um that of course would be "NINO Scalia (along with Wagner, Snickers, and Texas High School Cheerleaders, one of life’s guilty pleasures)
I’m not not even going to try to slog through that one, gang.
I’m sorry, I got about a third of the way thru post #40, and it doesn’t make any sense.
And this part:
is just gibberish.
It seemed to be something about how a court would be different from the UN in that they can use different templates, whatever that means. And then it trailed off into the Iraq war again, and then I couldn’t follow it.
I don’t mean this as a back-handed insult, but I have to ask, alaric, are you OK? I don’t want to Pit you in case there is something going on that isn’t your fault. But you aren’t making a lot of sense.
Can I request that you post a short precis of one or two points you would like to discuss? And see if you can drop off the random references and tangents.
That way I can tell if this is a real conversation, or might develop into one.
I honestly don’t mean to be insulting, and I apologize if I am coming across that way. But I cannot tell if you are serious or not.
Regards,
Shodan
I think he’s saying that the trouble with the World Court is that the US will just ignore the results. So his solution for the “fake” court would be to change the rules…if the defendent doesn’t respond, the plaintiff automatically wins. Since the consequences of Iraq/Venezuela/North Korea winning a judgement against the US would be so dire, the US will be forced to act as if the “fake” court actually had jurisdiction over it.
The fake court will have no power except what the individual signatories (France, China, etc) give it…in other words, the signatories agree to sell US securities or what have you whenever the court gives them the order. It doesn’t matter that the US doesn’t agree the court has any power, since the court’s only power is telling the signatories what to do. So the US has to act as if the court had power, since France and China believe it has power.
Of course, this presumes that France, China, Germany, etc have any interest in signing on to such an agreement. As for the contention that it would be used primarily against the US, common sense argues that world sanctions like these are never used against powerful countries but rather against weak ones that can’t fight back. Like Iraq, Venezuela, and North Korea. Why France would give up control over its own foreign and economic policy just to prop up Hugo Chavez I don’t know.
I believe that Alaric is convinced that since oil is going to be more and more expensive that non-US oil consumers are going to be falling all over themselves to curry favor with oil producing countries. Could be, exhibit A would be the US relationship with Saudi Arabia. But at the end of the day, oil producing countries sell their oil on the world oil market, oil consuming countries purchase oil on the world oil market. France might get a few favors from Venezuela by trashing their relations with the US, but how much are those favors actually worth?
I’ll bite…
In futility, I’d advise El Tio’s buddy to tone down the anti-american rhetoric. Also, as the previous post alluded, I’d advise him that Venezuela’s production/reserves are not significant enough in the world market and that the U.S. would not experience much, if any, disruption in finding replacement.
In futility, I’d advise him to take a real good look at the pre-Castro cuban economy, where it stands now, and where it’s headed.
If I read it right, the suggestion is for an “oil for anti-american alliance”, instead of the wildly successful UN administrated oil for food program. So, instead of allowing military bases or northwardly-pointing nukes to be positioned within Venezuelan borders… there is oil at a deep discount to be offered up. Man, why not concentrate on attracting domestic and foreign investment, full employment, education, health-care?
Has dictating from a posture of fear (either of those from within or from the big bad capitalistic war-monguering monolith to the north) ever proven to be a good strategy for the development and furtherment of one’s country and its citenzry? It’s like watching a train wreck in slow motion.
Watch the next elections in France and Germany - you may be in for a surprise.
Yup, I think we are getting the same vibe here.
alaric, let me repeat my request for a short, focussed restatement of one point. No hash brownie references, nothing fanciful, just something to show that you can make sense if you choose to. I’m trying not to attack your post, but I would like to know what is going on here.
Regards,
Shodan
I’ll do my best.
(If you could score some zyprexa, you being canadian and all, it would probably make the voices in my head quieter and I could type better–all they will give me here is thorazine, and I have a deal with a nurses aid who lets me watch her do things to herself if I give her my thorazine, so I don’t take any myself, and then the voices get louder…)
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Viewed from abroad, the United States under the Bush regime (kand unrestrained by the previous Soviet counterweight) is an international bully.
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Smaller nations who lie in the path of the United States are likely to get fucked.
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Not wanting to get fucked, they should cast about for some way of constraining United States’ behaviour.
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A consideration for such a small country is the sorry state of american media, insofar as providing a “reality check” to counter the Bush propaganda machine
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One solution is for the small country, using such resource as are available to it, to “create news” as it were, by structuring a forum the proceedings in which will command attention.
thank you for your concern, and don’t forget them zyprexa pills…
[QUOTE=Shodan]
I’m sorry, I got about a third of the way thru post #40, and it doesn’t make any sense.
And this part:is just gibberish.
I had hypothesized the appointment of Antonin Scalia to represent the United States in court, when W refused to appear. I had transposed a “c” for the “n” in
“Nino”, as he is called.
While making the correction, I took a moment to allude to the fact that he is brilliant, witty, charming and evil.
To appreciate his style from the opposite side of history, is a “guilty pleasure”
For some, Wagner is a similar internal contradiction–an asshole who wrote great music. Many who love the Ring are uneasy with it’s, shall we say, legacy…
Snickers is a candy bar, sold in the United States. It is another guilty pleasure.
