THE WEIRS TIMES, Thursday, September 30, 2010


9


UN GENERAL ASSEMBLY SESSION OPENS AMID CONFLICT, HOPE, AND HAMMERS


by John J. Metzler Syndicated Columnist


UNITED NA- TIONS—Amid the arrival of Pr e s ident s , Prime Minis- ters and Kings, the UN Gen- eral Assembly has opened in New York. The 65th an-


nual session of the UN’s main membership body will debate issues ranging from battling global poverty to promoting hu- man rights and international security. Yet the setting will be shadowed by the usual Contro- versary as leaders from Bolivia, Iran, Venezuela and Zimbabwe are set to speak to the proceed- ings with the usual political py- rotechnics against America and the West. Significantly the Presidency of


the year-long session has gone to Joseph Deiss, a distinguished diplomat and former Swiss President and Foreign Minister who brings a level of gravitas to the chamber in contrast with last year’s Assembly president from Libya. Not to be confused with Secretary General Ban Ki- moon of South Korea, Dr. Deiss will oversee proceedings in the 192 member assembly. The opening debate will see


the President of the United States Barack Obama, and his


political counterparts from Bra- zil, Turkey, People’s Republic of China and Iran all speak the same day. The following day the new British Prime Minister David Cameron will address the meeting along with counterparts from Japan and Afghanistan, and leaders from Zimbabwe and Venezuela. The actual Assembly agenda


being considered over the next few months contains 163 items including such perennial politi- cal issues as The situation in the Middle, Question of Pales- tine, and the Question of the Falkland Islands (Malvinas) to the more recent Role of blood diamonds in Fueling conflict and Situation in Afghanistan. Items on the perennial buzz-


words, the Millennium Develop- ment Goals, sustainable devel- opment and “globalization and interdependence” are also on the agenda. A plethora of dis- armament items, human rights issues, and matters dealing with far-flung UN peacekeeping operations will round out the list. But beyond the standard set


piece agenda items which rarely change, political action and lobbying is traditionally set on the sidelines of the discus- sions where pressing hot but- ton issues like Iran’s emerging nuclear program, Sudan’s mas-


sive human rights violations, and Somalia’s slide deeper into anarchy will dominate discus- sions. The Islamic Republic of Iran continues to confront the global


community and directly threat- en Israel (and equally frighten neighboring Arab states), with its nuclear proliferation. Though Tehran has been slapped with


See METZLER on 20


THE POLITICS OF RESENTMENT


Few things


by Thomas Sowell Syndicated Columnist


have captured in microcosm what has gone so painful ly wrong, where racial issues are concerned, l ike the re- cent election for mayor of Washington, D.C.


Mayor Adrian Fenty, under whom the murder rate has gone down and the school children’s test scores have gone up, was resoundingly defeated for re- election. Nor was Mayor Fenty sim-


ply a passive beneficiary of the rising test scores and falling murder rates. He appointed Mi- chelle Rhee as head of the school system and backed her as she fought the teachers’ union and fired large numbers of ineffective teachers-- something considered impossible in most cities across the country. Mayor Fenty also appointed


the city’s chief of police, Cathy Lanier, who has cracked down on hoodlumism, as well as crime. Either one of these achieve- ments would make mayors local heroes in most other cities. Why then was he clobbered in the election? One key fact tells much of the


story: Mayor Fenty received more than 70 percent of the white vote in Washington. His opponent received more than 80 percent of the black vote. Both men are black. But the


head of the school system that he appointed is Asian and the chief


of police is a white woman. More than that, most of the teachers who were fired were black. There were also bitter complaints that black contractors did not get as many of the contracts for doing business with the city as they expected. In short, the mayor appointed


the best people he could find, instead of running a racial pa- tronage system, as a black mayor of a city with a black major- ity is apparently expected to. He also didn’t spend as much time schmoozing with the folks as was expected. So what if he gave their chil-


dren a better education and gave everybody a lower likelihood of being murdered? The mayor’s faults were po-


litical faults. He did his job, pro- duced results and thought that this should be enough to get him re-elected. He refused to do polls and focus groups, and he ignored what his political advisers were warning him about. No doubt Mayor Fenty is now


a sadder and wiser man politi- cally. While that may help him if he wants to pursue a political career, Adrian Fenty’s career is not nearly as important as what his story tells us about the racial atmosphere in this country. How did we reach the point where a city is so polarized that an overwhelming majority of the white vote goes to one candidate and the overwhelming majority of the black vote goes to the oppos- ing candidate? How did we reach the point


where black voters put racial patronage and racial symbol- See SOWELL on 14


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