This does not necessarily mean that the U.S. must withdraw from the U.N., however. There is a Third Way. No, I am not proposing a compromise with socialism in the manner of Tony Blair. My proposal involves the exercise of diplomatic virility in the service of American interests.

Now is not the first time that the member nations of the U.N. have sought to use it against the United States. In the late 1970′s we had a President and a U.N. Ambassador who permitted — and even encouraged — a bunch of backwater third world nations to use the United States as a punching bag at the U.N. When President Reagan was elected, he chose Jeane Kirkpatrick as our United Nations Ambassador. Together, they made it clear to the upstarts that this sort of nonsense at the U.N. would have serious consequences. The greatest excesses of the U.N. were temporarily curbed.

That sort of thing could be done again, if there is sufficient will in the current Administration. Remaining in the United Nations, but exerting the power and diplomacy at our disposal, would have certain benefits. The primary benefit is that we do not hand our enemies an institution that is still a useful instrument of propoganda.

If, however, we lack the testicular fortitude to reform the U.N. and punish misbehavior by its members, we would be better served to get out. If we withdraw, we should do so in a way that diminishes the remaining United Nations to the maximum extent. We should deprive it of a forum in the United States, and withdraw from every treaty or compact created under U.N. auspices. We should refuse to recognize any authority exercised under the name of the United Nations. This will necessarily exacerbate the rift between the United States and the rest of the world, and trade and diplomacy would suffer, but we should never provide our enemies with a club to be turned against us.

The United Nations was a noble thought, but like most liberal thoughts, it was nobler in concept than execution. The credit, or blame (perspective counts, here) for the UN has be incorrectly attributed to FDR. In reality, the UN was just a re-establishment of Woodrow Wilson’s crippled League of Nations. That misbegotten body died an ignominious death shortly before the outbreak of World War II. It was powerless to do much but suck money from its participants and bandy about platitudes, paper, and ink. The United States Senate never ratified its charter and never joined its peculiar clique.

There are those who argue that the US’s failure to participate in the League doomed it to failure. I submit that no matter whether or not the US would have participated, this miscarriage would have failed. The reasons were simple. The body had no power. Yes, I said power. It had no army, no sovereignty, or authority. It was in reality a big gripe session with hordes of corrupt bureaucrats running about bilking each other’s government out of dues. It had lofty goals and high toned modern offices in Switzerland. Not only was it basically impotent, it was dangerous. The lack of any ability to back up its treaties and rules placed nations of good will at the mercy of those who would willingly sign an unenforceable treaty to provide cover for its systematic violation of that instrument. Weakness always invites attack.

So, if the League of Nations failed so miserably, why try it again under a different guise and housed in a different place (San Francisco, then New York)? I suppose that gut check needs to be done for most of liberalism’s chronic black hole failures; the war on poverty, the war on discrimination, the war on drugs, the Cold War (a topic of another paper…). The reason is as stated before. Liberals believe that noble goals are the ends and means. Demonstration of interest, concern, or care is directly tied to the amount of money one is willing to pay their bureaucrats to work on the problem.

The United Nations was doomed to fail before the ink on the charter dried.

Once, I thought that the UN served a purpose, if a little muddled, but now I am convinced that it is detrimental to international peace and governance. There are three major problems with the UN. First, the General Assembly is a sham loaded with corrupt and venal representatives of like nations whose only interest is in sucking money from the pockets of the West and in particular the US. Second, the Security Council no longer represents the world power structure. The charter treats all nations equally, even if they openly violate their treaties, abuse human rights, and make war on their neighbors. The third problem is still power. Although the UN has some limited ability to generate military force, its focus is diffuse and confusing. It still depends too heavily on police type activity and lacks the sovereignty to conduct a real war.

In its current condition, the United Nations is a disaster snowballing down the mountain growing faster as it gains speed. Therefore, until the Charter can be re-written to make it a rapid open diplomatic mission with only limited functions and based upon proportional economic, military, and population based representation, the United States should leave the General Assembly of the UN. It should then use its Security Council veto to block all of the latest and future anti-American actions.

In order to maintain some semblance of diplomatic order, the US should toss the entire mission out of New York. Geneva would do nicely. It could take up residence in the League of Nations buildings. Once the UN building is closed and its corrupt apparachiks moved to other environs, then the US could call for a new treaty to build a better more just and capable UN… Better yet, the US might just want to drop the whole thing. But that would take a stiff dose of reality and most government types, whether Conservative or Liberal, just have difficulty avoiding spurious feel good causes no matter how badly they always fail.

So from the very beginning, there have been many institutional implements available for the strongest nations to impose their will upon the many.

