The UN dictator protection racket

Wall Street Journal Editorial:

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In essence, the U.N. has become a dictator protection racket. Intervention by any country outside U.N. auspices is deemed to be illegitimate, as with the "coalition of the willing" in Iraq. But when a security problem is brought before the Security Council, that committee of the unwilling inevitably fails to act. The exceptions are when Russia, China or Europe wants to use the U.N. as a tool to limit unilateral action by Israel or the U.S.

Barack Obama has been campaigning on the virtues of the U.N. and its collective diplomacy, but we haven't seen any comment from his campaign on this latest U.N. failure. Not that it would matter much if he did say anything. Mr. Mugabe knows that the only action with any chance of challenging his rule in Harare would be a U.S.-led intervention, and Mr. Obama has said he really dislikes that sort of thing.

So the people of Zimbabwe are left to the brutal mercy of Comrade Bob. British Foreign Secretary David Miliband called Russia's veto "incomprehensible" -- which only shows that he hasn't been paying attention. At the U.N., it's business as usual.

That is the unfortunate truth. The people of Zimbabwe are left to the mercies of those who have shown none. It is clear that their neighbors will at best accept them as refugees, for awhile. It is another example of multilateral passive aggressive genocide. The UN is like a coop ruled by those willing to do the least. It is a wonder the furniture is not made up of broken down couches that were being discarded by its members.

Melanie Phillips calls it the tyranny club.