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We have discovered dozens of WMD-related program activities and significant amounts of equipment that Iraq concealed from the United Nations during the inspections that began in late 2002. The discovery of these deliberate concealment efforts have come about both through the admissions of Iraqi scientists and officials concerning information they deliberately withheld and through physical evidence of equipment and activities that ISG has discovered that should have been declared to the UN.

You'd think that now wouldn't you? What exactly do you do for a living, anyway?

And slavery may be forbidden where you live, but it's common, even in countries like the united states it's been known to happen.

You simply cannot compare Sweden and the States.
Sweden is 448,964 square km.
That's a tad bit larger than California.

Your statement that access to communications should be a human right is absolutely preposterous mate. Here are the UN defined human rights. A noble document that. To lump *access to communications* in with the other UN defined rights is simply ludicrous and tells me you've never ventured outside Northern Europe. I've been to Africa and Latin America, believe me, the ability to IM is the least of these people's worries. The fact that you think access to communications should be on the same page as All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. is mind boggling. If access to communications is a human right, then why is access to transportation absent from your argument? State provided access to transportation would do the world a lot more good than being able to IM your mum that you're hungry. I don't see you blogging for bicycles or minicabs for the world.

Honestly mate, while it may consume the largest part of your day, the ability to read slashdot is not at the top of the U.N. todo list.

--
Richard the Lionhearted

I'd also point out that education and healthcare are not rights, as excercising "rights" does not require coerced participation by a third party.

2nd reply- Health care is not a right. It's a NEED. As in food, clothing, shelter, water, medical care. One of the basics needed to survive as we pollute the planet beyond basic survival of our species and short circuit evolution to allow more people to survive. Fullfilling needs is NOT ENTITLEMENT- it's basic HUMAN RIGHTS as described in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Heck- you really need to look up what is a right- because a free-market capiatlistic society is NOT a right. It's a luxury.

http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html. Note most of the so-called "rights" that idiots like you have been brainwashed to believe in are not- they're priviledges that must be paid for by sacrificing real human rights.

this guy who's on the ground and watching the UN's presense first hand: The only way to get away from the UN there is to go where there's actually people in need. Hang out in 5 star hotels and you'll be swamped by 'em.

So that guy is hanging out in his 5 star hotel, whining that there's more people than usual?
"Yo, kettle! You black foo!"

Latest news on the UN efforts there.

this guy who's on the ground and watching the UN's presense first hand: The only way to get away from the UN there is to go where there's actually people in need. Hang out in 5 star hotels and you'll be swamped by 'em.

So that guy is hanging out in his 5 star hotel, whining that there's more people than usual?
"Yo, kettle! You black foo!"

Latest news on the UN efforts there.

The thing is, it is unacceptable that people are denied equal rights just because they happen to be homosexual, and it is unacceptable that prison rape occurs, and it is unacceptable that drug addiction is so unreasonably dealt with.

All of these things are unacceptable, most particularly the first case since drug-taking is after all relatively speaking a choice, whereas outside fundamentalist theorising neither homosexuality nor being born female are 'a choice'. And yes if a country started stringing people up for the crime of being homosexual, I'd be thinking it was very much time for the rest of Planet Earth to react on that matter. So what's your point?

I find a good solution to cultural relativism is the Declaration of Human Rights, which you can find right here. Although I realise that we here on slashdot apparently hold the UN in deepest contempt, this particular document is worth taking a good look at. As far as I am concerned, it solves a lot of problems, as one can look at situations within which one might be tempted to invoke cultural relativism and say: is this against human rights? If it is, it's not OK to just shrug and go "strange places, strange people", and if it isn't, shrug away... Cultural relativism is a useful concept when it comes to accepting weirdnesses and overcoming culture shock, but it is not a catch-all excuse.

Policies using international trade to improve the economies of the 50 poorest and least developed countries (LDCs) have not generated long-term reductions in poverty, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) says in a new report. ... if current trends persist, the number of people living in extreme poverty will increase to 471 million by 2015 from 334 million people in 2000, it predicts.

As a faltering U.S. economy, skyrocketing housing prices and reduced government services force people from their homes, agencies are scrambling to find ways to provide shelter and assistance to a growing and changing homeless population.

Policies using international trade to improve the economies of the 50 poorest and least developed countries (LDCs) have not generated long-term reductions in poverty, the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) says in a new report. ... if current trends persist, the number of people living in extreme poverty will increase to 471 million by 2015 from 334 million people in 2000, it predicts.

As a faltering U.S. economy, skyrocketing housing prices and reduced government services force people from their homes, agencies are scrambling to find ways to provide shelter and assistance to a growing and changing homeless population.