Over time, however, we have seen the erstwhile stronger nations degenerate into weak ones (the USSR/Russia, Great Britain) while some of the weaker ones have become more powerful either by their control of strategic resources (the Arab nations), by their surging economies (Germany, Japan), or by their alliances (the Africans), or by cynical manipulation (France, India).

Against such alliances, the United States finds itself defeated by the very rules and ideals that it created in the foundation of the United Nations-and that "one man, one vote" ideal has become the instrument of its own powerlessness when used in committee rules, in floor votes and in all the parliamentary folderol that weaves its webs of constraint about the United States.

I mention all this simply to say that while we have been playing the idealistic diplomat, we’ve been bushwhacked. Of course, one could be cynical and say that since we made the rules, we have to abide by them. But that is simply compounding misplaced idealism with naïve consistency.

While the United Nations has paid lip service to the "peace among nations" ideal, the most constant action amongst the motley collection of statist nations, tribalist alliances and their socialist bureaucrats has had but one objective: to redistribute the wealth of the strong among all the others-and as the strongest of all, the United States has provided these envious thieves with a common target.

For those who would say, "the United States has to stay a part of the family of nations," in order to influence and control the changes of international activity. But while this continuance is logical, it is also foolhardy. Staying in a family is not in one’s best interests when your brothers and cousins are planning to embezzle all your money from your savings and divert your salary into their household accounts.

And in a realistic sense, this is what the United Nations has evolved into, and the United States has acquiesced in the evolution, either by intent or by stupidity, or both. The UNESCO Human Rights Commission, composed now of such champions of liberty such as Sudan, has become a microcosm of the United Nations itself. In the truest sense of the word, the lunatics are indeed running the asylum.

So the rules have changed. The United States does itself no good by maintaining its membership in this body, this so-called United Nations: unless the United States wishes, through its own willfulness, to participate in its own destruction at the hands of its enemies and supine allies.

In Maine, Frank Buble is currently on trial for attempting to kill his son Phillip, over the son’s sexual obsession with a dog named Lady. Phillip told reporters that his father needs "therapy" to overcome his hostility towards him. Phillip is an activist Zoophile, a person who has a sexual orientation directed toward animals.

On a sleazy online magazine called Nerve.com, Princeton University "ethicist" Peter Singer has gone public with a favorable essay on bestiality. In writing a review of Dutch biologist Mida Dekker’s book, "Dearest Pet: On Bestiality," Singer notes that the taboo against humans having sex with animals is based on Judeo-Christian morality and our desire to differentiate ourselves from the animals. According to Singer, we are just great apes, so why not strike down the bestiality taboo? Indeed, and why not strike down the cultural taboos against sex with children or dead people? After all, the pedophiles who run the North American Man-Boy Love Association (NAMBLA) are simply expressing their "sexual orientation," aren’t they? And Necrophiliacs would argue that they are only expressing their sexuality in a different way than you or I.

Homosexual activists have taken the leadership role in striking down sexual taboos in our culture. They have lobbied aggressively for laws protecting a person’s "sexual orientation." In many cases, uninformed state legislators have passed these laws without clearly defining what "sexual orientation" is or who it covers.

We are now discovering where this trend is going to lead us. There are a whole variety of sexually confused special interest groups that may soon be vying for protected class status under sexual orientation laws. They may include the following: Apotemnophilia: Those who are sexually aroused by the stumps of an amputee; Coprophagia: Sexual gratification from eating feces; Klismaphilia: Erotic pleasure derived from enemas; Urophilia: Sexual arousal from urine; and Incest: Sexual arousal by having sex with a son or daughter. Will all of these groups receive special legal protections under local, state, or federal "sexual orientation" laws?

If sexual orientation isn’t clearly defined in a statute, these perverted sexual behaviors will be protected by the law. If a community or state already has a sexual orientation law on the books, concerned citizens should work to overturn it. Sexual orientation and behavior should not be given protected legal status. These are sexual disorientations or psychosexual disorders. They should not be normalized by legislation or by the likes of Peter Singer who believes that the taboo against bestiality should be broken.

What standards should be applied by the Senate in confirming or rejecting the President’s appointments?

The Constitution does not provide much guidance, providing in Article II, Section 2, Subsection 2, that the President has the power to appoint "officers of the United States" "by and with the advice and consent of the Senate."

In Federalist 76, Alexander Hamilton discussed the appointment process. He did not purport to direct the discretion of the Senators in consenting to an appointment, but he did make some important observations. Hamilton anticipated that the Senate would not often reject a President’s choice. One reason for this is that the President could simply nominate another choice very much like the first. This presupposes a President who will not be intimidated by the Senate. George W. Bush may have done this in naming Elaine Chao as a replacement for Linda Chavez as Secretary of Labor. Unfortunately, what Hamilton may have overlooked is the public relations benefits of a partisan Senate defeating a President’s first choice, and the effect that the national media can have in molding, shaping, and censoring the terms of the debate.

