Rofl
The uprisings you mentioned occured in relatively stable areas and hardly go to prove the efficacy of the UN. Furthermore, the Kosovo mission is termed "Interim Kosovo Mission" because they failed during the Kosovo mission (thousands of ethnic Albanians were summarily slaughtered under the UN's watchful eye), and this "interm" mission is to ensure that power is eventually transfered from the Serbian authority to a new government to be formed in the future. I would strongly advise you catchup on your Namibian, East Timorese and Balkan history before you try to cite some pathetic obvioulsy-biased opinionated article beseeching foreigners for increased donations. Bring me some empirical analysis.
Also, do you not see the errors of a US providing majority-funding to the UN? US GDP accounts for 1/3rd the total amount of world GDP, yet we have nowhere close to 1/3rd total authority over the UN. If our tax-dollars go towards funding UN operations, we want operations which are effective and bring about conflict resolution. The report cites our lack of funding for Rwandan and Congolese activities: who the fuck cares. Rwandans and Congolese were slaughtered en masse throughout the early 1990s (see CIA World Factbook for some history, chief), yet the UN didn't push proposals through until the late 1990s. Furthermore, the cost of UN peacekeepers is substantial; it takes a lot of money to convince impoverished, ineffective, and reluctant Pakistanis and other UN peacekeepers to perform their selected duties. The UN doesn't fight for anything besides world peace - employing a paradigm of tranquility which hardly resounds in the ears of soldiers nor encourages troops to increase productivity. UN Soldiers are VERY well paid, but remain VERY unmotivated. Funneling money into UN projects like Congo and Rwanada are useless; UN Intervention there has proved futile over the past 5 years (yes, there has been UN intervention despite our lack of 'legally mandated funding', and no, it has not been effective at all).
The UN is ineffective. If you want us to spend our *FAIR SHARE* of GDP on funding the UN, they had better give us our *FAIR SHARE* of power within the UN. You'd better ratify our attack-resolutions faster, and you'd better be more supportive of transfering power to democratic institutions- removing instability from developing countries. We don't need to be voted down by Bulgaria, Cameroon and former-Nazis in doing what we think is right. Telling us to blindly give the UN charitable funds is bullshit. It's like telling me to donate a million dollars to 50 random charities, including one which buys needles and drugs for drugusers in downtown London. I'm not going to fund a project I find morally reprehensible or one whose effectiveness is unproven. Those are sunk costs, and I'm not going to in effect burn my money on such causes. You present my government with viable, productive plans, and we will fund them provided you give us the power of decision we deserve. Otherwise,
.
denigrated@nameless
