xtisme, perhaps you didn’t notice to whom you were replying. Save your breath: You’re not going to change Commissar’s mind, and you’re not going to change anyone else’s, either, since everyone else already disagrees with him.
Priceless. This is roughly like defending Adolph Hitler by saying that the Jews attacked him first. Or the Japanese High Command by saying the AMericans were really, awfully mean and wouldn’t sell them oil so they could subjugate East Asia, so they were forced into a sneak attack at Pearl Harbor.
[QUOTE=Chronos]
xtisme, perhaps you didn’t notice to whom you were replying. Save your breath: You’re not going to change Commissar’s mind, and you’re not going to change anyone else’s, either, since everyone else already disagrees with him.
[/QUOTE]
Ah…I had forgotten. :smack: I didn’t recognize the name right off, but I seem to recall it now. You are right…no point in beating my head against the wall there.
-XT
I guess its a trade off between trying to punish Kim and in the process hurting a large number of innocent people, or giving into Kim and to a some extent strengthening him but potentially saving hundreds of thousands of lives.
I wouldn’t call it a human’s rights abuse, and I don’t know for sure what the right thing to do is, but I do think that to some extent Carter has a point.
The ones starving the Norks is Kim Jung-whatever the latest one is. Howcome Mr. Peanut isn’t ragging on him?
Kim steals the food and feeds his army. Therefore it’s our fault because we aren’t helping him do it?
Hasn’t Carter learned anything from the last time the Norks suckered him?
Regards,
Shodan
Like some of the others, I think that people ought to make a distinction between humanitarian aid and even serious political disagreements. Nobody is suggesting that the food aid we might send to North Korea would include Moet Chandon, beef Wellington, and live Maine lobsters; we’re talking about rice, millet, and other staples to just barely keep people alive.
If that was the point that Carter intended to make, then I can see that as a legitimate issue for discussion.
However, let’s loop reality back into the discussion here. The food situation in North Korea has deteriorated very seriously in the last few months – according to the North Koreas. The US and others have agreed to provide food aid to North Korea so long as people can enter the country to assess where and how much food is needed, and have asked for some monitoring to make sure that the food is going to where it needs to be.
North Korea has rejected this request. They are wrong to do so. These are very, very modest conditions on the food aid, and have fueled speculation that North Korea has other motivations for seeking aid.
So, it may well be that Mr. Carter is mistaken as to who is really responsible for the lack of food aid to North Korea at the moment. Food is not being used as a weapon: the US and others are acting responsibly to see that hungry people get fed, and the Norks are not willing to cooperate.
You’re assuming that Carter is capable or learning and, if so, capable of acting honestly.
The Presidents who extended the human rights the most were the ones who waged war not the ones who talked, FDR and Truman brought freedom to the countless millions of Europe and East Asia by annihilating the Nazi Reich and the Japanese Empire. Truman preserved the freedom of the ROK in the Korean War, Bush brought freedom to the sixty millions of Iraq and Afghanistan. Obama can only really help Libya by using our air power. Talk by US presidents has almost never brought freedom, it was our military might that made it possible.
Bolding mine.
You seem to have me confused with someone likely to be swayed by absurd fantasies that aren’t borne out by reality. The non-bolded part was a pretty good laugh too.
Huh, I thought you liked Reagan’s “Mister Gorbachev, tear down this wall.” Now it’s moot?
President Reagan’s words were good but he actually put money where his mouth was and did his best for world freedom.
What does any of that have to do with Jimmy Carter or North Korea??
-XT
Jimmy Carter is roughly as senile as Ronald Reagan was.
I’m saying that Carter has done virtually nothing concrete to expand human rights around the world unlike other abovementioned Presidents.
Just embarrassing. I try to pretend that he wasn’t actually President of the United States.
We can always hope that North Korea holds Carter as hostage until we improve…
You can always think about it this way:
Will withholding food shipments make North Korea change their ways? Or simply lead to more suffering for the innocent North Koreans?
Will giving food shipments to North Korea make them change their ways? Or simply lead to more suffering for the innocent North Koreans?
The right to food is a human right under the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which has been ratified by the US and South Korea - meaning that both countries are obliged to uphold that right.
The dimensions of the right are set out in the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights General Comment #14. Paragraph 37 says:
So under the international human rights law to which the US and South Korea are bound, Carter is absolutely correct.
No, it has not been ratified by the US.
No, the dimensions of various rights are set forth in the treaty, not in the comments.
You are referring to the General Comments, notthe treaty itself which was actually ratified. The comments, in turn, refer to Article 11. Nowhere in Article 11 is it stated that nations must continue to provide food to other countries, let alone dictatorships whose command-economies have stifled their own food production, who starve their own populace when they do have food and pass the food they have on to their military forces, and who initiate murderous military violence against the nations which provide them with food aid.
Further, Comments were written by the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights. And the CESCR was not set up by the treaty itself, but by the Optional Protocol. It only has authority over those who sign the OP. The OP is not in force, and has not been signed by South Korea.
You are wrong on all counts.