1. Judge not lest ye be judged.
2. This story was about blinding pilots. There are other threads about "other things going on in this country" (other countries too).
3. Our having Guantanamo Bay violates "All international laws"? Really? All of them? Even this one
4. Shining a laser on a passenger airplane is not a disease, unless you think stupidity qualifies.
5. Good for you and no its not.
6. Are you suggesting that people who don't share your views aren't "real" americans?

Map of three 2004 hurricanes intersecting

Map of Homeland and Ft. Meade, Florida. Man, somebody sure has a sense of humor. Perhaps the NRO people wanted to make the NSA guys eyes bug out. I believe somebody snickered over this, even if I cannot prove it.

Convention on the Prohibition of Military or Any Other Hostile Use of Environmental Modification Techniques

ENMOD gives a state nuclear power without all the lingering radiation. Note all the media comparisons of hurricane and tsunami power to equivalent Hiroshimas. If there's going to be a new world order it must be policed by force. Right? Uncooperative nations get tsunamied. Cooperative nations get favorable weather for growing crops. Do I believe it? I suspect it. It doesn't make it true.

Your ICQ wouldn't be 1588540 by any chance?
If not, nevermind. Your writing style just reminded me of a hypocrit poster who has been poluting this story from the beginning. He is a short-minded little dude with an anger-management issue, not unlike yours. All he wants to do is hear more about 'catastrophes' and complain about the US, Slashdot and 9/11 news feeds. Sounds familiar?
So, here is tip for the two of you: if you don't like Slashdot's content and want more disaster reporting, subscribe to this newsletter: http://www.un.org/news/dh/latest/subscribe.shtml . It's about natural and human-made disasters all over the World. Exciting, he?

A freind of mine was preaching to the choir (me) about how inappropriate it is that the RIAA is calling mass copyright infringement "piracy", and how it is an inappropriately biased term given the evils of Blackbeard and the like. Since I agreed, but like my rants to be backed up by better facts, I did some research on piracy of the "Argh, me hearties" kind. To my surprise, it almost fits, if you grant that copyright is "property", Cyberspace is a "place outside the jurisdiction of any State", and that mass copyright infringement falls within "act of depredation". (See what the UN has to say [un.org] about the Jolly Roger type stuff.)

Skimming the web for some history on this, it seems that the idea of the laws against piracy arose slowly to deal with the problem of crimes committed outside of any national jurisdiction. I was wondering if Mike has any thoughts on this parallel, and what it may imply about how cyberlaw may evolve. nte

So that makes two of us who are opposed to a unified world government.

I wasn't trying to attack your earlier point about smart people having more kids. I was thinking along the lines of constraints like finite resources and population increase etc. I mean, when we encourage one section of the population to breed, most of the global effort against overpopulation takes a hit. Sooner or later, someone will bring up the Shockley solution seriously.

For instance, India will face this "smart population vs dumb population" question next year, when the election constituencies are redrawn to reflect the population distribution. (Search Google for (india "delimitation commission") (without the parentheses) if you're interested. The current commission is supposed to report sometime in mid-2005.). It happens that some states in India have been very good at controlling their populations, but other state populations are still rising fast (and pulling the total with them). The side-effect of the constituency redrawing is that the states which do achieve low population growth are penalized by having their representation in Parliament reduced. (This has not been the case since 1976, when the Supreme Court froze all re-delimitations until 2000, but the latest delimitation is now well under way). There are only two ways in which this trend could be stopped: 1) If the "smart" states had more kids; 2) If the "dumb" states had less. Since this is India (with its strong accent on reducing total population), the first is not an option. It leads very quickly to the second being passionately advocated, in the form of "Why not force a compulsory sterilization after the second kid", moving on to "No reproduction for illiterates" and other related forms. (Yes I've personally been part of discussions like these). (BTW, targeting other states is still not as bad as blanket-targeting religions and/or communities for population growth).

I would imagine that with the world population exhibiting similar trends (http://esa.un.org/unpp/, using the medium variant throughout), similar sentiments would be expressed globally.

I wasn't attacking you personally for the concept that smart people should have more kids. I was merely pointing out that it often leads to the other strategy being preferentially chosen, especially where there is pressure to reduce overall population.

10% of under-teenagers have their own Web site

Year:2000
0-4 617,204,000
5-9 606,072,000
10-14 604,898,000 (so, split in half, say 302,449,000)

Grunwald Associates finds that 10% of children ages six to 17 in the US have their own Web site.

#ifndef CLICKZ_STATS
#define CLICKZ_STATS

#ifndef FALSE
#define FALSE 0
#endif

#define CLICKZ_STATS_FACTS FALSE
#define CLICKZ_STATS_BRAINS NULL
#define PATH_TO_CLICKZ_STATS_RAW_DATA "/dev/urandom"
#define WHERE_TO_FILE_CLICKZ_STATS_STORIES "/dev/null"

#endif

This is my last rejected submission on climate change - posted anonymously to avoid karma-whornig accusations.