Hamilton also defended Senatorial consent to Presidential appointments on the theory that "unfit" persons would be rejected. The danger that the Founders sought to avoid was the ability of a single person to exercise favoritism and cronyism in his appointments. As Hamilton phrased it, the Senate could "prevent the appointment of unfit characters from State prejudice, from family connection, from personal attachment, or from a view to popularity."

Hamilton thought that the prospect of a rejection in the Senate would inhibit the President from bringing forth a nominee who had such "insignificance and pliancy to render them the obsequious instruments of his pleasure."

Clearly, by Alexander Hamilton’s standards, the advice and consent of the Senate has failed its intended purpose. On the one hand, we have observed a President appoint people such as Janet Reno possessing that exactly that "insignificance and pliancy to render them the obsequious instruments" of the President’s pleasure. On the other hand, recent Presidents have used their appointments, and Senators have used their confirmation power, precisely for advancing their own personal popularity.

Why have we fallen short? The obvious structural answer is that the Senate created by the Founders is not the Senate we have today. Whereas Senators were originally chosen by their state legislatures, the 17th Amendment (adopted in 1913) made Senators subject to direct election, just like Representatives. Thus, the body that was supposed to be above the popular fray, became nearly as dependent on momentary public popularity as the House of Representatives. It is unrealistic to expect Senators today to display the same considered judgment that was expected of them by the Founding Fathers. It appears, perhaps because of tradition, that the Senate retained a certain statesmanship for a number of years following their popular election, but today the average Senator is indistinguishable from the average Representative in the depth of his pandering to important interest groups.

Is there any hope? I submit that the Senators must be challenged in their opposition to Presidential appointments. They must be made to declare their basis for opposing a nominee. The media will not force this issue, as they are content to accept the talking points of any liberal interest group who opposes a nominee. The President and those in the Senate who support him, therefore, must make the case for each nominee. If a Senator opposes a nominee on strictly partisan grounds, that should be made to appear. Second, if a President runs into a partisan defeat of his first appointment, he should appoint a second individual who is equally in accord with the President’s policies. A recess appointment might be used if necessary. As Alexander Hamilton realized, a Senate which exceeds its proper bounds in rejecting legitimate appointments must be met by an equally determined President.

We have seen alterations to the Constitution, some merely to clarify what was originally in place, but others that are a huge departure from the Founders original intent. The two most noteworthy of those, IMHO, are the 16th and 17th Amendments.

The 16th Amendment falls on it’s face both daily and yearly. Daily because it turns an about face on the Founders belief that any individual income tax is in itself bound to be unfair. This is the reason why it took a Constitutional Amendment to garnish the wages of working Americans. Yearly it falls on it’s face by imposing a punitive tax that is unfair due to it’s progressive nature. I am personally astounded that this progressive tax rate is not or has yet to be challenged on the basis of the 14th Amendment, citing the unequal treatment of individuals under the law.

I have long been of a mind that the only way to get REAL tax reform in this Country is to abolish the automatic withholding clause and have ALL Americans pay their taxes on the specified date. I believe that this should hold true for ALL Federal withholdings, Social Security and Medicare. Having each individual pay their "due" to the Federal Gov’t all at one time is the best and only way I can see to wake up America to the unjust amount of taxes they are required to pay.

But it is the 17th Amendment that has shown it’s ugly head twice in the soon to be displaced current Administration.

The first would obviously be the Impeachment of President Clinton. Faced with evidence, overwhelming evidence, that the President of the United States committed perjury, a felony in all 50 States, the Senate choose to read the polls and the liberal press and opted to ignore the law and the Constitution of the United States and not remove the felon from office. This is a clear example of what happens when a Senator is held accountable to the voters of the State.

As the original Constitution was drawn, Senators were appointed by the Governors and Elected Officials of the State they were to represent. The reason for this was to preserve the States representation to the Federal Gov’t and to provide a "cooler head" to the whim of the knee jerk populous. For knee jerk response there was the House, the senate was supposed to be able to worry less about the "people" than it was their duty to State.

Fearing that they would not be re-elected, they choose to ignore law and in most cases followed the polls that successfully spun the Impeachment as "just about sex".

A close and evenly divided election to be sure. With Joe Lieberman missing his chance to become VP and being egotistical enough to run both as VP and as Senator has tied the Senate at 50-50.

