The club of tyranny

Ian C

Time for the Union of Democracies, which would exclude Russia for not having independent media as it would try to claim to be a democracy -and noone can deny it's time came a long time ago.

Tony Allwright

We should not be surprised that the UN has become a despots' club - only 42% of its member-stages, each with an equal vote, are proper democracies and many of those are just "dots" like Andorra.

So, being the thoroughly democratic institution that it is, the UN is dominated by tyrants and anti-democratic thugs of various hues.

Institutionalised defence by the UN of thuggish behaviour is therefore inevitable and irreversible.

Thus, I fully agree with Ian C.

It is time for the democracies to walk out of the UN (and cut off its funding) in order to set up a new United Democracies. The UD, open only to proper democracies as decided by the UD, would be unashamedly dedicated to spreading Western style democracy across the world, in the sure knowledge that this is the foundation of international peace & security;
that true democracy eliminates poverty; that elimination of poverty promotes effective environmentalism & countless other benefits.

See
United Democracies

Ann

What 'last vestiges of its own credibility'? You can't have 'last vestiges' of something that has not existed for a very long time, if indeed it ever existed at all.

Union of Democracies: agree with the first two posters. This is long overdue. The UN has been a club dominated by racist, fascist, brutal regimes for a very long time, and I don't believe it can be salvaged. It's time to bin it, and set up something open only to democracies based on genuine elections and a free press.

Max Kaye

Why the surprise? It's been this way since Arafat was feted there in (I think) 1974 and Zionism was equated with racism.

John Bolton had the right idea about the place.

Kevyn Bodman

A Union of Democracies: what a very good idea.

I hadn't heard of it till reading these comments and am already won over.

davo

Yes an union of democracies sounds like a good idea.
However these days, it would be a very small club and hailed by those leftists within, as an elitist, racist, post imperial non identity.
The foundations of democracy are communal prosperity and this raises the envy and anger of so many failed despotic nations.
And any money thrown at them by those successful demcracies in appeasement, vanishes down the loo or in the pockets of "government" officials.

Andy Gill

"The Council kept firmly away from taking any action over China's handling of recent protests in Tibet,... It had earlier dropped special investigations into Cuba's rights record."

Of course. China and Cuba are members of this odious body. Along with those beacons of human rights Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, Egypt and Russia.

Bob Latchford

Would Hamas be invited to join this 'union of democracies' seeing how it was voted into power in one of the most open, honest and free elections in recent memory, or is it only democracies that 'we' agree with?

Nick Kaplan

Here is an interesting article on the topic of free speech from the Salman Rushdie dispute; http://www.aynrand.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=11927&news_iv_ctrl=1602. Reading the article about a Union of Democracies, it sounds like a very good idea. I would however make 1 suggestion; that it should not be called a Union of Democracies as it’s not really about upholding majority rule (which can be about as abhorrent as many other forms of tyranny) instead it should be a Union of Freedom Loving Countries, whose purpose is to uphold and promote those fundamental rights of “Life, Liberty, Property and the pursuit of happiness.” That way you might also keep out those horrible Lefties whose raison d’etre is to appease the kind of tyrannical regimes which violate these fundamental rights for some perceived ‘social good’ which both tyrants and lefties (often the two only differ in degree rather than kind) place above these natural rights. After all, it’s people of this political leaning that destroyed the UN, with their relativist, pacifist agenda in the first place.

Ann

"Would Hamas be invited to join this 'union of democracies' seeing how it was voted into power in one of the most open, honest and free elections in recent memory, or is it only democracies that 'we' agree with?"
---
Are you deliberately playing devil's advocate, or are you trying to be an annoying adolescent because you know it teases, or do you really and genuinely not get it? Those elections were neither honest nor were they free. There was gross intimidation, to put it mildly. The security arm of Hamas makes the IRA look like a convention of English vicars. This 'democratic' government executes suspected collaborators without a trial. Let's not even begin to talk about a free press. I could go on all night, but I suspect you still wouldn't get it, knowing where you come from (you wouldn't be an Islington councillor by any chance, would you, or perhaps a special adviser to Livingstone, that shining example of honest and non-racist governance?).