New evidence of climate change unprecedented in human history seems to arrive almost every day. Two new studies have added more data to the mountain of evidence supporting the anthropogenic climate change hypothesis. A UN Environmental Program report shows that the world faces a 'staggering threat', with the Arctic already being severely affected, with thawing of much of the sea ice and the Greenland icecap predicted.

The extinction of polar bears and seals seems likely. Worse, the decrease is salinity will affect the thermohaline pump that drives the North Atlantic drift, potentially stopping the Gulf Stream and reducing Europe to an icy wilderness. But it's not all bad news - the reduced ice cover will open new areas for gas and oil extraction!

Meanwhile, at the other end of the planet, Nature reports that the respected British Antarctic Survey has shown that loss of sea ice has causedAntarctic Krill populations to crash; this is the probable cause of crashing populations of various species, including the Gentoo penguin. (BAS press release here.) Sceptical readers may be interested to note that the US government now accepts that human CO2 emissions are causing climate change.

• Current resistance in Irak is not terrorism, as it targets essentially police and occupying forces. I'm not sure it qualifies as a just cause, though. I'd say no, as their country is in such a mess that it should be obvious that collaboration with the occupation is the only way to go for now, even if it means kicking the americans' ass later, when and where they least expect it.
  
• Suicide bombers at bus stops in Israel are terrorists, even though the cause of the palestinian people is certainly just, as the western nations clearly spoiled the palestinian people of their rights basic rights (see United nation's account of the spoliation of palestinian rights).
  
• French resistance against Nazi was not terrorism, despite it being called so by the nazis and French collaboration. It was also a just cause, clearly.
  
• It seems IRA has used terrorism to achieve its goal, just as the opposing protestant leagues have done it too. It seems the cause was just, at least according to the parent post. Nevertheless, the use of terrorism by IRA must still be condemned, today. (PS: sorry if I'm mistaken, I'm not fully sure IRA did commit real terrorism or if it was propaganda).
  
• Finally, Gandhi and the Indian congress did manage to get the English out of india without the help of terrorism, and with very minimal and only non approved use of violence, showing terrorism can be avoided to reach one's goal against a stronger opponent.
  

I'm going to spare you the Nazi reference for the "leaving the UN" bit.

It says "purposes and principles". Purposes and principles aren't their whim of the day, these are fixed terms and defined in Chapter I of the UN Charter.

Stop the pacifist plague. Ask your representative to bring home US criminal heroes. Not let them being judged by non neutral international tribunals.

The Guardian - Marines defend soldier's killing of Iraqi

UN News Centre - Iraq: UN human rights chief concerned over plight of civilians in Falluja

Amnesty International - Iraq: Urgent action needed to prevent war crimes

Stop the pacifist plague. Ask your representative to bring home US criminal heroes.

The Guardian - Marines defend soldier's killing of Iraqi

UN News Centre - Iraq: UN human rights chief concerned over plight of civilians in Falluja

Amnesty International - Iraq: Urgent action needed to prevent war crimes

Support the Iraq genocide

Stop the pacifist plague. Ask your representative to bring home US criminal heroes.

The Guardian - Marines defend soldier's killing of Iraqi

UN News Centre - Iraq: UN human rights chief concerned over plight of civilians in Falluja

Amnesty International - Iraq: Urgent action needed to prevent war crimes

Lets compare with some facts with the recent history of the United States.

"Check out how they blew up Korean Airlines 858"

Google for: USS Vincennes. On the 4th 1988 over 290 passengers of an Iranian passenger flight were killed by the US Navy.

"Or how they kidnapped Japanese civlians." Compare with the indefinate holding without trial of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay

"Or how they starve their own population" Compare with the 1999 Unicef report stating an estimated 1/2 million Iraqi children were killed by sanctions implemented after the first gulf war. (I love how the rights new moral justification for the war in Iraq is on humanatarian grounds. I must have missed the moral outrage when this report came out in 99)

"Or even how they test biochemical weapons on whole families - children and all: "The parents were vomiting and dying, but till the very last moment they tried to save kids by doing mouth to mouth breathing." Lets compare with the United States's pardoning and relocation of War criminals from Japan (who tested Chemical weapons on Ethnic Chinese and prisoners of war) after the second world war to futher develop their own Chemical weapons program.

"Of all the evil regimes to be apologetic for, North Korea is about as bad as it gets. Anyone who defends them is objectively defending evil."

This is pretty much the comment that made me reply. There is alot of evil in the world, alot of it directly created by the United States, (Look at Nicaragua as a very good example of this, and the subsequent world court ruling against the U.S.) and alot of it created by places like North Korea.

Do I think what the North Koreans do is moraly wrong and evil? Yes. Do I think it is more inherintly evil than the U.S.? Yes. Which one is more dangerous to world peace? Without a doubt it is currently the United States. The United States is the worlds only remaining superpower, and has shown a willingness to try and shape the world in its own image.

