On United Nations
Published October 1, 2007
By Max C. Bookman
What’s Going on Here?
That short, smug, defiant man whose last name nobody can pronounce has become the biggest pain in the western world’s ass to come from Iran since Xerxes owned 300 defiant Spartans last year. Indeed, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, this year’s academy award winner for “Best ‘Fuck America’ Performance at the United Nations,” seems to have fully grown into his role as valiant anti-American crusader by decrying US hegemony when no one else will.
How sad, the planet has turned to the outspoken leader of an oppressive Islamic theocracy for inspiration. Last year’s award winner - another anti-American crusader - was nowhere to be seen. Only one year after Hugo Chavez dominated headlines for his scathing anti-American comments, the Venezuelan president found himself too busy at home to make it back to New York for round two.
Maybe his speechwriters just had trouble topping last year’s performance, where Mr. Chavez complained that the podium smelled of sulfur following President Bush’s speech. The comment was a blunt comparison between our president and the devil (you can’t get much worse than the devil, you know).
Or maybe President Chavez really did have his schedule packed with the things authoritarian strongmen do.
Monday: consolidate power.
Tuesday: silence dissenting media.
Wednesday: cancel trip to the UN for weekly “private meeting” con Juana, la secretaria.
Yes, it does seem strange that the two men who have elected themselves as the proclaimers of American injustice are, in fact, not particularly in touch with justice themselves. Hugo Chavez’s transformation into an authoritarian dictator progresses with every domestic action he takes. Since coming to power in 1999, Chavez has rewritten the Venezuelan constitution, marginalized the legislature, undermined freedom of speech, and has been accused by respected groups like Amnesty International of numerous human rights violations. Foreign Policy Magazine has reported that Chavez is “rewriting the manual on how to be a modern-day authoritarian.” If Mr. Chavez is so interested in justice, then why did he shut down a dissenting media outlet last year, amid passionate public protest?
Iran is no better. Viable opposition parties are hard to come by, and freedom of speech is severely limited by the state-run media- the hallmark of a state with something to hide from its people, as was the case with the president of Colombia (no, not that Columbia). As the rest of the world saw Lee Bollinger steal the spotlight and call out Ahmadinejad on some of his more outrageous positions, Iran state media completely failed to cover the international ass-kicking.
It should be noted, Bollinger’s speech really solidified support of Ahmadinejad’s position in the Muslim community across the world as a crusader against the “hypocritical” US. Ahmadinejad really came out of it smelling like roses and looking like a winner. While Ahmadinejad’s David and Goliath struggle to construct a peaceful nuclear power program may resonate in the heart of the liberal idealistic American college student, the true nature of this country’s leadership raises red flags.
Absolute authority rests not in the hands of the tenacious president, but in the Supreme Leader, who is not elected, but appointed by the shady Assembly of Experts. Iran is not a democracy, and as any International Relations professor would tell you, nuclear capabilities do not belong in the hands of non-democracies (ahem, China, Pakistan). Despite their records, the Venezuelan and the Iranian have received much favorable attention in the past two years.
There is a formidable list of world leaders who support these two and an even larger group of those willing to tolerate them. But why is nobody rallying to America’s side in denouncing the vicious words of Chavez and Ahmadinejad ?
The Reality
America-bashing is now a popular topic at the opening of the General Assembly. But nobody, save a few on the fringes actually hates core American values like freedom, self-determination, and even capitalism. Remember that the world cried with America and waved red, white, and blue in the aftermath of September 11th.
What people do hate is what America has come to represent under the Bush administration: unilateralism, arrogance, and blind stubbornness. The international arena is said to be like a schoolyard with no teacher. Nations can do as they please because there is no higher authority to stop them.
The United Nations was established, in part, to bring some order to that anarchy. It follows that there is a solemn trust at the core of the UN’s existence- if the world is to come together with one voice, that voice is to be respected and obeyed. When President Bush chose to ignore the international community and invade Iraq in 2003, he tore down the respect for internationalism that the United Nations stands upon.
It became clear that the Bush administration was ideologically disdainful of the UN, and America’s position as moral leader of the nations disappeared. A vacuum was left behind. With the continued absence of real American leadership (”either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists”), the world, like a mob, will turn to whoever shouts the loudest.
Until a new American administration takes a progressive, positive, and leading stance in the international arena, the General Assembly will continue to applaud clowns like Chavez and Ahmadinejad. The United States no longer has the ability to call oppressive rulers out and demand reform, and respect for American judgment may not simply reappear with the end of Bush’s term.
The next presidents are going to have to work relentlessly to restore that confidence. If that can ever happen, these two authoritarian rulers won’t have a leg to stand on. But for now, Hugo Chavez and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad will continue to distract their willing audience from domestic injustice with a message that the entire world seems to agree with: the United States has got to stop being such a douche bag.
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