Wednesday, October 07, 2009

What's Happening Now

If All Nippon airways really wanted to reduce carbon emissions, it wouldn't ask its customers to pee; it would ask them to stay home.

Here's hoping the idiotic sports reporters who attacked Rush Limbaugh over his perfectly-appropriate Donovan McNabb comment in '03 gag on this news.

Which health insurer denies the most claims? Find out here.

Tell me again why the USA gives one penny to the United Nations.

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Labels: Business, Climate, Government Health Care, Health Care, Media, United Nations

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 12:01 AM

Thursday, September 24, 2009

Netanyahu Asks World: "Is This a Lie?"

Netanyahu delivered a terrific speech before the U.N.

He asked the nations that didn't boycott the Iranian dictator's speech, or who didn't walk out during it when Mahmoud Ahmadinejad launched into an anti-semitic tirade, "...but to those who gave this holocaust denier a hearing... Have you no shame? Have you no decency?"

The U.S., fortunately, was one of a little over a dozen that did the right thing. Canada was the best. It didn't wait to hear what was said and boycotted from the outset.

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Labels: Foreign Policy, History, United Nations

Posted by David A. Ridenour at 6:27 PM

Monday, August 10, 2009

United Nations Scandals Get Weirder

You wouldn't think it possible, but United Nations scandals are getting weirder.

In this one, a United Nations employee bites a security guard who is trying to drag him out of a superior's office, where he had gone to make a nepotism allegation.

I do wish we'd drop out of that ridiculous (on a good day) organization.

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Labels: United Nations

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 4:46 PM

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Ban Ki-moon Rejects Waxman-Markey as Insufficient

The Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade global warming bill would "reduce aggregate GDP by $7.4 trillion, kill 844,00 jobs and raise the energy bill paid by a typical family by about $1,500 annually" (based on a study by the Heritage Foundation's Center for Data Analysis).

Is UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon concerned about the impact this supposedly anti-global warming legislation* would have on working Americans?

No, he says working Americans aren't being hurt enough.

* The bill, if adopted and if it worked perfectly -- both very large assumptions -- would have negligible impact upon the climate, if any.

Hat tip: Dr. Benny Peiser.

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Labels: Climate, Economics, Environment, United Nations

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 8:23 AM

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Outrage of the Day: United Nations Threatens Bush Administration Officials

From "European Nations May Investigate Bush Officials Over Prisoner Treatment" by Craig Whitlock for the Washington Post:

...Martin Scheinin, the U.N. special investigator for human rights and counterterrorism, said the interrogation techniques approved by the Bush administration clearly violated international law. He said the lawyers who wrote the Justice Department memos, as well as senior figures such as former vice president Richard B. Cheney, will probably face legal trouble overseas if they avoid prosecution in the United States.

'Torture is an international crime irrespective of the place where it is committed. Other countries have an obligation to investigate,' Scheinin said in a telephone interview from Cairo. 'This may be something that will be haunting CIA officials, or Justice Department officials, or the vice president, for the rest of their lives.'"...

Tell me again: Why do we remain in the United Nations? We're paying nearly the quarter of the budget for a corrupt, bloated organization that sits by (or goes to dinner) while corrupt dictators kill and imprison suspected political opponents (and sometimes their children), but let George W. Bush try to keep Americans alive, and it is all over it.

The United Nations is an affront to our sovereignty, our pocketbooks, and to every sane notion of decency.

America must get out of the United Nations.

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Labels: Foreign Policy, Outrage, United Nations

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 1:36 AM

Thursday, April 02, 2009

Outrage of the Day: The Communique of the G-20

From the Communique of the G-20:

...In particular we agree: to establish a new Financial Stability Board (FSB) with a strengthened mandate, as a successor to the Financial Stability Forum (FSF), including all G20 countries, FSF members, Spain, and the European Commission; that the FSB should collaborate with the IMF to provide early warning of macroeconomic and financial risks and the actions needed to address them; to reshape our regulatory systems so that our authorities are able to identify and take account of macro-prudential risks; to extend regulation and oversight to all systemically important financial institutions, instruments and markets. This will include, for the first time, systemically important hedge funds; to endorse and implement the FSF's tough new principles on pay and compensation and to support sustainable compensation schemes and the corporate social responsibility of all firms; to take action, once recovery is assured, to improve the quality, quantity, and international consistency of capital in the banking system. In future, regulation must prevent excessive leverage and require buffers of resources to be built up in good times; to take action against noncooperative jurisdictions, including tax havens. We stand ready to deploy sanctions to protect our public finances and financial systems...

From the Declaration of Independence:

...Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it...

Any government we don't vote for has no right to regulate us.

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Labels: Economics, Europe, Foreign Policy, History, Human Rights, United Nations, White House

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 11:34 PM

Friday, March 13, 2009

Outrage of the Day: U.N. Secretary General Calls U.S. "Deadbeats"

Apparently dissatisfied with the United States paying a full 22 percent of the expenses of the ridiculously wasteful and notoriously corrupt United Nations, U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon referred to the U.S. as a "deadbeat" nation while on a visit to the U.S. Congress Wednesday.

Ban effectively said that it is not only important for the United States to be the world's largest donor to the United Nations by an overwhelming margin, be perennially kicked in the teeth and insulted by U.N. proceedings, and host the United Nations here in America on some of the world's most valuable land donated by an American in a building refurbished by a massive interest free-U.S. loan, but we must also pay our dues on the timetable the U.N. specifies.

The offensiveness of the sentiment combined with the stupidity of the choice of location in which to say it makes this a whopper of a gaffe indeed.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: Let us get out of the United Nations and let's kick the whiny you-know-whats out of here.

