OUR DEBT OF GRATITUDE

With the world seemingly headed to war, and with millions marching against that war around the globe, all the news that streams in from all parts seems bad. The North Koreans celebrated dictator Kim Jong Il’s birthday by hating the US, and promising themselves a victory should nuclear war result from Pyongyang’s own lawbreaking. Al Qaeda mastermind Osama bin Laden or one of his voice impersonators issued a new tape again, this time promising that his terrorist group’s “victory” in Afghanistan (a victory seen in their rearview mirrors, for some odd reason) was the beginning of the end of the US.

But all is not lost, even with the gigantic anti-war protests of the weekend. We Americans, especially we Americans who lean to the right politically, owe a huge debt of gratitude to one nation which has provided so much clarity to these confusing times. So all together now, folks—thank you very much, France.

Yes, you read that right. Thank you very much, France. You have taken a clouded world and made the view as bright as a spring day.

In your recent actions, France, you have vindicated a viewpoint that was once, as in last week, considered little more than a fringe idea. You have single-handedly shown that the United Nations is every bit as useless, feckless, amoral and corrupt as many of us have long suspected. You have proven that the UN isn’t about keeping international order, and hasn’t been for some time. You have proven its true purpose, which is to rein in the one country without which the UN will be irrelevant, the one country that has ever had the power but lacks the sinister purpose to conquer the entire world, and to reward that country’s generosity and goodwill with a big, multilateral finger in the eye. So thank you.

You’ve done it so openly, and in retrospect so obviously, that it’s a wonder we never saw it coming. Late last year you made a big show of voting yes to UN Security Council Resolution 1441, the 17th UN resolution aimed at disarming the rogue state Iraq, and this resolution seemed to have “we really mean it this time” attached. But now it’s obvious that you didn’t really mean it, since Iraq has continued to flout 1441 and the other 16 resolutions, and you’re still not ready for the enforcement that surely must come. In so doing, you’ve proven that the UN is a parliament of insincere blowhards. Given some of the UN’s other recent actions, that’s a good thing.

After all, just a year ago the UN gave succor to every tinpot nut who wanted to call the United States the world’s leading racist state. The august body met in Durban, South Africa, where it spent several days (and millions of dollars) to ignore the racism of all Arab states, the ethnic cleansings of at least one European state, the tribalism and slavery of many African states, and the religiously-inspired tyrannies of scores of other states, and instead focused on America, a nation organized according to the will of all its people and that welcomes the world’s tired, poor, and huddle masses without regard to ethnicity, or faith, or much of anything else. Our immigration service is so sweet it even allows avowed terrorists in, and refuses to kick them out when they break our laws. Aren’t we nice?

It’s also the UN that gives despots and terror-sponsors equal moral status with legitimately elected heads of states. It’s the UN that recently elevated Muammar Gaddafi’s Libya to chair its human rights commission (the same commission the US had been unceremoniously booted from about a year prior), and it’s the UN that recently placed Iraq at the head of its committee on disarmament. What’s next—North Korea to head the International Atomic Energy Agency? China to head the council on healthy children? The Palestinian Authority to chair meetings on free and fair elections? Whatever is next, we Americans need no longer care, because whatever the UN does from here on out will be totally irrelevant. If it can’t enforce the resolutions passed by its central policy-making body, what can it do?

To those of us who never much liked the UN, Friday’s moves by you, France, and your friends in Germany and your partners Russian and China have been immensely clarifying, and serve to remind us of how you folks like to operate. Looking at Germany, why, it was only a few decades ago that its chosen leader rampaged across Europe with his nation united behind him. We saved you from him, remember? Looking at Russia, why, its current head of state once ran the KGB, which sponsored its share of terrorism in the bad old days. In fact, that same KGB seems to have helped along the activities of one Joschka Fischer back in the days of the Cold War and West Germany’s pro-Soviet Red Army Fraction. Herr Fischer now runs Germany’s foreign affairs, which, surprise! have gone all anti-American and apparently pro-terrorist. Herr Fischer was present at an early meeting of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, which decided in his presence that its goal would be to exterminate Israel. You’d think that any German would think twice about associating with anyone trucking in such ideas, but you’d be wrong here. And let’s not forget China, the other state that your UNSC actions have provided cover. China seems to be towing your anti-war line just fine, until the subject of Taiwan pops up. Then suddenly Beijing gets unilateral on us, growls about “one China” and continues to modernize its military in the hopes of one day forcing the “rogue province” to heel. It’s this same China, run by this same thugocracy, that swallowed Tibet and declares most religious groups “enemies of the state,” or in the new parlance, “terrorists,” and exterminates them. Anyone remember Tiananmen Square, circa 1989? That’s who you’re helping out, France. Nice job.

You’ve also reminded us just who it is that protects disarming the madman in Baghdad. Aren’t these the same people who blamed America when it was attacked on 9-11? Aren’t these the same people who warned us that we should give peace a chance in October 2001, oblivious to the fact that “giving peace a chance” had brought the terror war to our doorstep? Aren’t these the same people who warned us about the “terrible Afghan winter?” Heck, I’d take that winter over the actual Maryland winter that’s piling up in my yard. But I digress. Aren’t these protesters the same people that, marching this weekend in the name of peace, pulled a mounted policeman from his horse and beat him? And wasn’t that officer one of New York’s finest, those brave men and women who rushed into the Twin Towers on that awful day? Yes, he was, and yes, these protesters are the same useful idiots who have been wrong about so much—everything, really—since 9-11.

France, you’ve shown the UN’s true colors—several shades of yellow, it turns out. You’ve reminded us that the UN lets itself be mocked in the leadership it chooses. You’ve reminded us just who it is that we’re supposed to ask permission before we defend ourselves. And you’ve reminded us just who’s been out there protesting. And since NATO seems to be working better now that you’ve been shut out of its meetings, there’s hope we can kick you out of it. You voluntarily dropped out in 1966. Maybe you need a little shove this time. But for all your other fine work, we do owe you a deep dept of gratitude. You’ve vindicated a half century of right wing American politics.

Merci beaucoup.