When the United States follows its own ideals, it can become the policeman of the world. Until then, I believe getting a mandate first from the rest of the world http://www.un.org/ may be a wise course of action. It is not a matter of letting the U.N. "protect" the United States.(By all means go and build a aircraft laser platform)

It is the allowance, that before you go and invade another country, the majority of the world sees some justification for it first.

As can be seen on http://unfccc.int/essential_background/kyoto_proto col/status_of_ratification/items/2613.php
China and India have at approved or accessed of the kyoto protocol (accessed means entered after the treaty had entered into force). This has the effect that these states accept to be bound by the treaty. See http://untreaty.un.org/English/guide.asp for a definition of these terms.
I'm afraid we will need an extra planet for the USA who seem no longer willing to accept reality or take note of what happens outside.

The war is most definitely NOT about oil. The US, or any UN member nation for that matter, hasn't received any significant amount of Iraqi oil since the economic embargo imposed in 1990 (http://www.un.org/News/ossg/iraq.htm.

Most of Iraq's infrastructure was destroyed during the war and they have yet to pump any meaningful amount of oil. Maybe Haliburton is siphoning off some of the supply to fuel the war effort but it certainly isn't making it back to the US and I'm not sure how they would profit from such an action.

And yes, fuel prices are significantly higher in Europe but that is from taxes not a supply issue. The Europeans are in the same boat as we are when it comes to oil. They are also dependent on foreign sources, middle eastern sources especially. And if the war were truly about oil I'm sure more European countries would be supporting our effort.

My $.02.

Hence why the security council need changing so that there are no permanent members and no veto power. Yes, it will seriously piss off the five that has veto power, especially the two that use it the most (US and UK), but it has to be done.

Americans love democracy so much...they really should try it some time.

It puzzles me how somebody who won the vote of less than 25% of the population can claim to be democratically elected.

Better yet - can claim a mandate as the leader of the "democratic free world". Hey, if the US president wants to be the leader of the democratic free world, let's open the election up to the rest of the free world...using a sensible electoral process.

BTW - now that Iraq has been "liberated", shouldn't they also be allowed to participate in the election of the "leader of the democratic free world"?

If the US presidential candidates don't want to open the ballots to the rest of the world, they should stop claiming to be our representative, and start ceding some power to a globally representative organisation

I still feel like I'm failing to understand something of the definition of a human that you are using. Are you saying that all it takes to be human is the requisite genetic code? If so then answer me this: why is a fertilized ovum a human and a red blood cell is not? Both are single cells that contain human DNA.

"Yep- and differ it by 2% and you have a chimpanzee. Human is the name of a SPECIES - and Human Rights is the application of law to provide all members of the species equal protection"

Yes. But we've had the concept of a species much longer than we've known about genetics. When we talk about genetics species has a very particular meaning. But it is a meaning arbitrarily assigned to it by geneticists. Other people may disagree with the definition. The question is, are we in law using the same definition of species as we are in science. Should we be? For the record having given the bill a cursory search I don't believe they once use the word species. But now I'm drifting into semantic waters so I will move on.

"Then you'd better abandon your support of any rights based on species- because it is an incontrovertible fact IF you accept the idea of speciation."

But my whole point is that some people DON'T accept the idea of genetic speciation at least in so far as defining the essential nature of a human. If I accept the idea of genetic speciation then the whole debate is a non-issue. The question is, why should we accept genetic speciation over any (every) other proposed definition, and who are we to make that determination for everyone?

"True enough- you need to read a good biography of Elaenor Roosevelt if you want to know more (she was the principal author of that document of principles- just to get my spelling straight in my own head). She intended Article 2- and it's companion, Article 3- to be read as a support of anti-abortion laws"

I actually didn't know that about Eleanor Roosevelt. That's very interesting. I wouldn't have thought that abortion would have been as big of an issue in 1948, but then as you can no doubt tell, I'm no history major either ;-)

"The converse is also true. If the UDHR is the inalienable rights by which we judge governments, then a muderer does NOT automatically give up his Article 2 and Article 3 rights without some other need to protect society."

That's an excellent point. It always astonishes me how some people can extol the virtues of the death penalty in the same breath they're decrying abortion. It always struck me as somewhat hypocritical. If a right to life is indeed a universal human right then it should apply regardless of whether or not the human in question has committed an act we don't approve of.

"You truly have no scientific backing for your philosophy"

Well that's certainly true. That's what makes it philosophy ;-)

"while those who believe in the seemless garment of life are attracting both law (philosophy) and fact (scientific genetic evidence of speciation) in their favor. When faced with physical evidence, philosophy must bend. Always"

I think what I'm really driving at here is that resorting to the letter of science to answer every question is as much a philosophical decision as anything else. Science places importance on some aspects of nature and down plays others. Who's really to say that the scientific answer is the right one?