For additional commentary, see also Don Surber's "Dump Mr. Ban" on his Charleston Daily Mail blog, Jules Crittenden's "Deadbeat Nation" on the Jules Crittenden blog and Rory Cooper's "United Nations says to America: 'You're Deadbeats'" on the Heritage Foundation's The Foundry blog. Surber and Crittenden appear to be as irritated as I am; this is a quote those of us who appreciate the United Nations for what it truly is can't let die.

Let us get this one on some t-shirts.

Rory Cooper's piece should be read for information about Senator John Kerry's nauseating response, which is to give the United Nations ratification of its dangerous Law of the Sea Treaty. Kerry's obviously never going to give up his hate-America-first schtick; he must have some kind of psychological problem.

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs called Ban's word choice "unfortunate," and called on the U.N. to respect the rather substantial financial contributions of American taxpayers (a sentiment we hope the Administration begins to extend to domestic budgetary matters). It wasn't quite the statement I, or, I suspect, Don Surber, Jules Crittenden or Rory Cooper would have made, but considering how pro-U.N. Barack Obama is, it was a good B+ effort.

But an "F" to you, Mr. Ban.

___________________

Labels: Congress, Conservatives, Foreign Policy, United Nations, White House

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 6:19 AM

Sunday, March 08, 2009

Outrage of the Day: U.S. To Pay Legal Bills of U.N. Official It Seeks to Prosecute

The United Nations has agreed to pay the legal fees of Benon Sevan, former head of the U.N.'s scandal-ridden Iraq Oil-for Food program.

Sevan has been charged in the United States with bribery and conspiracy to commit wire fraud, but has been hiding in Cyprus.

Because the United States pays approximately one quarter of the United Nations' expenses, about 25 percent of Sevan's legal fees will be paid by American taxpayers.

For more information, see: Nile Gardiner, Ph.D. and Steven Groves, "Oil-for-Food Revisited: The U.N. Should Not Pay Benon Sevan's Legal Fees," The Heritage Foundation, February 24, 2009.

___________________

Labels: Outrage, Scandals, United Nations

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 5:10 AM

Friday, April 18, 2008

Washington Post Gets Conservative Concerns About the ANC 20 Years Late, and Almost Too Late Altogether

From David Almasi:

An unsigned house editorial in the April 15 Washington Post is very concerned about post-election unrest in Zimbabwe, where, it seems, President Robert Mugabe is willing to do whatever it takes to remain in power despite indications he lost the popular vote. The twist is that the Post is laying the blame for Mugabe's ability to remain relevant at the feet of South African President Thabo Mbeki.

And they aren't that happy with Mbeki's foreign policy elsewhere, to boot. My, my.

Mbeki is the former president of the African National Congress (ANC), the current South African ruling party that was a terrorist organization mere decades ago. It was the political entity that benefited from the American anti-apartheid protests of the 1980s. Mbeki took over the presidency after Nelson Mandela's retirement.

When I was involved in the South Africa protests of that bygone era, we warned that the ANC was not the moral equivalent of our own Founding Fathers. Mandela, for instance, was a co-founder of the ANC's militant Umkhonto we Sizwe wing. Mbeki was a member. We warned about the ANC's ties and kinship with radical groups and governments across the globe, but we were told we were crazy (and worse).

Now, with the ANC firmly entrenched and South Africa serving on the U.N. Security Council and other U.N. bodies, the chickens are really coming home to roost. In its editorial, Post editors lament:

Since that country began serving a term on the U.N. Security Council last year, the government of President Thabo Mbeki has consistently allied itself with the world's rogue states and against the Western democracies. It has defended Iran's nuclear program and resisted sanctions against it; shielded Sudan and Burma from the sort of pressure the United Nations once directed at the apartheid regime; and enthusiastically supported one-sided condemnations of Israel by the U.N. Human Rights Council...

Every Western democratic government has condemned Mr. Mugabe's maneuvering, and even many Africans have appeared to lose patience with the 84-year-old strongman. That he remains in office is due mainly to Mr. Mbeki, who has used South Africa's considerable influence and prestige to bolster Mr. Mugabe.

Mbeki is crisscrossing Africa to continue to prop up Mugabe. I don't think I could have written it better than the Post editors have, except I and other conservatives could have told you this would happen 20 years ago.

The one thing the world has in its favor is that the old breed typified by Mbeki is dying out. Democracy has held together. Other, younger ANC leaders are already distancing themselves from Mbeki, including his successor in the ANC and the presidency. Mbeki, like the apartheid government he once fought, is becoming isolated in the world as well as in his own country.

But it's a shame, for the people of Zimbabwe in particular, that the world had to suffer his leadership even one day.

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Labels: Foreign Policy, History, Human Rights, Media, United Nations

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 7:13 PM

Sunday, December 30, 2007

100 Prominent Scientists Disagree with UN Secretary General on Global Warming

From Peyton Knight:

On the theory of human-caused global warming, United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon claims "the time for doubt has passed." Yet 100 prominent scientists, some of whom are current or former UN IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) scientists, disagree.

The scientists sent an open letter to Ban, warming:

It is not possible to stop climate change, a natural phenomenon that has affected humanity through the ages. Geological, archaeological, oral and written histories all attest to the dramatic challenges posed to past societies from unanticipated changes in temperature, precipitation, winds and other climatic variables. We therefore need to equip nations to become resilient to the full range of these natural phenomena by promoting economic growth and wealth generation...

In particular, it is not established that it is possible to significantly alter global climate through cuts in human greenhouse gas emissions. On top of which, because attempts to cut emissions will slow development, the current UN approach of CO2 reduction is likely to increase human suffering from future climate change rather than to decrease it...

In stark contrast to the often repeated assertion that the science of climate change is "settled," significant new peer-reviewed research has cast even more doubt on the hypothesis of dangerous human-caused global warming. But because IPCC working groups were generally instructed (see http://ipccwg1.ucar.edu/wg1/docs/wg1_timetable_2006-08-14.pdf) to consider work published only through May, 2005, these important findings are not included in their reports; i.e., the IPCC assessment reports are already materially outdated.

