11 Comments

“It’s too cynical for me.”

In what sense is it cynical at all? Point to the existent regulatory mechanism that provides for the removal of the SG and you will find that its imposition devolves upon the Security Council and is therefore subject to veto by France or Russia. You remember France and Russia – the two states most deeply involved in the corruption being investigated.

Kofi should stay – and Chirac and Putin will make sure that he does. I fail to see why the world should be denied continued evidence of the inherent design flaws in an institution incapable of reforming itself or being reformed from without.

Freedom and liberty are best served by the UN/NYT/WaPo axis rotting in plain sight. They stink no more today than they did thirty years ago. Perhaps your sense of smell has improved?

I hope that we (and the MSM) don’t get so caught up in the fate of Kofi Annan that we forget that there are many other people involved in this scandal. The investigation needs to continue until all parties, UN officials and other, are found, named, and if possible prosecuted.

ìFor the most part all you need is email and a phone. Once you are known to be interested in a subject, people will come to you with their stories.î

Goodness, Roger, what you describe sounds suspiciously like, you know, work. And investing stories that might ruin your carefully constructed ideological paradigm is such an unpleasant bother.

Naaa, letís go back to writing about fake memos. Maybe THIS time we will bring McChimp Bu$Hitler down.

I originally wanted to see Annan leave his post. The notion that the US Administration wants to see a weak and irrelevant UN is gaining ground by their voiced support for Annan. A new Secretary General will only gain momentum for the UN while the current leadership serves to bolster lingering questions about corruption and underhanded motives.

I cannot see any other reason for Washington’s support.

http://www.RightViews.com

Investigative reporting? Seems lately it’s just the province of the few, such as Claudia Rossett. Otherwise, it appears it’s becoming extinct–except, of course, for those stalwarts who are willing to go that extra mile (Mary Mapes, et al) to dig up (or if necessary, manufacture) dirt on those they consider to be political enemies.

But, in a practical sense, the UN seems to be such a corrupt institution at this point that I’m not sure any change at the top would matter.

ìI hope that we (and the MSM) don’t get so caught up in the fate of Kofi Annan that we forget that there are many other people involved in this scandal.î

I am quite confident that almost everybody working for the UN is involved in some scandal or other and our Rotten Secretary is simply beautiful representative of such corruption. It is only a matter of degrees. In the former CommieLand, where real money was scarce, working for the UN was one of the most coveted posts: not only regarding your official salary and perks but most importantly the unofficial ones. I remember conversation on the subject at the table ñ my parents had many acquaintances and some of them had ìconnectionsî in the UN.

It all comes down really to the four ways of spending money, enumerated by Milton Friedman: your money for yourself, your money for somewhere else, somebody elseís money for yourself and somebody elseís money for somebody else. How careful is an ordinary person with the money in any of these circumstances?

The UN only deals with somebody elseís money, so why should they be careful what and how they spend, except when they spend it on themselves?

My recollection is that Bob Woodward writes that he and Deep Throat were friends prior to the break-in at the Watergate.

“It’s too cynical for me. Ironically, however, the New York Times and the Washington Post seem to. At least they act that way. They do everything they can to mollify the controversy, thus keeping Mr. Annan in place.”

I doubt the WP and NYT are agreeing with the Washington Times, unless I’m misreading the WT. The WP and NYT are positively favoring Annan, the WT is indicating Annan, by staying in place (which he is likely to in most any imaginable scenario), will help to serve as a prominent sign for a fundamental need for reform – i.e., that Annan is more the red cape than the matador, the latter being the current corrupt state of the UN as a whole. It’s debateable, since Annan is presently forwarding the idea of the expansion of the UN, but while debateable, it’s more of a practical and realist than a cynical suggestion.

I want Kofi to go but I look forward to his remaining in place just long enough to watch his “reform” package go down in flames. Is that cynical?

In retrospect, apologies to our bandwidth host for my unnuanced reply to the original post. I only belatedly noticed the correct intent on a second reading. It was the word ‘cynical’ that caught my eye and that I responded to, prior to giving it a second reading.

So again, apologies to Roger.

Read some sane thoughts on Kofi Annan