Beyond that I'd like to thank you for sharing you thoughts with me. I've found it enlightening and intellectually stimulating. I hope I haven't offended you with any of my ramblings.

Just because a society is different, don't necessarily mean that its peoples are oppressed (and need 'liberating'). It's a big planet, there's nothing wrong with a little diversity.

"The moment sperm meets ovum" isn't based on religious dogma. Catholic religious dogma has, in the past, supported abortion through to the second week AFTER birth, through to the time of quickening, etc. It's only after MODERN SCIENCE and knowledge of GENETICS showed that the entire biological plan for an individual was present at conception, that the rules changed once more. It's not based on religious belief, it's based on science.

Beyond that- it's a matter of human rights. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the United Nations in 1948 and policed by Amnesty International, demands in Article 2:

Article 2. Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non-self-governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.(Emphasis mine)

This means that yes, you can't discriminate against HUMAN BEINGS based on whether they've been BORN or not. To do so is a violation of their human rights. Therefore, abortion being legal is a human rights violation- as nasty and evil of one as China running over protestors with tanks in Tinamen Square.

So we have BOTH a scientific fact on when life begins, and an international law arugment defining when one becomes a person. Do you have any backing for the fetus NOT having the right to life?

And before you go "tough it's their product", may I remind of you of what the Universal Declaration of Humans Rights has to say about the matter:

(1) Everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits.

Mark that: Freely participate. It doesn't say that the choice of not listening is OK. It says that it is our right to be listening to music. This is a human rights issue. Sure, you may not care about human rights, but I do.

Saddam Husayn remained firmly committed to acquiring nuclear weapons. These officials assert that Saddam would have resumed nuclear weapons development at some future point. Some indicated a resumption after Iraq was free of sanctions.

At least one senior Iraqi official believed that by 2000 Saddam had run out of patience with waiting for sanctions to end and wanted to restart the nuclear program.

The Iraqi Atomic Energy Commission (IAEC) beginning around 1999 expanded its laboratories and research activities and increased its overall funding levels.

As to actual WMDs, the UN found both small batches of weapons, and parts of weapons, in various places. (A dozen here, four there, etc..) Just one example of the nasty things they found: R-400 Anthrax bombs: 8 complete bombs (with anthrax filling) and components for 96 more. These were take

Even assuming they lacked legal claim, your "*way outside*" its original boarders is less than 110 meters (360 feet), and still within the existing terms and conditions of the War World II DMZ, completely legal under any standard of international treaty and law.

This map here, from that evil and ineffectual body we like to call the UN, shows that the wall is in places up to 10km from the Green Line and is currently planned to include about 15% of the West Bank.

And I am well aware of the situation following the 6 day war.

These rights and freedoms may in no case be exercised contrary to the purposes and principles of the United Nations.

Read against these definitions, Article 29 of the UDHP is just saying that you can't use the UDHP as an excuse to disrupt "international peace and security," to deny "equal rights and self-determination of peoples," to deny "sovereign equality of all [UN] Members," to engange in "threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state," or similarly violate the "purposes" and "principles."

UDHR Article 29 was not intended to remove rights when they are "contrary to the interests of the government," because nowhere in the definition of "purposes" or "principles" are the general "interests" of states or of the UN as an entity even mentioned. It just says that you can't use the UDHR contrary to the stated reasons they founded the UN in the first place.

So you believe all you hear, right? Have you ever considered which national military makes up the bulk of the UN "peacekeepers"?

According to the UN, no country made up the bulk of the contributions in August 2004. The largest contributor was Pakistan, who contributed 8600 out of 60000 peacekeepers. The USA ranked 26th on the list, contributing 430.

But maybe Iraq is a distraction, so let's go back to August 2001: in that month Bangladesh was the biggest contributor, with 6100 peacekeepers, and the USA was 17th on the list, at 750.

I'd be interested in seeing the source of your numbers. I can believe that the US contributes the bulk of something to the UN, but "peacekeepers" it's not.

So you believe all you hear, right? Have you ever considered which national military makes up the bulk of the UN "peacekeepers"?

According to the UN, no country made up the bulk of the contributions in August 2004. The largest contributor was Pakistan, who contributed 8600 out of 60000 peacekeepers. The USA ranked 26th on the list, contributing 430.

But maybe Iraq is a distraction, so let's go back to August 2001: in that month Bangladesh was the biggest contributor, with 6100 peacekeepers, and the USA was 17th on the list, at 750.

I'd be interested in seeing the source of your numbers. I can believe that the US contributes the bulk of something to the UN, but "peacekeepers" it's not.

Seems to be a bit askew...

In general, it's 'give, take and learn' (and a few more, like 'forgive', but that doesn't apply to the net) for both sides.