I have never seen them (alas) but if their dance moves are provoking salutary legislation, I am pretty sure that the high school cheerleaders in Texas are also guilty pleasures…
No doubt…though I doubt this is unique under Bush. The US has been viewed as an ‘international bully’ on and off for quite a while. To some extent its even true. 'Course, its true of every major power in the world as they all use military/economic/political clubs to beat smaller countries like baby seals when they want too.
Why? Or more to the point, why under Bush specifically? And when you say ‘fucked’ are we talking they feel threatened by the US from an invasion/military standpoint or because of our Unbridled Capitalism™? Or a bit of both perhaps? And perhaps…just perhaps mind you…could a third factor be unrealistic paranoia? Sort of like folks in East Bumfuck USA preparing for a terrorist attack on their fair city? Just a thought.
Well, why limit it to just constraining the US’s behavior? After all, the UNSC has been doing pretty much what it wants and running rough shod over smaller nations since its inception…no? And whats in it for the big players you mentioned (or were mentioned for you, i.e. France, Germany, Russia, China, etc)? They all kind of have a stake in the status quo at least as far as the UN goes…and they also have a fairly large stake in the continued success of the US economy, since we constitute a fairly large market for their goods and services.
Huh? How does this have anything to do with…well, anything? There are counters to ‘the Bush propaganda machine’ in the US media and folks are free to avail themselve to it if they so choose. In fact, most folks on this board do so afaik. I think you are becoming captured by your own bias and bullshit here. Reguardless I don’t see what this has to do with the theme (such as it is) of your OP or your position. Because the US media is biased this will…what? Cause nations to band against us economically?
They already have this alternative as the US doesn’t control their media. What though requires US citizens to avail themselves to these outlets though? After all, afaik most non-US news sources aren’t currently being employed by the Bush Propaganda Machine™, nor are they in lock step with mainstream US media sources. I fail to see how they could ‘create news’ that will ‘command attention’, or that even if they did how this would help prevent the US from invading Venezuela (or whatever you were talking about in your OP).
Have you considered electrical shock treatments? 
-XT
tried. melted the electrodes.
I’m not Canadian.
Thanks for the restatement. Could you briefly, and without a lot of side ramblings, explain why your idea is better than the UN is?
Regards,
Shodan
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proceedings in the un mean either the world court or the security council.
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World court jurisdiction is voluntarily granted, ad hoc. If witheld, it cannot be coerced.
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proceedings, on the other hand, in the security council have several defects.
a. they are unfair–theUS is prosecutor, juror, judge and executioner rolled into one.
the “accused” per contra, doesn’t’t even get to show up and say "Powell, you are full of ".
b. they lack rules of evidence, such as the prohibition on hearsay, thus permitting a “party” to blow all kinds of smoke up all sorts of asses, as Powell did vis-a-vis the Iraqi mobile weapons labs.
c. Even where a party has granted “nominal” jurisdiction to the security council to decide the equities as between two nations, that party, in this case, the us, can decide to go outlaw at the last moment, cancel the vote, announce that “we don’t need no stinkin’ second resolution” and off they go.,
d. The appointment of an arbitration panel will produce procedural rulings that will be transparent, contrary to the deliberations of either the world court OR the security council. This is crucial since evidentiary rulings an rulings on cross-examination have-the power to cut a case off at the knees if the judge is in the pocket of one party or another.
e. The ad hoc international bully restraining order court would appoint a representative to argue for an absent US, thus retaining the adversary procedure the absence of which renders security council proceedings suspect.
f. nothing in the UN Charter provides for a restraining order, as opposed to an order of mandate, which in essence is what a security council resolution is. By spelling out exactly what the US needed to avoid in order not to trigger the trustee sale, and by providing for predictible enforcement (as opposed to the vague sorts of threats that always accompany ultimata generated with as much of an eye to domestic political gain as to the interests of collective security).
But my points are getting longer. Probably a sign that it’s time to go find that nurses aide and give her my thorazine before I’m tempted to waste it on myself…;
I suppose I owe you a response.
And the General Assembly, I would guess.
I don’t understand this. Why is the world court better than the UN because its decisions cannot be enforced? And how is this different from, say, a UN resolution that isn’t enforced?
Again, I don’t understand. You did know, did you not, that there are other members of the Security Council and the UN besides the US?
And, AFAIK, Iraq is a member of the UN, and had every opportunity - twelve years of opportunity, in fact - to present its side of the case. How would that be different in a world court proceeding?
I don’t want to get sidetracked into a different discussion, but I don’t think “hearsay” means what you think it does. Perhaps Bricker or another of our legal eagles will clarify this, but I would be interested in finding out why you think a proceeding against the US in the world court would be better than the UN, if Bush decided to invade Venezuela, or whatever it was.
Again, why is this different from a world court ruling that can also be ignored?
This part I just don’t understand. How would such an arbitration panel be different from the UN General Assembly? Or, what are you talking about here?
Again, I don’t know what you are talking about. The UN can enforce its resolutions, as it did in the first Gulf War. They don’t always do so, often fortunately, but again, I don’t see how that makes them inferior to a court that cannot.
Thanks for your response, I guess. Don’t take it amiss if I give up trying to decipher you.
Regards,
Shodan