I sat raise the rent to what that NYC prime real estate is really worth...when they can't pay - bulldoze the place and put the new stadium there!
win Autographed Copy of Hugh Hewitt's Best Seller
Posted on 01/02/2005 5:07:44 AM PST by flitton
A close political ally of President George W Bush has launched a fierce attack on the United Nations' ability to handle the aftermath of the tsunami disaster, declaring that some of its agencies had "terrible, terrible records in dealing with people in need".
David Frum, a prominent Republican and former speech writer to Mr Bush, said America's reluctance to allow the UN too free a hand in the relief operation, was based on its poor management record.
"We are not arguing about money, we are arguing about control," he said on BBC Radio 4's Today programe. "It is humane and necessary that the United States and other democracies should be very careful about what happens to their money."
He made his comments hours after Colin Powell, the US Secretary of State, denied that Washington was trying to edge out the UN as leader of the international relief effort in the Indian Ocean by forming a core group of nations to organise aid.
After a visit to UN headquarters in New York, Mr Powell said: "In due course we hope the core group will work itself out of business because we will have brought all of the international organisations into play, under the overall supervision and leadership of the United Nations."
In a criticism of the slow pace of UN bureaucracy, Mr Powell said that the countries involved in the group, which includes Australia, India and Japan, had assets which could be "brought to bear right away".
UN officials went to great lengths to conceal the whereabouts of Kofi Annan, the organisation's general secretary, who was on holiday when the tsunami struck and did not surface in New York until Thursday.
In fact, it was revealled that, Mr Annan spent Christmas at the holiday home of James Wolfensohn, the president of the World Bank and a critic of the Bush administration, who owns a 160-acre ranch in the resort of Jackson Hole, Wyoming.
Only a handful of Mr Annan's most trusted advisers were allowed to know his location. One official said: "He did not want to be seen frolicking in the snow. It wouldn't look good." So anxious were UN staff that his first interview, which was with the CNN cable news channel almost three days after the tsunami struck, was conducted by telephone, via the UN's headquarters, and producers of the show were not told where Mr Annan was speaking from.
Last week Washington officials were angered when Jan Egeland, one of the first UN officials to comment on the disaster, declared the initial US aid contribution of $35 million (£18 million) to be "stingy". On Friday the White House announced that the American donation would rise to $350 million.
In his first press conference of the week at UN headquarters on Thursday, Mr Annan insisted that his absence did not matter. "We live in a world where you can operate from wherever you are," he said.
World leaders including the prime ministers of Australia and Japan will gather in Jakarta at an emergency summit on Thursday.
The US is expected to send Mr Powell and Jeb Bush, the governor of Florida and brother of the president, who are beginning a tour of the region today.
Officials said the Florida governor, whom some believe may be positioning himself for an eventual run at the presidency, would draw on his experience of disaster relief following the series of hurricanes that battered his state in recent years.
The UN is the most corrupt organization in the world. Its HQ should be in Havana, Paris, Berlin or Pyongyang, but not in New York.
The UN should be UNestablished.
I beg to differ. It is in the money area that they are most UNtrustworthy and corrupt! You want to see the worst features of every third-world country in action? Just give the UN a big chunk of change and watch it head for Switzerland.
The UN is totally ill equipped to handle anything much less a Disaster. The UN doesnt even know the capabilities of the equipment needed to handle the emergency. They have no ships , planes ,helicopters, troops , yet they want to rush in and take charge? . The UN cant even get their building renovated , they are hardly ready for the Big time.
I can't argue with that.
Giving the UN control of the disaster relief would be like giving the city of Boston billions of tax dollars so they could build another tunnel.
http://diplomadic.blogspot.com/
A colleague came back from a meeting held by the local UN representative yesterday and reported that the UN rep had said that while it was a good thing that the Australians and Americans were running the air ops into tsunami-wrecked Aceh, for cultural and political reasons, those Australians and Americans really "should go blue." In other words, they should switch into UN uniforms and give up their national ones.
Now you all know that The Diplomad is not a cynical or suspicious being, but there is something funny going on here . . . what could it be? Could it be a genuine concern for local "cultural and political sensitivities" that would be offended by the presence of Aussies and Yanks in their own military uniforms saving thousands of lives? Maybe . . . or, might it not be an odd coincidence that just after the infamous Mr. Anan (see prior posts) says the UN will be setting up air traffic control in Aceh, the UN wants to show that it has an ATC system operating? What better way than to continue in the UN tradition of taking credit for others' work? And this just before Mr. Anan arrives in Indonesia on January 6.
Ping
Not YET..but it has happened before..
Good
UN=lying, thieving weasels. Koffi and company should be kicked out asap. How much more proof do we need of corruption and graft? When all is said and done, the UN will blame the US every which way but up, and if you think Islamofascists and other enemies don't pay attention, think again. When the US fails to slap down the likes of Koffi and Egeland, we're seen as weak and invite not only verbal, but physical attack.
And it ain't coming from the U.N. The Associated Press reports on the arrival of the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln off the cost of Aceh, Indonesia:
From dawn until sunset on New Year's Day, 12 Seahawk helicopters shuttled supplies and advance teams from offshore naval vessels while reconnaissance aircraft brought back stark images of wave-wrecked coastal landscapes and their hungry, traumatized inhabitants. The helicopters took off from the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, staged in calm waters about three miles off the Indonesian province of Aceh along with four other vessels to launch the sprawling U.S. military operation.
More than a dozen other ships were en route to southern Asian waters, with the USS Bonhomme Richard, an amphibious assault vessel carrying Marines, headed for Sri Lanka, which along with Indonesia was the worst-hit area. The mission involves thousands of sailors and Marines, along with some 1,000 land-based troops.
Thailand's Vietnam War-era air base of Utapao has become the airlift hub for the region. C-130 transport planes were already conducting sorties to Jakarta and the Sumatran cities of Medan and Banda Aceh, according to a statement Saturday by the U.S. Embassy in Jakarta.
U.S. Navy medical staff are also on the ground in Meulaboh, a decimated fishing village where several thousand bodies have been recovered. The Navy is considering a request from Jakarta to establish a field hospital there.
The Lincoln's operations officer, Cmdr. Matthew J. Faletti, said the New Year's Day effort off Sumatra was focused on ferrying emergency relief, including biscuits, energy drinks and instant noodles, to communities along the 120-mile stretch of seacoast south of the city of Banda Aceh.
U.S. military medical and damage assessment teams were also landed with helicopters flying in heavy winds, rain and low clouds. Supplies had to be dropped from craft hovering over some water-logged areas where landing proved impossible.
Officers said information was being gathered on how best American resources could be used including the skills of machinists, masons, carpenters, divers and general laborers among the more than 6,000 crew members on the giant carrier.
"Everyone is champing at the bit to go out and help," said Vorce. "Today wasn't about a paycheck."
Memo to those who criticized President Bush for being too slow to "respond" to the humanitarian crisis by giving a press conference: a press conference is not a "response;" what the USS Abraham Lincoln and the Bonhomme Richard were ordered to do--that's a response.
And it began while Kofi was still on the slopes.
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