In your description, you're making it sound like
- The UN does all the taking
- 'The net' does all the giving
- nobody learns

Sterling isn't proposing that the UN take over control of the net. He's proposinig that whilst the UN -can- form a form of governing body over the net*, the UN could also learn from the net how to be more flexible and direct - more accurately, it will -have- to learn how to be more flexible and direct due to the nature of the net.

* btw... the riaa/mpaa/fbi+cia+nsa/foreign commercial|government institutions already do what you describe. If there's a some kid in The Netherlands which hacks an American company and causes some grave damage, the American governmental bodies will conduct an operation in conjunction with Interpol to try and find the person and bring them to justice (including extradition where appropriate).
A specifically good example would be your Muslim thingy (as other posts have shown - flamebait line right there). If a Muslim state wants to block porn on the net they can do so on their boundaries of the net already - just look at China (great firewall of) and North Korea (unpenetrable firewall of). However, with the UN as a governing body, one might imagine the 'burden' to become to lay with its member states* to simply block traffic towards such a Muslim state directly. No need for filtering at hundreds of points - just block the traffic at the major 'highways/crossroads'. That doesn't mean porn would be blocked everywhere. Of course there's an element of trust involved there; "Who says the UN wouldn't block information on yaddayadda to the US? How would we tell??". But quite frankly you already have to trust governing bodies and even commercial entities from not doing anything like that - so there's no change in direction there, other than that there would be a single governing body who could actually slap the wrists, by political|policing|control means, of those government bodies/commercial entities who cross the line.

* member states, I think, is an important notion. Not -all- countries are UN members ( http://www.un.org/Overview/unmember.html ). Therefore there will, by default, be states that needn't adhere to any of the policy|policing of the net. And on the flipside, that means the UN could instruct its members to refuse dataflow to those states - if it should choose to do so, which is doubtful. /rant

> that doesn't treat the Bill of Rights like a joke, and I'll think about it.

The ICC is a court, hence most aspects of the Bill of Rights don't even apply to the ICC. Otherwise, the court follows the international accepted rules of conduct, most of which are written of the Bill of Rights. Here the complete statute

Concerning the aspect of undue punishment, the ICC is judging over war-crimes and genocide. What kind of punishment would the US impose on those crimes?

So, it seems to me, that your personal distrust for foreign and/or supranational entities is more the basis for your reaction than its legal framework.

• It would require all countries to give up their own laws regarding computers placed in their country (eg. Germany could not forbid nazi-propaganda spread by german servers). A sacrifice few governments will make - and even fewer to the UN.
• It would require the UN to make (many & complex) laws about theese sort of things. Seing how hard it is to agree on something in the UN now, this could not be done.

1. Osama is still on the loose

This is very true, but does he have anywhere near the support infastructure that he had on Sept 11th?

If we had captured Osama on Sept 10th would that have stopped the attacks?

If we had captured him on the 12th would that have destoryed Al-qaeda?

2. No WMD found

I suggest you read Iraq Survey Group Report on WMD in Iraq - congressional testimony as there has been a considerable amount of evidence that shows that Iraq did have both biological and chemical weapons capabilities.

Or perhaps you should check out The May 2004 Quarterly UNMOVIC Report that details confirmed Iraq missle engines that have been exposed to radioactive material. I'd love to hear your reasoning that the second most oil rich nation on the face of the earth needs radioactive material for?

3. No peace for Iraqi's

Suggesting that Bush is the reason for the lack of peace, not the extremists that that you side apparently so admires?

4. No direct link between Iraq and Al-qaeda for the american attacks.
5. No Iraqi's involved in the attack

Are we fighting Terrorism or Al-qaeda? Are you attempting to suggest that Iraq has no ties to terrorism?

And I'll take you up as I like to use facts to back up statements instead of using my literary ability to talk out my ass!

What did Iraq have to do with 9/11?

"* Abdul Rahman Yasin was the only member of the al Qaeda cell that detonated the 1993 World Trade Center bomb to remain at large in the Clinton years. He fled to Iraq. U.S. forces recently discovered a cache of documents in Tikrit, Saddam's hometown, that show that Iraq gave Mr. Yasin both a house and monthly salary."

"* Spanish investigators have uncovered documents seized from Yusuf Galan -- who is charged by a Spanish court with being "directly involved with the preparation and planning" of the Sept. 11 attacks -- that show the terrorist was invited to a party at the Iraqi embassy in Madrid. The invitation used his "al Qaeda nom de guerre," London's Independent reports."