The UN climate conference in Bali has been planned to take the world along a path of severe CO2 restrictions, ignoring the lessons apparent from the failure of the Kyoto Protocol, the chaotic nature of the European CO2 trading market, and the ineffectiveness of other costly initiatives to curb greenhouse gas emissions. Balanced cost/benefit analyses provide no support for the introduction of global measures to cap and reduce energy consumption for the purpose of restricting CO2 emissions. Furthermore, it is irrational to apply the "precautionary principle" because many scientists recognize that both climatic coolings and warmings are realistic possibilities over the medium-term future...

Attempts to prevent global climate change from occurring are ultimately futile, and constitute a tragic misallocation of resources that would be better spent on humanity's real and pressing problems.

Go here to read the letter in its entirety.

Go here to see who signed the letter.

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Labels: Climate, Environment, United Nations

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 2:03 AM

Thursday, October 04, 2007

Under Law of the Sea Treaty, Burmese Junta Has Purse String Powers

David Ridenour takes another look at the Law of the Sea Treaty, and still doesn’t like what he sees:

Brutal assaults on pro-democracy demonstrators, the arrest of 700 Buddhist monks, the complete obliteration of at least 18 villages, the dragging of pro-democracy demonstrators from their beds at night and the creation of millions of refugees...

...not exactly a resume that suggests "financial competence," but it apparently does at the International Seabed Authority, a creation of the Law of the Sea Treaty.

You see, Myanmar, the name given Burma by its military junta, currently serves on the Finance Committee of the International Seabed Authority. The Finance Committee is responsible not only for recommending membership dues, but on how the proceeds are re-distributed. Until this year, the Burmese junta served on the International Seabed Authority's 36-member Council, the ISA's governing body, until it was replaced by that paragon of human rights and democracy...

...Vietnam.

More troubling is the fact that the Myanmar representative had to be elected to the five-year term on the Finance Committee. Also on the Committee are China, the Russian Federation, Uganda, and FOH Brazil (that's "friend of Hugo").

This provides a glimpse of how badly the deck is stacked against the U.S. under the Law of the Sea Treaty.

Nevertheless, the Senate appears poised to say "hit me."

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Labels: Congress, Foreign Policy, Human Rights, United Nations

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 1:17 AM

Wednesday, September 05, 2007

Would Ronald Reagan Support the Law of the Sea Treaty If He Were President Today?

Supporters of U.S. ratification of the Law of the Sea Treaty often claim Ronald Reagan would support ratification of LOST (also referred to as UNCLOS, short for "United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea"), were he with us today. Many of them have publicly argued that President Reagan's only objection to the Law of the Sea Treaty was the treaty's deep seabed mining section, which was modified in 1994.

A few of many examples of Law of the Sea ratification supporters making this claim:

Senator Richard Lugar (R-IN): "President Ronald Reagan declared U.S. commitment to the principles of UNCLOS with the exception of the mining provisions."

Lawrence Eagleburger and John Norton Moore: "Opponents assert that Ronald Reagan deep-sixed the convention, when instead he set requirements for renegotiation of Part XI, which were successfully achieved..."

Rep. Tom Lantos (D-CA): "The provisions on deep seabed mining, the only provisions that President Reagan objected to, were comprehensively revised to remove all of our objections in 1994."

Rear Admiral William L. Schachte, U.S. Navy, Retired: "...the U.S. was also able to obtain necessary changes to the deep seabed mining provisions to address all of the concerns raised by President Reagan."

William H. Taft IV / U.S. Department of State: "President Reagan expressed concerns only about Part XI's deep seabed mining regime."

Former Secretary of State George Shultz: "It surprises me to learn that opponents of the treaty are invoking President Reagan's name, arguing that he would have opposed ratification despite having succeeded on the deep sea-bed issue. During his administration, with full clearance and support from President Reagan, we made it very clear that we would support ratification if our position on the sea-bed issue were accepted."

David B. Sandalow / Brookings Institution: "President Reagan praised the Convention's 'many positive and very significant accomplishments,” but declined to sign because of the deep seabed mining provisions."

Maggie Goodlander / Council on Foreign Relations: "President Reagan refused to endorse the treaty because of its provisions related to seabed mining, most of which were amended in 1994."

Amanda Griscom / Grist: "Ronald Reagan was in office and he declined to sign on because of pressure from ultra-conservatives and specific objections to deep seabed mining provisions."

Senator Richard Lugar: "President Reagan refused to sign it because of technology transfer provisions and other problems in the section on deep-seabed mining."

The Saturday before last, husband David was reading aloud to me from The Reagan Diaries (yes, liberals, that's the kind of thing conservative married couples do on Saturdays -- your suspicions are confirmed), and came upon the entry for Tuesday, June 29, 1982:

Decided in NSC meeting-will not sign "Law of the Sea" treaty even without seabed mining provisions.

Many people may claim to speak for Ronald Reagan, but Ronald Reagan himself is the one person who really knew what Ronald Reagan thought.
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Labels: Defense, Foreign Policy, United Nations

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 1:04 AM

Wednesday, August 08, 2007

Maybe Bill Nelson Should Resign

From husband David:

Senator Bill Nelson (D-FL) has said he plans to convene a hearing to look into why Everglades National Park was taken off the United Nations’ “List of World Heritage in Danger.”

But why bother? The Senator has already made up his mind on the subject: He blames Deputy Secretary of Interior Todd Willens for convincing the World Heritage Committee to remove the Everglades from the list and has called for Willens to be fired.

"The U.N. should have been presented with the position of our agency experts," said Nelson. “This action is absolutely unacceptable and, I believe, warrants Willens’ removal.”

What Nelson is suggesting here is that the call be made by unelected bureaucrats rather than by people duly appointed by the President. This runs counter not only to the concept of accountable government, but counter to the convention under which the list was created.

