The Coalition of Punks

I was so blown away by the data he presented that I forgot to copy the link to a September 2005 post titled How They Vote at the UN by Dan Riehl at Riehl World View. I intended to comment on the post at the time but somehow the post got misplaced among the piles of reports that I snap up on a daily basis. When I went back to the site a few weeks ago to look for the link I couldn't find archives that far back.

I thought of Dan's post again while reading this morning that South Africa joined two other nonpermanent members of the UN Security Council, Qatar and Indonesia, in putting up resistance to the latest resolution on Iran's nuclear program. So on Friday the resolution was further watered down.

South Africa's government is now a cutout for China's foreign policy initiatives, which boil down to forging a coalition with every corrupt, poverty-stricken government that depends on transnational crime and/or oppression to keep them afloat.

Here's Dan's post if you missed it the first time around with my comments appended; it's a good guess that the voting pattern hasn't changed since 2005, although India (which shouldn't be considered an Islamic or Arab country) may now be throwing a more few votes to the US:

How they Vote in the United Nations

Below are the actual voting records of various Arabic/Islamic States which are recorded in both the US State Department and United Nations records:

Kuwait votes against the United States 67% of the time
Qatar votes against the United States 67% of the time
Morocco votes against the United States 70% of the time
United Arab Emirates vote against the U. S. 70% of the time.
Jordan votes against the United States 71% of the time.
Tunisia votes against the United States 71% of the time.
Saudi Arabia votes against the United States 73% of the time.
Yemen votes against the United States 74% of the time.
Algeria votes against the United States 74% of the time.
Oman votes against the United States 74% of the time.
Sudan votes against the United States 75% of the time.
Pakistan votes against the United States 75% of the time.
Libya votes against the United States 76% of the time.
Egypt votes against the United States 79% of the time.
Lebanon votes against the United States 80% of the time.
India votes against the United States 81% of the time.
Syria votes against the United States 84% of the time.
Mauritania votes against the United States 87% of the time.

U.S. Foreign Aid to those that hate us:
Egypt, for example, after voting 79% of the time against the United States, still receives $2 billion annually in US Foreign Aid. Jordan votes 71% against the United States and receives $192,814,000 annually in US Foreign Aid. Pakistan votes 75% against the United States receives $6,721,000 annually in US Foreign Aid. India votes 81% against the United States receives $143,699,000 annually.

Perhaps it is time to get out of the UN and give the tax savings back to the American workers who are having to skimp and sacrifice to pay the taxes or tell them to leave the USA and set themselves up in one of the countries that receive the aid, like Egypt or similar.

My heart is with Dan's suggestion, but we know what happens in American cities when banks redline neighborhoods that are poverty-stricken and crime infested: there is a flight of the middle class from neighborhoods that border the redlined neighborhood. That sets off a domino effect.

In the same manner, the US can't pull out of the United Nations just because there are gangs of punk governments roaming the halls. China's modus operandi is to forge alliances with other punks so that together they can thwart democracies. So America has to stay in there and battle it out, inch by inch, and that's easier if the United Nations remains on American soil.

With regard to the Islamic countries that overwhelmingly vote against the US at the United Nations -- the US pays a very high price for our support of Israel, but the price is worth it many times over.

Israel is a daily reminder to oppressive governments that litter the Middle East and Africa about what can be done with hard work. Israel was given only a lie with their barren land, but they fought and scrapped and made a vibrant democracy out of it. What's more, they accomplished the miracle with very little help from the US or any other government. Nor did the Israelis whine that the British once betrayed them every time they encountered a problem.

It's never how the other guy acts that is most important. With regard to how my government acts, I think our most serious battles are fought within the US government, not at the United Nations.

The US Sinophiles and corporate lobbies that want to partner with China, at any cost; the Arabists who want to make even more concessions to oppressive Arab governments and scale back US support for Israel; the factions that want to start a Cold War with Russia; the factions that want US foreign policy to cede to views of Nato allies; and the factions that want the US to roll back on a strongly defense-oriented foreign policy -- these are the toughest battles, and they define how the United States performs at the UN.