"* An Iraqi defector to Turkey, known by his cover name as "Abu Mohammed," told Gwynne Roberts of the Sunday Times of London that he saw bin Laden's fighters in camps in Iraq in 1997. At the time, Mohammed was a colonel in Saddam's Fedayeen. He described an encounter at Salman Pak, the training facility southeast of Baghdad. At that vast compound run by Iraqi intelligence, Muslim militants trained to hijack planes with knives -- on a full-size Boeing 707. Col. Mohammed recalls his first visit to Salman Pak this way: "We were met by Colonel Jamil Kamil, the camp manager, and Major Ali Hawas. I noticed that a lot of people were queuing for food. (The major) said to me: 'You'll have nothing to do with these people. They are Osama bin Laden's group and the PKK and Mojahedin-e Khalq.'""

"* In 2001, Saudi Arabian border guards arrested two al Qaeda members entering the kingdom from Iraq."

Please read the rest for your self here

And yet more evidence here

Saddam's economy was in the tank. His infrastructure to reconsititue any weapons program was evicerated and atrophied to the point of being worthless.

Iraq's economy was bad, yes. But Saddam had the money he needed coming from the France and Germany through the oil for food program. One wonders why they were not supportive of US actions when they had such a sweet deal.

The irony is that since there were no weapons, and so Saddam was in complience afterall.

Hmm the UN doesn't seem to agree with you on that one. Please read The May 2004 Quarterly UNMOVIC Report which states:

"In his testimony, the head of the Iraq Survey Group noted that the Group continued to look for weapons of mass destruction. He also said he did not believe that the Survey Group had sufficient information and insight at that time to make final judgements with confidence as to Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programmes and to determine the truth of their existence."

"Mr. Duelfer's publicly released testimony mentions, as an example of uncertain Iraqi intent, that the Tuwaitha Agricultural and Biological Research Centre had equipment suitable for the production of biological agents and that research work there on the bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis would be important to a biological weapon programme."

"The Commission's experts are conducting an investigation...regarding the discovery of items from Iraq...at a scrapyard in the Netherlands....to investigate increased radiation readings...By comparing the serial production number on the engine with information in the UNMOVIC database, the experts were able to confirm that the engine was one from an SA-2 missile that had been tagged by United Nations inspectors in the past and had not been declared as having been fired. Representatives of the scrapyard company indicated that a number of similar engines (5 to 12)

I did a quick search and upon the realization that corporations exist in just about every country, and the extremely competitive market between them, I'd say that it is impossible to outlaw corporations and still maintain the integrity of our economy. Corporations appear vital to the world economy, and the only way to get rid of them is with a world treaty (hah hahaha hahahahaha).

Japan has an extremely competitive economy, which may very well rival America someday, they recently passed legislation to further DECREASE the liability of corporate management in an effort to increase their competitive advantage, read this:

One particular facet of the Japanese corporate law that should be revised is the area of corporate governance. The current corporate law of Japan generally adopts a "pre-regulating" method of corporate governance. Under this system, the corporate law imposes detailed restrictions on the activities and decisions of the management of a Japanese company in order to ensure the safety and reliability of commercial transactions and to protect the interests of the company's shareholders and creditors. Though such system limits the flexibility of the management of a Japanese company, it make it unnecessary that the management worries about the possible liabilities stemming from their misconduct, so long as they comply with those detailed restrictions. This "pre-regulating" system has worked well in the past because it suited to the Japanese society in the 20th century, which enjoyed long-lasting economic growth.

However, the mismatch of these laws to the current economic environment in Japan has now become apparent. The rapid globalization of the world economy since the end of the cold war and revolutionary changes brought about by advances in information technology has placed Japan squarely in the so-called "Mega Competition" with other nations. Such a business environment demands that management be able to make aggressive business judgments and take accompanying risks. Moreover, the shareholders and other stakeholders are required to invest in Japanese companies, considering the related risks by themselves on the basis of sufficient information disclosed.

In view of the current circumstances, the Ministry of Justice of Japan ("MOJ") now regards changes to the civil, commercial, and criminal laws relating to business activities in Japan as urgent and essential. In this regard, MOJ decided to replace the current "pre-regulating" legal regime with a "post-remedy" legal system and formed on April 1, 2000 the "Headquarters of Preparation of Changes in Civil and Criminal Law relating to Economic Activities" for the purpose of accomplishing such changes within the next 5 years.

.......

(b) Reduction of liabilities of directors, etc. against their companies
(i) Waiver of directors' or corporate auditors' liabilities
Under the former law, any waiver of a company's directors' or corporate statutory auditors' liabilities to their companies generally requires the unanimous consent of all of the shareholders of the company. The Third Stage Changes will afford greater immunity to corporate directors and others by relaxing this strict requirement for liabilities stemming from violations of laws or the articles of incorporation based on simple negligence. Under the revised Commercial Code, on the condition that one of the procedures described in (1) or (2) below are taken, any such liabilities in excess of the following amounts may be waived without the unanimous consent of shareholders

Source: http://unpan1.un.org/intradoc/groups/public/docume nts/APCITY/UNPAN010252.pdf

Seems like the world is moving more and more in this direction, as evident from the "pricipal-agent" problems we've been having with companies like Enron, Worldcom, Tyco. There may very well be an "environmental war" sometime in the future, o

Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien called Bush a "buffoon"

Mr Hans Blix, whom you might remember as being 100% RIGHT when Bush and friends were lying to the whole world about the WMD- and you now ALL acknowledge that FACT, dont you ? - , well Mr Blix called the bush administration "Bastards" .