Article 11 of the “Convention Concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage” specifies that inclusion of a site on the “List of World Heritage in Danger” requires the “consent of the state concerned.” Such consent power is held by the President, not by people ensconced in the bureaucracy who do not change from one administration to the next.

Continued listing of the Everglades is an embarrassment to the United States because it says that the United States needs international technical and financial assistance to protect the Everglades. Such listings are normally only welcomed by developing nations, which lack the wherewithal to restore such heritage sites.

The suggestion that Willens be dismissed because he believes the United States can handle its own environmental challenges is excessive, to say the least.

From Nelson’s reaction, you’d think Willens had suggested that authority over our lands be transferred from accountable American officials to unaccountable international bureaucrats.

Oh, wait – That’s what Senator Nelson has called for.

Perhaps someone else should be removed from his position.

To contact author David Ridenour directly, write him at dridenour@nationalcenter.org

Note from Amy: For those who don't know, the designation of "endangered" by the U.N. World Heritage Program bestows no benefit upon the Everglades. The designation exists to create publicity for a handful of endangered sites worldwide for the purpose of attracting capital to sites located in countries undergoing upheaval and to poor countries. Inasmuch as the United States has a stable (if frustrating) government, does not receive foreign aid, and its Everglades programs are not dependent upon nor expecting capital from abroad, the main practical impact of a de-listing is to give U.N. officials one less excuse to junket to Florida (about 22 percent of the cost of which would ultimately be billed to U.S. taxpayers). The de-listing also allows, as Todd Willens noted in the AP article, and David referred to above, for more attention to be given to endangered sites located in nations that cannot or will not care for them. The Everglades does not require publicity.

An open question for Senator Nelson: What do you expect the United Nations to do for America that America cannot do for itself?

For more information about World Heritage areas, I recommend various National Center for Public Policy Research publications on this subject, including World Heritage Areas: A Critical Analysis, by Ryan Balis, This Land is My Land: How United Nations Claims of World Heritage May Swipe America's Past, by Ryan Balis, Keep the Statue of Liberty Free: An Argument for Congressional Oversight of U.N. Land Designations in the U.S., by Amy Ridenour, 1972 Treaty Grants the United Nations Control Over American Historical Landmarks, by Melissa Wiedbrauk, United Nations Gaining Control Over American Historical Landmarks, by John Carlisle and Americans Losing Control of U.S. Treasures to United Nations, by Elizabeth McGeehan, among others.

In looking through our files on the subject I was reminded that The National Center, in conjunction with the Committee For a Constructive Tomorrow, in 2000 bestowed an award on then-Congressman Helen Chenoweth-Hage for her work on the American Land Sovereignty Protection Act, legislation that would have required the approval of the U.S. Congress before any U.S. landmark was listed as a United Nations World Heritage Site. Rep. Chenoweth-Hage was Senator Nelson's opposite: Senator Nelson apparently not only believes U.S. sites should be listed by the United Nations without the approval of the U.S. Congress, but he believes Congress should "investigate" if sites listed without Congressional approval are removed from United Nations supervision.

One wonders, as David asks above, why Senator Nelson serves in our government, if he believes we need to be supervised by the United Nations. He might better suited for a perk-laden post at Turtle Bay. Let's hope he considers it.
_____

Labels: Congress, Environment, Liberals, United Nations

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 4:16 PM

Tuesday, August 07, 2007

Law of the Sea Debate Continues

The conversation that began with Doug Bandow's article in the American Spectator on the law of the Sea Treaty, continued in the American Spectator's letters column and then moved to this blog goes forth with a rebuttal to husband David's last points from Robert J. McManus of Kile Goekjian Reed & McManus, pllc:

My letter in American Spectator, which your husband David purports to rebut in your blog, referred to "the dwindling band of sneering treaty opponents . . ." And so, I was disappointed, but not surprised, that your husband's rebuttal included a sneering reference to my profession (attorney), strongly implying that my disagreement with Doug Bandow's article was motivated by my personal financial self-interest. Nevertheless:

1. Your husband (May I call him David?) argues that the treaty will harm the cause of fisheries conservation, because it "requires states that cannot harvest the entire allowable catch in certain areas to make the surplus available to other nations . . . ." I believe this point is specious, because, under Art. 62.2, the coastal state has exclusive competence to determine "allowable catch" (a defined term) in its 200-mile economic zone (which, under Article 61, may well be less than "maximum sustainable yield."). Article 297.3(a) even exempts the coastal state's determination from compulsory dispute settlement.

2. David also argues that oil and gas exploration will be rendered illegal, because CO2 causes global warming, which kills coral reefs. "You do the math," he sneers. No, you do the math; I'll fall back on critical thought. Nothing in the treaty requires parties to adhere to environmental norms to which they have not independently subscribed. (See Article 297.1(c), for instance.) David will be on target only when the US ratifies some other treaty which prohibits oil and gas exploration. (Don't hold your breath.) In the meantime, the US will have plenty of company. Every nation on earth consumes oil and gas, thereby supposedly contributing to global warming and coral reef bleaching. They would all be subject to the dreaded "environmental litigation" you mention if the point were well taken.

3. I confess I don't understand David's lead-off point about "underwater vehicles," but he seems to believe that the US could not use ROVs, or even paravanes (which are unquestionably submerged "vehicles"), in mine-sweeping operations inside the 12-mile limit if it ratifies the treaty. I assume he understands that the "innocent passage" provisions of the treaty do not apply to US military operations in our own territorial sea. This non-problem would arise only when someone has mined some other territorial sea, thereby impeding innocent passage in the first place; without a more specific hypothetical, I can't respond further. Anyway, this alleged issue seems somehow to have escaped the notice of the CNO and the JCS.

Please tell me more about how I can profit personally from US accession to the LOS treaty. I'm all ears.

