Op/Ed,

A Plea to the Secretary General of the United Nations

“I saw then in my dream so far as this valley reached there was on the right hand a very deep ditch; that ditch is it into which the blind have led the blind in all ages, and have both there miserably perished.” (Pilgrim’s Progress, John Bunyan)

No doubt, Mr. Secretary, you have watched incredulously these past two days as the blind on the right in our House of the peoples’ representatives attempt once more to drive America into the ditch of unending death and destruction in their fabricated “war” against terror by splitting the nation into true patriots or enemy sympathizers. All these men on the right, silver haired, impeccably coiffured, well-fed, paunchy in their navy-blue pin striped suits, stand nobly before their fellows in the air-conditioned splendor of the House Chamber and belittle those who have documented the deceit, the failures and the follies of this administration as it attempts to re-justify a “war on terror” that is unquestionably nothing more than an illegal act of aggression that is morally repugnant as well as a defiance of international law and the Charter of the United Nations. House Speaker Hastert and Illinois Congressman Henry Hyde, our moral emissary who declared President Clinton a sinner but who finds no darkness in the sins against humanity inflicted by the current occupant of the White House, intoned their anthem – you are for this resolution and our troops or you give aid and comfort to our enemy. Thus did they summarily dismiss truth and righteous dissent as anathema to a democracy.

Men bloated with arrogance do not yield to truth or respond to facts that contradict their assertions; they drown their adversaries with lies, indignation, humiliation and condemnation. Deceit blossoms as “our mission”; thus do we liberate those we’ve invaded. Illegal occupation metamorphoses into aiding the people of Iraq establish stability against enemy insurgents; thus do we deny the torture at Abu Ghraib and the massacres at Haditha. Threats against America from WMD, biological and chemical weapons, alliances with al Quaeda by the dictator Saddam Hussein who co-conspired to destroy the Twin Towers evaporate as America’s responsibility to bring God’s gift of freedom to the mid-east miraculously rises as our mission in Iraq; thus do we bury our guilt beneath the cloak of God’s compassion for the afflicted of the world. Saddam’s sins as mass murderer, as invader of neighboring countries, as an enemy of America intent on destroying the United States are vehemently condemned by this righteous duo to give justification for their invasion; thus do they erase their guilt in supporting Saddam by providing him the means to gas the Kurds and use chemical warfare against the Iranians, and, most insidiously, to hide from the American people the fact that Iraq had been devastated by the U.S. for 12 years through illegal sanctions and illegal bombing. Having wrapped their failures in the flag of patriotism they mock those who dissent as cowards who would rather “cut and run”; that America’s sons and daughters have been sent to execute an illegal war, to suffer and die as do the innocent civilians that become their victims, does not reach their conscious minds.  Arrogance is the mid-wife that prods these old men to hemorrhage hypocrisy as they declare their love and loyalty to the youth they send to slaughter. These men are the storm troopers of this administration and they will not yield to what is right. That is why I write to you today.  

You, Sir, approach your Biblical time of three score years and ten still holding an office of significance in world affairs, an office that could enable you to fulfill that dream, stated so eloquently in your United Nations Biographical sketch, “to encourage and advocate human rights, the rule of law and the universal values of equality, tolerance and human dignity found in the United Nations Charter.” “He labored that all -- the rich and poor, the mighty and the low, the swift and the slow, the sound of body and the afflicted – might attain justice and mercy, fulfillment and happiness in a world united in compassion and love.” Such, Sir, might be the inscription on your monument should you move to address the true grievances that assault the institution you administer.

...United States are vehemently condemned by this righteous duo to give justification for their invasion; thus do they erase their guilt in supporting Saddam by providing him the means to gas the Kurds and use chemical warfare against the Iranians, and, most insidiously, to hide from the American people the fact that Iraq had been devastated by the U.S.

Lacking any other alternative, you as head of the UN must act on behalf of the vast majority of Americans who now realize the full corruptness of their government, to seek redress for them from the deceit and arrogance that infests this administration and drives it to inflict its demented demands on the nations of the world. This cannot be done through the Security Council since the United States acts as Cerberus by forcing all to conform to its will or be devoured for such insolence. But the voice of the international community does not reside in the Security Council, it is present in the General Assembly and there it must speak. When one nation declares as its rightful policy dominance over all other nations, when it proclaims its right to determine unilaterally pre-emptive force against others regardless of provocation or acknowledged intention of harm, when it has demonstrated its willingness to impose its will by military force or financial coercion, the international community must address this threat to equality, justice, and human rights or accept the ineluctable reality that the very concept of the United Nations and its Charter is a fraud, a mockery, a horrible deception foisted on people to allow despotism to reign supreme. 

As this country approaches its 2006 elections with its threat to the Republican control of the entire government, we witness a new buildup of military force in the deployment of aircraft carriers toward Iran not unlike the buildup that preceded the invasion of Iraq. We also witness the deployment of articles in the main stream media and paid advertisements calling for strategic attacks against Iran’s nuclear facilities because they pose a threat to the United States, a deployment lead by the Israeli lobbies that dominate America’s foreign policy in Washington and control our congress and senate. A similar thrust of aggressiveness goes on in Washington against the democratically elected government in Palestine as the House and Senate destroy any chance for that Hamas dominated government to succeed by imposing draconian measures that cripple its effectiveness even as they create inhumane conditions on a people already suffering from the world’s neglect. In short, we witness the continued devastation of the mid-east as America and Israel force a conflict between Arab countries and the west by permeating the press with propaganda that instills fear providing the excuse needed to invade, occupy, and divide. The UN alone can stop this illegal and inevitable consequence from unraveling the ties that bind the world’s communities. You, Sir, must bring this matter before the UNGA.