Then he decided it would be better to call them "Weasels" instead.

This is in a documentary about Bush that goes much deeper than the Michael Moore pamphlet. It's sad to see that people in the US would prefere to argue hours about Moore's movie rather than see this one which is much more "objective" (there's no "narator" it's only interviews from different people like Blix, the husband of the CIA spy, the guy that writes the speeches for bush, and so on ...)

This is in an amazing documentary called

Ok, class. One more time. There is no such thing as international law. There are international treaties, such as the UN charter...but a law a treaty does not make.

The U.N. has member states. Those are the states that have signed on and are recognized by the "international community" as being "legitimate" states. But no state is compelled to become a member of the U.N. (though they do because the benefits in doing so far outweigh the cost of not doing so).

I was just beginning to moderate this thread but I feel it is better to reply:

First of all, you too (like many /.ers) overuse 'Ethics. But you're talking about Morality here.

What you're essentially saying is that the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (e.g. Article 1,3 [BTW, china is a member of the UN]) should not be universal.
That is ok. Ironically, it's is a human right to post your opinion on slashdot (article 19).

But please be honest!
If you think "fsck human rights", say that in your posts. Please, don't hide your thoughts behind cloudy "freedom for all, they have the right to choose their ethics etc.pp.". WHO CHOOSES?

This is the thing I really dislike about many right-wing libertarians (you seem to belong to this group). Essentially promoting social darwinism/economical exploitation/etc, but hiding this all behind the nice word "freedom".
Freedom, i.e. economical freedom for those who have money or freedom to suppress others for those who have power (not suprisingly, being rich and being mighty correlates strongly).

That all sounds wonderful.

But how does one actually do it? How do you "make the U.N. more effective and then enforce its resolutions swiftly and firmly. with U.N. garb", when the United Nations is clearly unwilling to do so? How do we deal with an organization that allows Sudan to retain its current seat on the U.N. Commission on Human Rights at the very time that Sudan is committing genocide (or, in the words of the U.N.'s own High Commissioner for Human Rights, "a disturbing pattern of disregard for basic principles of human rights and humanitarian law, which is taking place in Darfur for which the armed forces of the Sudan and the Janjaweed are responsible."

This is, of course, the same U.N. Commission on Human Rights that was chaired by Libya in 2002 at the same time Libya was defying U.N. Security Council resolutions calling on it to turn over the terrorists who blew up Pan Am 103 and answer for other terrorist attacks around the world.

Look, I would like the support of the rest of the world. But I have absolutely no faith in the U.N.'s ability to actually resolve conflicts which involve dictators (all of whom, of course, are members of the U.N. itself) and terrorists. The U.N. almost presupposes a certain amount of rationality and good will among its members when it tries to end conflict. This is just not always the case, and when it isn't, the U.N. is organizationaly incapable of dealing with it effectively.

Remember that one of the main reasons President George H. W. Bush did not invade Baghdad during the first Gulf war was because he did not have unanimous support from the international community to do so. That didn't pan out so well.

Again, I agree that your goals are laudable. But I don't see how to change it in the current global situation, and I certainly don't think we will make it better by refusing to do what me must to defend ourselves.

And in terms of the current presidential race, if John Kerry were saying how corrupt the U.N. was and his first job would be to bring about U.N. reform so that it would actually have the will and desire to enforce its own resolutions, then I might support him. But he has offered no vision other than his own ability to somehow persuade our allies to go along with us in the future.

I'd point out that it's never been proven that Iraq actually violated the terms of the cease fire- only that Saddam wanted to.

Actually, there's another legal document that describes this: The Universal Declaration of Human Rights and how SCOTUS has interpreted the Constitution when it comes to abortion violates Articles 2 & 3 (and the current trade agreements of the Administrations of Bush, Clinton, and Bush violate Articles 20-25).

Even if said country would like to think that it rules the world.
Hate to break it to you, but we do.

BTW, are you implying that political junkies should not be classified as nerds? While surely there is a need to differentiate them from techies, those of us willing to read (in their entirety) documents such as pending legislation, FOIA requests, UN resolutions, etc. should easily qualify as nerds.

oh i'm sorry you preferr this one

http://www.un.org/apps/news/infocusRel.asp?infocus ID=97&Body=Oil-for-Food&Body1=inquiry

Just because you never heard of it does not make it so. Many people warned of many things and never get attention until it's to late

http://www.un.org/News/dh/iraq/mortimer-30apr.htm