Robert J. McManus
Kile Goekjian Reed & McManus, pllc

David's response:

Although I don't agree with the points that Robert McManus made, I applaud him for citing specific reasons why he believes my criticisms of the Law of the Sea Treaty are not valid. This sets him apart from most of the LOST proponents I've encountered.

He is, nonetheless, off base.

First, he calls my suggestion that the treaty might contribute to resource damage (by requiring the sharing of surplus fish stocks) "specious" because, he notes, Article 62.2 specifies coastal states have the exclusive right to determine allowable catches. Actually, Article 62.2 deals with determining harvest capabilities -- not determining allowable catches -- but it is a long treaty and mistakes such as this are easy to make.

Mr. McManus probably meant to cite Article 61, which does specify that the coastal nations "shall" determine "allowable catches."

But in noting this requirement, Mr. McManus seems to suggest that a coastal nation can simply pick the "allowable catch" number that suits it at any given time. It can't. Article 61 goes on to specify what factors the coastal state shall consider in determining the catch.

Mr. McManus notes that 297.3(a) exempts the coastal state's determinations on its catches from compulsory dispute settlement. He neglects to mention, however, that 297.1(c) requires mandatory dispute resolution if it is alleged that, in exercising its sovereign rights governing resources, the coastal state acts in contravention of international standards "which are applicable to the coastal State and which have been established by this Convention or through a competent international organization or diplomatic conference in accordance with this Convention."

In any case, Section 70 of the treaty, which attempts simultaneously to satisfy nations that wish to harvest its entire allowable catch while still providing "equitable arrangements" for nearby disadvantaged states to participate in the "exploitation" of the same "living resources," would at the very least have to be seen as encouraging a trend toward overfishing.

All this may be beside the point, as whether a coastal state is required to participate in compulsory dispute settlement does not free it from its obligations under the treaty, which surely will not escape the attention of the legal teams of interested parties.

Second, Mr. McManus dismisses my argument that environmental activists could use the treaty to stop oil and gas exploration, using, among other things, concern over global warming as an excuse. He argues that the United States would not be required to submit to any environmental requirements to which it hasn't already subscribed, and he cites 297.1 to back him up. But that provision -- as the citation earlier clearly indicates -- says no such thing. The United States is not party to the Kyoto Protocol, which clearly would qualify under 297.1.

Furthermore, environmental advocacy groups have already signaled their intent to use the treaty to pursue their global warming-related regulatory objectives. As Dr. Thilo Bode, then the international executive director of Greenpeace, wrote in 2000: "Global warming is likely to have a big impact at sea. The oceans play a central role in shaping the Earth's climate, absorbing carbon dioxide and other gases, and redistributing heat and water. Sea levels have risen by an estimated 10-25 centimeters over the last century, and as this continues the waters will cover land and coastal habitats in many countries... Solving the environmental problems facing the oceans and ensuring sustainable fisheries is one of the greatest challenges facing humankind in the 21st century. No single nation or region can do this alone: it will require comprehensive international cooperation as required by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea."

Article 212.1 of the treaty (among others, such as 207) could even be read as a mandate that party states adopt regulations limiting carbon dioxide emissions: "States shall adopt laws and regulations to prevent, reduce and control pollution of the marine environment from or through the atmosphere, applicable to the air space under their sovereignty and to vessels flying their flag or vessels or aircraft of their registry, taking into account internationally agreed rules, standards and recommended practices and procedures and the safety of air navigation."

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee acknowledged the treaty's mandate on party states to combat "pollution" affecting the oceans in its 2004 report accompanying the treaty, saying "[The Law of the Sea Treaty] advances U.S. interests in the protection of the environment by creating obligations binding on all States to protect and preserve the marine environment from pollution from a variety of sources, and by establishing a framework for further international action to combat pollution."

While it is unlikely that treaty negotiators more than a generation ago had carbon dioxide in mind when they referred to "pollution," no such assumption can be made in the post-Kyoto era.

Mr. McManus is, of course, correct that every nation consumes oil and gas and emits greenhouse gases. But few nations contribute 25% of the world's emissions, which makes the United States a tempting target -- even more tempting given our rejection of the Kyoto Protocol.

Further, treaties ratified by the United States can be given the effect of domestic law in U.S. courts. This simply isn't so in many other countries.

Third, Mr. McManus confesses that he didn't understand my point about underwater vehicles, so I'll explain further. Under the Convention on the Territorial Sea and Contiguous Zones to which the United States is a party, submarines are required to operate on the surface of the water to invoke the right of innocent passage. The Law of the Sea Treaty extends this surfacing requirement to all underwater vehicles, thus applying to unmanned underwater vehicles, including those used in mine detection. Such a surfacing requirement would render these vehicles ineffective.

He is correct that the issue would arise when mines are placed in the territorial sea of another coast nation, but he's wrong in suggesting that innocent passage would be impeded in these cases anyway.

The concern here is that mines placed by third parties -- rogue states or terrorists -- could damage or destroy U.S. naval vessels that are otherwise exercising their right to innocent passage because mine detection vessels can't do their job. It would have been wise when the treaty was renegotiated to, at minimum, consider such craft as extensions of the vessels they are protecting.

Finally, Mr. McManus implies that I said in my response to his American Spectator letter that he would personally profit from U.S. ascension to the Law of the Sea Treaty. I did not and I don't think any reasonable reader would conclude that I did.

My point was only that the Law of the Sea Treaty would spur lawsuits and be a boon to the legal profession -- a profession to which, I note, Mr. McManus belongs. I regard this comment as no different than an observation that changes to the tax code are a boon to CPAs. It was meant as good-natured ribbing.

There seems to have been already one casualty of the Law of the Sea Treaty: Its proponents' sense of humor.

