*when looking for budget cuts, The US could start here...*

Unprecedented.  As Ahmedinejad speaks, one by one delegations are exiting the chamber.  Ahmedinejad is now speaking to a virtually empty house.  The translator is choppy, not helping the clarity of his prepared speech.  Now he lies about the "open democratic election" in Iran.  Qadaffy in comparison, whose speech was rambling yet effective, retained an audience and made many valid points, especially regarding the Security Council.

Ahmedinejad is in total denial of reality and the world as a whole has told him so.

 kurtster wrote: 
About this, kurtster, you are right on all points. We should enable Qadaffy's evidently sincere and contrite international rehab, not lock him out. Ahmedinejad is a different issue altogether. He needs to be confronted and challenged in the UN, not fruitlessly boycotted.

And I'd love the UN headquarters to ROTATE among nations, same way the Olympics do. Blue helmets all around!

Having watched both Obama and Qadaffy earlier, I find it necessary to comment on how rude, arrogant and hippocritical it was for Obama to dis Qadaffy and not attend his speech, let alone have any contact with him.  Wasn't it Obama who campaigned that we should talk to all world parties without preconditions ?

Qadaffy openly praised Obama and repeatedly refered to Obama as "my son".  Qadaffy was very hard to follow, but raised many interesting points, including that of moving the United Nations to a new location.  Q thanked and praised the U S for being the host of the U N for all these years, but made the case for finding a new location, more neutral, less restrictive and more accessible to smaller nations.  Many here have wanted the U N to move, but different reasons.  Q was right for the right reasons.

Should we be conspicuous in our abscense when what's his nuts from Iran speaks ?  Not sure.  Once again, it is inconsistant with Obama's no preconditions policy.  I think the guy needs to look into the eyes of his peers when he lies about the holocaust, regardless of its impact.  That would be the time for someone to speak up and say "you lie", or at the very least and probably better, quietly walk out at that point in unison.  That would have a greater impact than by simply not attending.

Passage of Orwellian resolution on religion suggests U.N.'s inability to reform itself



Once again belying its stated purpose of "promotion and protection of human rights around the globe," the United Nations Human Rights Council passed a resolution last week straight out of George Orwell's dystopian novel "1984." The measure, sponsored by Pakistan on behalf of a group of Islamic states, employs Western-style references to "diversity," "interfaith harmony" and "tolerance" in defense of a decidedly intolerant objective: a global ban on criticism of religion — specifically, criticism of Islam. "Islam is frequently and wrongly associated with human rights violations and terrorism," states the resolution, the brainchild of the powerful 57-member Organization of the Islamic Conference. One of the main culprits in this "Islamophobia," the measure says, is "the print, audio-visual and electronic media." The solution: Governments must "combat defamation of religions," including "stereotyping of religions, their adherents and sacred persons." Not surprisingly, Canada, Chile and the European Union nations that sit on the Human Rights Council opposed this resolution, which they recognized as a thinly veiled attempt to legitimize the anti-blasphemy laws that theocratic Muslim regimes use to squelch dissent and persecute religious minorities. Indeed, it was hard for the measure's supporters to argue otherwise, given that Islam was the only religion specifically mentioned in the resolution and the list of nations backing the measure could, with a few exceptions, double as a who's who of human-rights violators. An attack on human rights couched in the language of human rights, the "defamation of religion" resolution essentially would abolish free speech, freedom of the press and freedom of religion in any country that adopted it. As a statement of opposition released by a diverse coalition of 186 religious and secular non-governmental organizations explained, the concept of "defamation of religion" has "no basis in domestic or international law" and "would alter the very meaning of human rights, which protect individuals from harm, but not beliefs from critical inquiry." The "defamation of religion" resolution is old trick at the United Nations, where Islamic states that belong to the OIC have been passing similar measures for a decade now. This year's resolution is the latest salvo in the long-running campaign of Islamist extremists to use Western language and respect for the rule of law to subvert Western ideals of freedom and democracy. Their success has made the Human Rights Council an international joke. Its forerunner, the Commission on Human Rights, was disbanded after it became hopelessly corrupt. In 2006, the council replaced the commission in an attempt to restore integrity to the United Nations' top human rights body. But the new council still lacks membership criteria to weed out human-rights violators. So the same repressive regimes that dominated the former commission dominate the new one, making the council a textbook case of the fox guarding the henhouse. Given the council's predictable continuation of old patterns — aiding and abetting totalitarian states and singling out Israel, a democracy, for repeated rebukes while ignoring human-rights violations by neighboring nations — the Bush administration refused to seek election to the council when it was reconstituted in 2006. The Obama administration announced Tuesday afternoon that the United States will seek a seat on the council, though last week's vote should have given President Obama pause. One more nay ballot from the United States would not prevent the passage of such measures as the "defamation of religion" resolution, which won by a double-digit margin. Rather than spurring reform, America's presence on the council may only legitimize its sham proceedings. Genuine reform may be possible at the United Nations, but given its record of self-correction in recent years, such renewal seems improbable. More likely is continuation of the sorry status quo: repeated assaults on the concept of human rights at the hands of the very organization charged with their defense. Colleen Carroll Campbell is an author, television and radio host and St. Louis-based fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center. Her website is www.colleen-campbell.com.