Nick Kaplan

Bob Latchford has just given a prime example of the problem I was talking about. People are far too prone to associate the word democratic with the word good or legitimate. Unfortunately people like Bob (lefties) believe that the essence of democracy is unlimited majority rule. It is the notion that the government should not be constrained, as long as its behavior is sanctioned by majority vote. It is the notion that the very function of government is to implement the "will of the people." It is the notion espoused whenever we tell the Lebanese, the Iraqis, the Palestinians and various other Arab nations that the legitimacy of a new government flows from its being democratically approved. But really democracy should be valued only as a means not as a good in itself. Democracy is good to the extent it prevents tyranny and upholds rights, bad to the extent that it justifies the violations of those rights. I wonder, if Latchford is aware that Hitler was democratically elected, in what were consider at the time to be free and fair elections, using PR as well. But this did not make Hitler legitimate and neither does the election of Hamas make them legitimate, Hamas like the Nazis are inspired by hate and racism and have no concern for Human Rights or individual liberties and hence are as illegitimate as the Nazis were. Freedom only exists when there are limitations on government (democratic or not), imposed by the principle of individual rights. if "popular will" were the standard, the individual would have no rights--only temporary privileges, granted or withdrawn according to the mass mood of the moment. The tyranny of the majority, as explained by De Tocqueville can be just as bad as any totalitarian regime. In a genuinely free country, voting pertains only to the means of safeguarding individual rights. There can be no moral "right" to vote to destroy rights. When majority rule is seen as the sole means by which a regime can gain legitimacy it allows groups such as Hamas to claim the moral high-ground when they should be condemned absolutely. As a spokesman for Hamas, following its electoral victory, correctly noted: "I thank the United States that they have given us this weapon of democracy. . . . It's not possible for the U.S. . . . to turn its back on an elected democracy." If we are going to try to replace tyrannies, we must stop confusing democracy with freedom. We must make clear that the principle we support is not the unlimited rule of the majority, but the inalienable rights of the individual. Empowering killers who happen to be democratically elected does not advance the cause of freedom--it destroys it.

john

One hopes that John McCain on accession to the Presidency of the US, follows throught qith his suggestion for a creation of a body known as the League of Democracies. Should be excluded, the FSU, China, North Korea, the African thugocracies, every single Muslim state, and those more ludicrous states such as Luxemburg, Lichtenstein, San Marino etc.

And absolutely do not walk out of the UN: the West has three valuable vetos there. On the other hand, cut back on the funding.

john

One hopes that John McCain on accession to the Presidency of the US, follows throught qith his suggestion for a creation of a body known as the League of Democracies. Should be excluded, the FSU, China, North Korea, the African thugocracies, every single Muslim state, and those more ludicrous states such as Luxemburg, Lichtenstein, San Marino etc.

And absolutely do not walk out of the UN: the West has three valuable vetos there. On the other hand, cut back on the funding.

Ann

What's happening today? Posts are duplicated, indeed several of Melanie's own blog entries are duplicated, the site keeps freezing - help!

Ian C

Nick - UnFLoC sounds good to me!! For others, No Hamas would not be allowed in because democratic as it may have been it does not represent a recognised country and it seeks the destruction of another. Simple. It's charter would rightly deny it an application form.

Ian G

The free nations fund the UN. The money currently squandered on the UN would fund a Union of Free Nations absed on the Anglo-Sphere. WHO, UNICEF and anything else that works would continue to receive their funds from their major donors but would be annexed to the new Union.

Criteria for joining:

Rule of Law - based on English Common Law/Judeo-Christian as most/all free nations are.
Limited Government subject to Democratic, free voting system.
Freedom of expression, subject to libel and slander laws.
Freedom of the individual/ Habeas Corpus/ Innocent until proven guilty etc.

This would keep the French out.

jordan

lan G may I remind you, because I'm bored... that France practically created Human Rights out of it's revolution. I know some people need hsitory lessons. The UN is rendered absolutley time and time again, MANY people know it, others are ignorant as Democrats... None the less it reigns, and holds liberalism high on a world stage of ignorance.

Nick Kaplan

Jordan; I‘m afraid you are mistaken, Human Rights were not invented by the French in the French revolution, the idea was first established in England at Magna Carta in 1215 and were given greater meaning by the English Philosopher John Locke in the 17th Century over 100 years before the French revolution in 1789. In fact many Liberal philosophers at the time such as Edmund Burke, a Whig who was against the absolute monarchy, Or Thomas Paine and Thomas Jefferson, participants in the American Revolution, condemn the French revolution as anti-democratic, anti-liberal and dangerous. The French revolution was a violent disaster based on semi-socialist principles that violated fundamental human rights such as property rights that form the basis of liberal democratic societies.