David

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Labels: Climate, Defense, Environment, United Nations

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 1:58 AM

Thursday, August 02, 2007

More Law of the Sea Debate

Doug Bandow had an article in the American Spectator Monday, harshly critical of the Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST):

In short, the LOST is unsalvageable. It reflects the collectivist political environment within which it was first negotiated. Protecting navigational rights and the ocean environment are legitimate, even important, goals, but the provisions advancing these ends should not be paired with creation of a redistributionist regulatory regime for the ocean's floor.

LOST advocates have made much of the president's support for the convention, and the White House has launched a sustained campaign to co-opt Republican Senators and conservative activists. But the Bush administration long ago abandoned the traditional limited government, market-oriented tenets of conservatism. That it is pushing a treaty that establishes a collectivist system most notable for inefficient bureaucracy simply confirms that the administration has lost its ideological soul. Conservatives must say no to the LOST.

On Tuesday, the American Spectator printed two letters to the editor. The first, by Robert J. McManus of Kile Goekjian Reed & McManus, pllc, says, in part:

...former Secretary of State George Shultz supports accession, and he also sets the record straight on the position of the sainted Ronald Reagan, whose 1982 refusal to sign is often trotted out by the dwindling band of sneering treaty opponents as emblematic of conservative orthodoxy on this issue. Said Shultz: "It surprises me to learn that opponents of the treaty are invoking President's Reagan's name... During his administration, with full clearance and support from President Reagan, we made it very clear that we would support ratification if our position on the sea-bed issue were accepted."

...[Bandow] reveals much when he refers to the current Part XI as "redistributionist.” If some form of sharing in resources beyond national jurisdiction be "redistribution," then he must also believe that such oceanic resources belong exclusively to those with the power and technology to snatch them first. Well, I guess it's a position.

As general counsel of NOAA, (and a former Alternate U.S. Rep to UNCLOS), I participated in the 1982 decision not to sign the unamended text. I (and the Secretary of Commerce for whom I worked) were criticized at the time for favoring efforts to rewrite Part XI, on the oft-stated grounds that the treaty was simply "unsalvageable" (Bandow's word). The ensuing 12 years showed that the nay-sayers were wrong, but they will never say die and admit error, and they therefore applaud politically noisy treaty opponents who spread outrageous misstatements about the text of the treaty, on the web and elsewhere.

The second letter was by husband David, who wrote:

Doug Bandow's "An Administration LOST at Sea" does a great job of outlining many of the shortcomings of the Law of the Sea Treaty. To his list, I'd like to add a few more that are often overlooked.

For one, the treaty requires all underwater vehicles to travel on the surface of the water to exercise the right of "innocent passage.” This is a radical departure from previous agreements, which applied only to submarines. This represents a new security threat as it would mean that unmanned underwater vehicles used for mine detection would be required to surface, rendering these vehicles ineffective and making our ships more vulnerable to attack.

Second, the treaty contains provisions that -- contrary to proponents' claims -- could harm the marine environment. It requires states that cannot harvest the entire allowable catch in certain areas to make the surplus available to other nations, especially developing nations. Since the treaty makes re-acquiring harvest rights difficult once surrendered to a developing nation, coastal nations may seek to use the entire catch by whatever means are necessary. This may contribute to damage of marine resources.

Third, the treaty has the potential of making oil and gas exploration more difficult, not easier, as its proponents have suggested. The treaty requires state parties to "prevent, reduce and control" pollution of the marine environment, including "through the atmosphere.” A by-product of burning oil and gas is CO2, CO2 is a greenhouse gas, and environmental activists argue that global warming is destroying the coral reefs, home to some of the ocean's most biologically-diverse eco-systems. You do the math.

For these reasons, and those mentioned by Bandow, the Law of the Sea Treaty needs to be scuttled.

Today, for this blog, David penned a few words in response to Mr. McManus' letter:

To allay conservative concerns over the Law of the Sea Treaty, Robert J. McManus assures us that Ronald Reagan would back the treaty, citing testimony by George Shultz saying so.

Perhaps he missed it while serving as general counsel of NOAA (where, he notes, he "participated in the 1982 decision" not to sign the treaty unless changed - a rather interesting, yet ambiguous choice of words), but conservatives were not entirely convinced of Mr. Shultz's commitment to conservative principles back when he was Secretary of State. They're unlikely to be convinced of them now.

The fact is that the Law of the Sea Treaty's environmental provisions would vastly increase the potential for environmental litigation that could either hold up or stop resource exploration. This doesn't seem to bother McManus -- perhaps not surprising given that this would be a boon to his profession -- but it should bother most conservatives. These provisions are at odds with the beliefs of most conservatives, including Ronald Reagan, who once quipped during a visit to Indiana: "If the federal government had been around when the Creator was putting His hand to this state, Indiana wouldn't be here. It'd still be waiting for an environmental impact statement."

After winning hard-fought concessions, it can be difficult to watch them go down with the rest of the ship. This may explain why so many of those who worked on the Law of the Sea Treaty are fighting so vociferously for its ratification, despite its obvious shortcomings.

But the ship should be sunk nonetheless.

My two cents: Mr. McManus says George Shultz “sets the record straight on the position of the sainted Ronald Reagan,” claiming that, according to Shultz, Reagan now would back ratification. The record is not as straight as Mr. McManus would have readers believe: Ed Meese says Reagan would still oppose it.
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Labels: Defense, Environment, United Nations

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 3:22 AM

Friday, July 27, 2007

Another Neo-Know-Nothing?

When it comes to the Law of the Sea Treaty, "neo-know-nothings" can be found in some pretty august positions.

Here's part of what Heritage Foundation President Ed Feulner had to say about the Law of the Sea Treaty in a column two years ago:

in Washington, a bad idea never goes away -- it just gets tabled until everyone forgets why it was such a bad idea.

The facts are simple, and they are the same today as they were back in 1982 when President Reagan first rejected the Law of the Sea treaty and Donald Rumsfeld (then a special presidential envoy on the treaty) told the world why: It does not serve our national security interests or our economic interests, and we should make sure it isn’t ratified.

