The United Nations

Great article from last Friday at Human Events by Thomas Kilgannon. It's a pretty sad state of affairs when even you're 'closest' allies won't support you the majority of the time diplomatically - even though we fund the vast majority of the UN's operating budget.

"For 25 years, the State Department has been compiling voting records at the United Nations, and the trend is troubling. Twelve years ago, the General Assembly and the U.S. were in agreement on half of the recorded votes -- today, it is less than one in five. Specifically, the General Assembly voted with the United States only 18.3 percent of the time during 2007, according to State’s most recent congressionally-mandated report. In part, that is because in the global legislature that is the General Assembly, the United States has no protector of political pride or enforcer of national interests. Even a strong ambassador like John Bolton can’t spend his days whipping votes and twisting arms like Lyndon Johnson used to do in the Senate."

Israel and micro states Palau, the Marshall Islands, Kiribati, and Micronesia all vote the US position over 2/3 of the time, with Australia, Canada, Great Britain, France, and Monaco, rounding out the top ten and supporting the US about half the time. Our Other NATO allies vote with the US around 40% of the time. The top ten recipients of US direct foreign aid are Israel, Iraq, Afghanistan, Egypt, Sudan, Pakistan, Lebanon, Colombia, Jordan, and Kenya, averaging around $1 billion in aid each. Excluding the Israelis, these nations vote with the US less than 10% of the time.

It appears to me the UN is seriously broken, and in dire need of replacement.