It should come as no surprise that GWB has appointed his bully boy Bolton to be the US Ambassador to the UN ( *1). The expansion and security of the Empire requires the denial, dismissal and ultimately the destruction of international law and its institutions. Bush and the neocons have no more use for the UN than they do for the International Criminal Court. All these organizations do, as far as they are concerned, is hamper the unilateral expression of American power in favour of their interests ( *2).
We should have no illusions about what is at stake here. While this cabal is in power, they are raking in handsome profits for their corporate backers and that might tick you off, but while they are doing that, they are destroying the basis of world peace since WWII. With its many flaws and the unreserved cynicism of its charter, the United Nations has still functioned as a safety valve between great powers preventing things from getting out of hand. That may be about to change.
With the fall of the USSR and the subsequent rise of American triumphalism in the form of the neocons and their fellow travellers, things are a lot dodgier. Bolton will try to subvert the UN to American purposes and when that fails, he will try to take it down. If we return to an era of treaties and alliances reminiscent of the pre-WWI era, except this time with modern (nuclear) weapons, the world will be a very much more unstable and hostile place.
The United States needs to reassert its support for the institutions and the substance of international law. The world needs the United States to be a champion of freedom and justice again, not an overlord.
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