Admittedly, Secretary Rice isn’t the treaty’s only supporter. Last year, it passed the Senate Foreign Relations committee. Even some members of the U.S. military are on board. As Michael Mullen, then vice chief of naval operations, told a House committee, “we must be able to take maximum advantage of the established and widely accepted navigational rights the Law of the Sea Convention codifies to get us to the fight rapidly.”

But, in fact, the Navy stands to gain little from the treaty. As Admiral Mullen also testified, the U.S. already is complying with large parts of the agreement. “If the U.S. becomes a party to the Law of the Sea Convention, we would continue to operate as we have since 1983,” he said. “The Convention’s rules in this regard do not change the rules the Navy has operated under for over 40 years under the predecessor 1958 treaties to which the United States is a party, governing the territorial sea and high seas.”

In other words: Treaty or no treaty, we’ll keep doing what we’re doing.

But while there’s not much for us to gain, there’s plenty to lose.

In October 2003, Defense Department official Mark Esper told the Senate that other nations could use Law of the Sea treaty to curtail American military operations, even though these maneuvers are supposed to be exempt. China, for example, likely would waste no time attempting to use the treaty to stop U.S. naval war games.

It’s not merely the military that’s at risk, though. If ratified, the treaty would create virtual governments that would be outside of American control but would exercise power over American interests. For example, Section 4 of the treaty would establish the International Sea-Bed Authority to exercise executive and judicial control over almost all of the world’s oceans and seabeds -- nearly 70 percent of the planet. Its new authority would have the power to tax American interests engaged in a variety of maritime endeavors. Only U.S. lawmakers ought to be able to decide how -- and how much -- to tax Americans.

If the treaty went into effect, the result would resemble the United Nations: The U.S. would foot the bill for about 25 percent of the organizations the treaty would establish. But, as at the U.N., blocks of non-democratic nations could limit our actions easily.

Let’s be frank: These international bureaucracies don’t work. The United Nations is already dealing with a sex scandal in the Congo, genocide in Sudan and the Oil-for-Food fiasco in Iraq. Why would we want to create more unaccountable international bureaucracies and place them in charge of our oceans?

As former Secretary of State George Shultz noted last year, nations create international organizations to serve their common interests, not to govern them. The current system works well and is in our national interest. That’s why it’s time to sink the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea, once and for all.

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Labels: Congress, Courts, Defense, United Nations

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 5:17 PM

Thursday, July 26, 2007

Neo-Know-Nothings? Law of the Sea Supporter Casts Civility Adrift

A story (paid subscription required) in the National Law Journal this week featured husband David as the lone supporter of U.S. sovereignty against quotes from three supporters of ratification of a treaty many Reaganite conservatives believe would hurt our national defense.

The National Law Journal article is nothing if not objective, beginning with the title "Sea Treaty Cast Adrift by the U.S.; Plenty of Support, but No Approval."

By the very definition of "plenty," there isn't "plenty of support" for the Law of the Sea treaty, because there hasn't been enough to get it approved. "Plenty" implies a surfeit. But more to the point, if there have been polls of public attitudes of the Law of the Sea Treaty, and I know of none, they certainly weren't referenced in the article.

The text commences in an equally fair and balanced manner:

The Law of the Sea Treaty, which established a sweeping legal regime for activities on and under the world's oceans, has been a fixture of international law for nearly three decades. But why, despite broad political, military, industry and environmental support in the United States, has the Senate never ratified it?

Some international law experts say it's unlikely any other treaty has been so widely supported and yet failed to come to a vote in the Senate for so long a period of time.

Today, 153 nation states have acceded to the treaty, including Russia, China, every European Union nation and virtually all U.S. allies in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development.

President Bush recently urged the Senate to dust it off and push it through by the end of this congressional session.

Is the small, but tenacious, opposition rooted in traditional conservative mistrust of international legal bodies, such as the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court?

"I think that can be part of it," said treaty opponent David Ridenour, vice president of the National Center for Public Policy Research. "Certainly there are provisions of the treaty that give people reasons to be distrustful."

But that distrust is based on misinterpretations of treaty specifics and poor lawyering, insisted longtime treaty advocate John Norton Moore of the University of Virginia School of Law, director of its Center for National Security and Oceans Law and Policy...

Mr. Moore (a Law of the Sea Treaty negotiator) goes on to refer to treaty opponents as a "a neo-know-nothing movement," evidently referring to the mid-19th century Know-Nothing Party.

(The National Law Journal may have missed the reference, as it did not capitalize the party's name -- possibly its writer and/or editors thought Moore was describing critics as a movement of newly-minted idiots.)

The Know-Nothings, for those of you who have limited your knowledge of history to what they teach in schools and universities, was an anti-immigrant and anti-Catholic political party during the pre-Civil War era.

The slur is reminiscent of comments from the pro-amnesty lobby, which called law-abiding citizens who want to build a wall to protect our border before discussing amnesty for illegal aliens xenophobic immigrant bashers, among other epithets. But heck, even Jimmy Carter's amnesty of Vietnam War draft-dodgers didn't take place until after the war was over.

Peace first; then forgive.

To be fair, Mr. Moore also called some treaty opponents "fine people." If I actually were married to an anti-immigrant Catholic basher, it would be a relief indeed to know he is a fine one. And at the risk of sounding like a newly-mined idiot myself, based on his picture on the University of Virginia website, Mr. Moore looks friendly -- though not chubby -- enough to play Santa Claus. Maybe he didn't really mean it.

I'm posting a bit more of the article below, but you'll have to visit (paid subscription required) the National Law Journal website to see the whole thing:

...The treaty gives states the option of choosing among ITLOS, the International Court of Justice or arbitral tribunals to settle their disputes. The United States is on record as rejecting the two courts and as choosing arbitration once it is a party to the treaty.

