The would-be regulators of the world’s climate (and your wallet) will be jetting to Bali this December for Ban Ki-Moon’s next UN weather fest: “UN Climate Change Conference 2007.” UN policy allows even the lowlier UN staffers to travel business class on long-haul flights (your tax dollars at work), the better to arrive wined, dined and ready to hit the ground …and the beaches … and the golf courses … and the tennis courts — running. Apparently there is so much to discuss that the conference will run for a full fortnight, from Dec. 3-14, at Bali’s seaside luxury resort of Nusa Dua.
For all those taxpayer mugs out there who have not had the experience of flying business class to spend a fortnight at Nusa Dua, check out the spectacular seaside photos of the Bali International Convention Center, with its slogan: “The Place…Where Business is a Pleasure.” For more information, page through the Bali conference outline on the UN Framework Convention for Climate Change, or UNFCC, web site. This includes a handy list of pre/post conference tours, and a list of hotels (Nusa Dua Beach Hotel and Spa, and Melia Bali Villas and Spa Resort, already sold out) plus recreational facilities: sailing, fishing, snorkeling, ocean kayaking, and, of course, the shopping gallery.
There, undistracted by the winter winds whipping past the UN’s NY headquarters (now prepping for a $2 billion renovation), they will discuss the many ways in which the UN can collect fees and fund more conferences via taxes and productivity caps administered by the same UN system which refuses to open its own books to the public (where is that full and transparent accounting we were promised for the tsunami donations?).
Recall that the UN apparently rebuffed out of hand a recent invitation from Canada to move its headquarters north. One might just wonder — would “climate change,” be such an urgent UN issue were UN bureaucrats required to hold their meetings without availing themselves quite so amply of other people’s money to enjoy their own convenient change of climate.
Quick Multiple Choice Quiz on the UN system: Will the UN release for the perusal of Joe-average taxpayer a detailed post-conference breakdown of staff expense accounts for Ban’s bash on Bali?
A. Ha
B. Ha-ha
C. You’ve got to be kidding
D. In order to operate, the UN must preserve its confidentiality in such matters. Tennis, anyone?
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25 Comments
1. B Dubya:The UN, in all respects, has mutated into a hugely corrupt bureaucratic entity that the United States should rightly consider to be a terror supporting organization.
I give you the UN Human Rights Commission and the Security Council. I give you Koffi Annan and his benighted offspring.
Time for the wannabe rulers of the next world order to get the hell out of Manhattan and go someplace else. Tripoli, perhaps. Or Moscow.
Time for the United States to stop footing the bill for this collection of grifters and thugs hiding behind diplomatic pouches.
Nov 6, 2007 - 1:36 pm 2. ZZMike:Surely the organizers will maintain that they’re only going to some off-the-beaten-track spots like Bali is because if they held it in any of the major countries, it’d look like they were showing favoritism to that country – which the UN would surely never want to do.
I’m really surprised that they didn’t hold it in one of the Saudi Arabian resorts. Maybe next year.
Nov 6, 2007 - 2:49 pm 3. Jeff:Personally I think any global warming conference should be held in Greenland. Where, incidentally, they think it’s a great idea….
Nov 6, 2007 - 4:28 pm 4. Phil:I’ve worked for a small NGO the past couple of years, both in Central Asia and Iraq, and have had the opportunity to work and partner with various UN orgs in both places. The amount of waste I’ve seen is absolutely stunning. We were able to help rebuild entire villages for the same amount of money that some of their mid-level program staff were getting in salaries, expense accounts, and ‘free’ travel.
Nov 6, 2007 - 4:53 pm 5. ptsargent:Claudia…transparency is critical to at least creating a sense of shame regarding the foolish waste of taxpayers resources by bureaucrats, Congresssional types and on and on. Why is it so hard to effect these reforms? What can the average citizen do to create the climate for reform. How about lots of blog clubs generated by individual citizens who are willing to take information like yours and bring it to the attention of friends, relatives, neighbors and the like? There’s gotta be a way.
Nov 6, 2007 - 4:57 pm 6. N. Zuckerman:there are those who say: stay home and video conference. I say unto them: do you or your loved ones ever take a plane? Why? Or is it your dislike of the organization doing this? A conference is not the same thing as a video conference and to pee on this parade is to show small-mindedness. Have your country spend a lot less on planes and tanks and other military items and instead devote this money to helping rather than to destroying and our world will be a better place.
Nov 6, 2007 - 5:01 pm 7. ElcubanitoKC:Mr Suckerman, do you, in any way, pay for the US military spending?
Nov 6, 2007 - 5:18 pm 8. BDT:Zuckerman -
I’ll start taking global warming seriously when Lear Jet Liberals living in 25k square foot houses do.
10k years ago the spot where I’m typing was under a mile of ice. Apparently, wooly mammoths drove SUV’s. Who knew! The arrogance of people who think the world should stay the same from now until the end of time is unbelievable. The climate of Earth changes. It always has and always will. Venus and Mars are getting warmer too. Do you have an explantation for that? Martians driving SUV’s? How about THE SUN?
As to military spending, I don’t know where you live, but I’d bet you typed your BDS infused rant from a safe and secure place provided compliments of the US Military.
BDT.
Nov 6, 2007 - 5:22 pm 9. Tim S:Zuckerman: When I worked for a Swedish company I travelled coach class on Europe to Singapore flights, many times. Coach class was company policy. I stayed at business class hotels, not at resorts. Again, company policy. In fact, travel itself was an expense that had to be approved at the highest level. Corporate policy preferred phone and e-mail conferences. To paraphrase your statements, to pee on video conferencing is to pee on the taxpayers (like me) who pay the bill. Just give me the chance, Zuckerman, and I’ll pee on you in return.
