what it seems like.
In the space of 24 Hours you have accused America of
being unsuitable to oversee other countries' human
rights practices and also of being
"not-so-democratic."
I don't know what your personal InBox is like Charlie,
but I know that if I said these things about any
European country, I'd have at least two or three
messages telling me to back off and respect other
people's countries. Those comments are simply
gratuitous, Charlie, and I think that they are
completely inappropriate.
> And "I will not do anything to harm America's
> interests" is a constructive
> place to start? That leaves a lot of room for
> manoeuvre doesn't it?
This is, of course, as opposed to other countries
where the Head of State is routinely expected to harm
his country's interests.
> Oh. Thanks for all the help in the Falklands.
You guys wanted our help????????????????????
Back to the top.......
> > 1) Just a week or two ago, I thought we had
> > established to everyone's satisfaction that while
the
> > UN opposes the death penalty, it does not consider
the
> > matter part of "human rights."
>
> Down to America and China insisting on that stance.
You are conveniently neglecting, of course, that fully
half of the writers of the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights had the death penalty at the time of the
writing - making it impossible to interpret the UDHR
as forbiding the death penalty. Moreover, the
purpose of the UNHCHR is to oversee implementation of
the UDHR. So, whatever your personal views as to
what should and should not be a human right - those
views are irrelevant to the question of which nations
are most fit to oversee implementation of the UDHR.
BTW, the only two nations to sit continuously on the
UNHCHR since 1947 are now India and USSR/Russian Fed.,
both of which retain the death penalty.
>. The right to life is
> *the* human right, and nowhere does it say that you
> can remove that right.
> Well, nowhere that I'd consider
Well, you aparently seem to think that women (and only
women) have the right to decide if a particular unborn
child retains the right to life.
Nevertheless, despite my position on this issue, I
have never been so arrogant as to suggest that Cyprus,
or any EU country, or even the USA under Bill Clinton
should thus be considered undeserving of a seat on the
UNHCHR. I understand that your countries are
different from my own, and I am not going to issue
carte blanche condemnations and disqualifications of
those countries based on a single issue.
Take a recent example. I recently received a "prayer
e-mail", asking me to pray for the voters of Ireland
to reject the Treaty of Nice - as the Treaty of Nice
would pave the way for the EU to force Ireland to
legalize abortion. Not only did I decline to engage
in such prayers, I took the time to write to the
person who had sent this to me to explain to them that
despite the EU's faults (like being pro-choice), the
EU is a fundamentally good institution. Moreover, in
this case, the greater good of binding the people's of
Central and Eastern Europe into the EU outweighs the
potential risk of killing thousands - or millions -
more innocent children in Ireland. Yes, the Treaty of
Nice was not a particularly good Treaty, but the EU is
fundamentally good, and EU expansion is fundamentally
good, and I did not want to risk derailing either.
I have firmly believed for the past several months
that this discussion has continued that eventually,
when it comes down to it, that the Europeans on this
List would eventually agree that the US is a
fundamental source of good in the world, just as I
think that the EU is a source of good in the world.
Unfortunately, I am beginning to despair of that ever
happening at all - as it seems that many people here
would just prefer to criticize America at every
opportunity.
And finally...........
> That stuff
> about "The Shining City On The Hill" made me want to
> throw up.
Yeah, everyone keeps saying that, but so far, we have
had one person pose exactly one substantive
disagreement with that post - and that was Sonja
disagreeing on the very narrow issue of the US
founding the UN.
Anyhow, in that post, I argued that America was not
just good, but "great" - that the net benefits of
"goodness" to the world by America stand out for their
uniqueness and importance.
Apparently a lot of you disagree, yet somehow noone
ever seems to come up with a substantive and coherent
argument as to why America is *not* "great."
So, I have attempted to at least find consensus on the
fact that America is a "net source of good" to the
World, and even on that lesser issue, I have not so
much found disagreement, but waffling in avoidance of
answering the question.
At this point, I am just ready to throw up my hands
and concede that the lot of you just have an
irrational revulsion of America. I would prefer not
to believe that, and certainly hope to not believe
that - but when I post a serious argument that America
is "great" and receive 5 insults and one very narrow
substantive rebuttal; and when I post that "America is
a net source of good" and get only waffling; I don't
know what else to do.
JDG
=====
John D. Giorgis
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Takoma Park, MD
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