States are the main parties before the court or the arbitral tribunals, unless a state authorizes a private party, for example an oil company whose tanker has been seized by a foreign state, to proceed on its own behalf. Private parties have direct access to dispute resolution only in the deep sea-bed mining portion of the treaty. Mining companies sought their own right to sue and arbitrate, which was considered radical at the time, according to Oxman, but now is quite common, particularly under investment treaties.

Despite the United States' election of arbitration, Ridenour and other treaty opponents, such as Jeremy Rabkin of George Mason University School of Law, argue the United States could end up before the court when provisional measures -- similar to temporary injunctions -- are sought by a complaining state. The treaty provides that the court would automatically adjudicate such disputes when states cannot reach agreement on the method of adjudication or arbitration "within two weeks from the date of the request for provisional measures."

"You can imagine many circumstances in which the U.S. would disagree with Syria or Iran and where neither side agrees to arbitrators," said Ridenour. "The tribunal is not packed with a lot of U.S. supporters. One of the problems with these international tribunals is often you have judges from countries that do not have a long tradition of representative democracy."

But that is the "extreme setting" that treaty opponents magnify into a major, but baseless, problem, Moore said.

"All of the general dispute mechanisms are set up specifically for arbitration, like the normal commercial arbitration favored by American industry around the world," he said. At the end of the day, if parties can't agree on the arbitration process, he and others said, it is not unusual to have an appointing authority step in. And, if the United States were a treaty member, said Moore, it could have a judge on ITLOS and be an influential voice in the development of ocean laws.

Opponents also say treaty provisions on protecting the marine environment could become a "backdoor for environmental lawsuits" brought in U.S. courts on issues such as global warming. But supporters counter that U.S. courts are familiar with interpreting treaty obligations and the government wants this treaty because it offers stable rules of law and avenues for stopping environmental damage...

David's concerns about the Treaty, though it doesn't cover all of them, can be found here.
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Labels: Congress, Courts, Defense, United Nations

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 12:16 AM

Sunday, July 22, 2007

Law of the Sea Treaty Unconstitutional?

Julian Ku, writing on the Opinion Juris blog, says Article 39 of Annex VI of the Law of the Sea Treaty may be unconstitutional:

I believe this provision, Art. 39 of Annex VI, does raise a real potential constitutional issue. This provision refers to the effect of decisions of the Seabed Disputes Chamber, a portion of the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea authorized to settled disputes over seabed rights...

Here is the provision in its entirety:

Article 39 Enforcement of decisions of the Chamber

The decisions of the Chamber shall be enforceable in the territories of the States Parties in the same manner as judgments or orders of the highest court of the State Party in whose territory the enforcement is sought.

As I argued at length here, this provision appears to require U.S. courts to give more than "full faith and credit" to judgments of this international chamber. Rather, it requires a U.S. court to treat such chamber decisions as equivalent to those of the U.S. Supreme Court. As far as I know, no prior treaty has ever committed the U.S. in quite this emphatic way. And I do think this provision raises real and serious U.S. constitutional questions about the excessive delegation of judicial power under Article III...

...[The State Department's] Their solution is to request the Senate attach a declaration to its advise and consent papers declaring this provision is "non-self executing." This means that Congress would have to act to subsequently pass legislation giving effect to this provision.

But even this solution is not free of problems. First of all, UNCLOS art. 309 appears to prohibit any reservations and exceptions, which might be read to nullify any non-self execution declaration. Second of all, even if Congress passed subsequent legislation, this would help (but not completely resolve) the constitutional question of whether Congress can require federal and state courts (and maybe the U.S. Supreme Court) to treat an international tribunal judgment as binding precedent...

Some commenters to his post disagree.

The entire conversation is here.
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Labels: Courts, United Nations

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 11:08 AM

Monday, June 18, 2007

Bush Administration Law of the Sea Treaty Defense Inaccurate

Husband David has a letter in today's Washington Times. It corrects factual errors in a June 13 op-ed by deputy secretary of state John Negroponte and deputy secretary of defense Gordon England defending the Bush Administration's decision to ratify the Law of the Sea Treaty.

Said David:

The op-ed by John D. Negroponte and Gordon England "Reap the bounty," (Wednesday) contained a number of inaccuracies.

They state that by assigning responsibility for maritime zones, the treaty would improve protections for the environment. It could do just the opposite. It requires, for example, that nations either harvest their entire allowable catch in certain areas or give the surplus to other nations. Such a use it or lose it policy is reminiscent of federal grazing policy, which until recently required ranchers to use their forage rights or lose them. Because ranchers lacked the flexibility to remove cattle for extended periods, overgrazing resulted.

Mr. Negroponte and Mr. England also suggest that ratification is needed to have legal certainty of such maritime rights as "innocent passage." They're wrong in two ways: Such rights already exist under the 1958 Convention on the Territorial Sea, and the treaty governs the behavior of signatories -- currently numbering more than 150 nations -- regardless of whether the United States accedes to the treaty.

Finally, they suggest the treaty would bolster U.S. national security. Instead, it would complicate some of these efforts by subjecting certain actions to judgment by an international tribunal.

The Law of the Sea treaty should be scuttled.

DAVID RIDENOUR
Vice President
The National Center for Public Policy Research
Washington

It is interesting to me that we haven't heard any environmental organizations speaking out against the possibility of United Nations-mandated overfishing, as David warns could happen under Law of the Sea.

Go here here for lots more reasons to worry about the Bush Administration's perplexing support for the Law of the Sea Treaty.
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Labels: Defense, Environment, United Nations, White House

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 1:29 PM

Tuesday, June 05, 2007

The U.N's Carbon Footprint

The headquarters of the United Nations leaks "nearly 25 percent of the heat pumped into it in the winter."

Great leading-by-example, guys.
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Labels: Climate, United Nations

Posted by Amy Ridenour at 4:12 PM