Nov 6, 2007 - 5:31 pm 10. BD:N. Zuckerman, I think you missed the point. Most of the people who are flying halfway around the world for a conference at a Bali resort already work together in the same building. It’s just an outrageous waste of money. And then there’s the enormous carbon footprint of all that air travel, which is beyond ironic for a meeting about climate change.
Nov 6, 2007 - 5:43 pm 11. John Bono:Of course they had to go to Bali. It would be a shame if during the global warming conference, they were subject to horror of horrors,
An Inconvenient Blizzard
Nov 6, 2007 - 5:45 pm 12. Mad Insomniac:Have your country spend a lot less on planes and tanks and other military items and instead devote this money to helping rather than to destroying….
Great! I could do with a tax cut.
Nov 6, 2007 - 6:00 pm 13. Whistle Blower:I once worked on contract for the UN secretariat on Biodiversity, which was (and no doubt still is) the poor cousin to Climate Change.
Two week meetings are standard there, which boggles the mind given that anyone who actually works would never go near such an event.
What’s more if you poke around, I’m sure you’ll find that a month or two before the mega two-week meeting there are smaller regional meeting where all the Asian countries get together and all the Africans and all the North and South Americans.
And since you can’t fly that easily within Africa they’ll go via Paris.
We also produced rooms full of documents no one read.
It was a complete waste of time, energy and resources, and completely soured me on the UN.
Nov 6, 2007 - 6:45 pm 14. Vinny Vidivici:Right, Zuckerman. Forget underwriting of many of the institutions of global economic activity upon which hundreds of millions depend, and forget the giveaways like the GPS system, a quarter of the UN’s budget or massive private charity initiatives. I could go on.
For you, the impact of the U.S. is confined strictly to ‘destroying’ rather than ‘helping’.
Folks, it’s the Zuckermans of the world who are presented as evidence of our ‘tarnished’ global reputation whenever handwringing begins among those more interested in being well liked than in doing the right thing.
People around the world receive a one-sided narrative of ceaseless American wickedness and villainy, and we wonder why they end up thinking like Zuckerman, then fret about how WE must change so Zuckerman will like us.
What a shakedown.
Nov 6, 2007 - 7:23 pm 15. Perfect Sense:Hey Zuckerman:
In blood and treasure, American has brought peace and prosperity for much of the world since 1945. Because America provides military protection for Europe, Japan and South Korea these the citizens of these countries enjoy the highest lifestyles on the planet.
What have you done for world peace?
Nov 6, 2007 - 8:40 pm 16. The New Editor:Checking Out the Bali Beachheads of UN Climate Change
Claudia Rosett:
Nov 6, 2007 - 9:02 pm 17. Bill Bradley:The would-be regulators of the world
Obviously, there is no such thing as the greenhouse effect …
Nov 6, 2007 - 9:58 pm 18. Ban Ki Moon:Dear Mr. Suckerman:
I’d like to offer you a position as Deputy Assistant Principal Officer for Crimate Change. The duty station is in New York, with frequent travel required, including an upcoming trip to Bali. You play tennis, right?
Sincerely,
BKM
Nov 7, 2007 - 12:21 am 19. Chip:Apparently the UN stocks up on ‘legitimacy’ in Bali. Amazing how many people would cede our sovereignty to the UN without a care.
Nov 7, 2007 - 12:24 am 20. L. Riofrio:Hello Claudia Rossett: I am a scientist, spoke at a conference in that very same hotel. (Not Climate change or UN, the International Astronomical Union.) Melia Bali is a bit nicer, but Westin has the biggest convention centre in Nusa Dua.
Nov 7, 2007 - 1:25 am 21. Blog-o-Fascists:UN Climate Panel to Discuss Global Warming at Tropical Resort
NewsBusters.org – Exposing Liberal Media Bias
Here’s an amazingly inconvenient truth: the upcoming Here’s an amazingly inconvenient truth: the upcoming <a hr…
Nov 7, 2007 - 5:30 pm 22. tanstaafl:B
No, wait
C
Junkets, international symposia in nice places with amenities and good food, writing “reports”…
Isn’t that the sum total of “The UN’s” work ?
Nov 8, 2007 - 10:48 am 23. HeatherRadish:I say unto them: do you or your loved ones ever take a plane?
The main difference is “me and my loved ones” aren’t telling everyone else on the planet they need to stop driving cars, taking showers, using toilets, going on plane trips, buying food grown abroad, etc, to “save the planet” while we’re flying about. We’re not proposing to cripple anyone’s economy with mandates on capping energy consumption, either.
And we’re certainly not forcing you or anyone else to pay for our plane trips, much less luxury food, booze, and spas.
Nov 8, 2007 - 10:50 am 24. Scott Kirwin:Any idea on how many participants there will be, or where they are stationed? How about how much imported liquor they’ll down? Based on my experience running into UN personnel in the developing world, it will be quite a bit.
Nov 8, 2007 - 11:27 am 25. Acton Institute PowerBlog:Global Warming Consensus Alert: Coal is Universal!
When you think about it, NBC’s little promotional stunt on Sunday Night Football for their “Green is Universal” week is a lot like a mini-Kyoto treaty: it was an empty gesture that had no long-term impact on the problem it was trying to
Nov 8, 2007 - 11:48 am