This means that the GOP does have actual control of the Senate as VP Chaney has the tie breaking vote. One would think that this puts the GOP in a great position, controlling all 3 branches of Gov’t. Buzzzzzz, wrong!

What does Senator Give a Lott do? Changes his name to Gives it ALL and makes the choice to name Democrats to an equal number of Chair positions. Now why would he do such a thing? After all for almost 50 years the GOP has been looked down upon and snubbed as far as leadership positions go. For the time that the Democrats controlled the Senate there were almost no chance that a Republican would take a Chair position.

Did the GOP rail against such a system? You bet they did. Did it do any good? Heck no. The Democrats laugh their collective butts off at us.

So why does Lott give away what the GOP has fought so hard to gain? Because the new spin is that this is the "FAIR" thing to do. Democrats cry and whine because they have half the seats they should have say in things that matter and Chair important positions. Obviously BOTH Parties have forgotten the history of the past 50 years. The new spin says that if "we" don’t share the power we are mean. If we don’t share the power, says the media and the polls, we are partisan. Clue time America. Politics are partisan.

Where was the media when the GOP complained that power was to be shared? Where was the polls when the GOP was shut out? Oh yea, that wasn’t "unfair". After all it was only the GOP locked out, not the Democrats.

The long and short of it is that Give it ALL, is more concerned about winning re-election, as are his fellows, than they are about being leaders. What has been done here for the sake of re-election.

Thus lay the flaw of the 17th Amendment. Before it would have been tough to get things through having to get "moderate" Democrats to agree and to herd RINO’s. What Lott has done makes it almost impossible. No amount of checks and balances can overcome a bunch of Democrats who will be determined to show that President Bush cannot work together with them. Democrats can’t and won’t work with him because the media will support them when they cry and whine. And because all the members of the Senate have to worry about what the voter thinks, instead of what is best for their State and the Country, they have to compromise on their core beliefs.

As I said in the beginning, the Founders were blessed with wisdom beyond what they could possibly foresee. Or as my Grandfather use to say "What a fine day. Now watch someone come along and screw it up." The Senate has become a smaller House, subject to all the same pressures that the Founders sought to relieve them from.

Sadder are we all for the short sightedness of those who drafted the 17th Amendment.

I used to work in show business: "the business." In fact, I grew up in a trunk and pursued and knew no other business until my mid-twenties. I know more than I want about the misery, sorrows, and disappointments of pursuing a career in the arts. I also know that for these folks they have no choice and they love it. They didn’t choose the career–the career chose them. For the people involved, any public recognition validates a life of practice, training, and sacrifice.

The greatest difficulty for the performance artist (actors, musicians, singers), is to find an audience for their work. The same as new writers’ attempts to find publishers to reach readers. While it is possible for a musician to sit and play the piano in their home, every now and again their work requires an audience, and even more sporadically, it requires praise and recognition.

The video camera and cheap computer editing equipment has made it possible for actors and aspiring directors to produce their own works, with their own limited funds. Few of these will ever see the inside of a commercial cinema, but that isn’t the point. For 99% of the people involved, this isn’t the objective. Unpublished novelists are now giving away their books through the Internet or electronic self-publishing. They don’t care if they make any money at it—they just want their books read. The same is true for musicians. The technologies have become affordable for garage bands, soloists, and the Saturday night blues bands to produce a recording of reasonable quality and their goal is to get their music heard.

I’m sure all of us have been in a small café or a mall and listened casually to the musician playing their guitar. We see small chamber orchestras performing on the streets and subways of our major cities. Most of these musicians make their daily bread in traditional jobs, just like you and me. Some also make extra cash with the coins collected in the open guitar case, or the self-made CDs and cassettes they sell at these performances. They make photocopies of their performance dates and hand them out in hopes of acquiring a following, a continued audience. For 99% of these people, fortune is not their goal—they want recognition and the fame in having their work known.

These performers are no less great, no less remarkable, and no less important than their record company-backed, wealthy, packaged, "famous" peers. It is for these folks that Napster was invented and it is for these people that Napster should be protected. Places like Napster have made it possible for the little guy to freely distribute their works–to carve out their 15 minutes of fame.

The people who benefit most through Napster-like technologies are the equivalent of small businesses competing with the mega-giant corporations. While neither has any more or less rights than the other, we recognize the importance of small business to an ever-growing and vital economy—and we cut them a little more slack.

You are correct that copyrights and intellectual property should be protected. But why is the intellectual property and technology created by Napster any less valuable or less worthy of protection? Should the thousands of unknown artists, writers, and performers be denied access to the public by making the distribution vehicle illegal?

Again, I will argue that it is irrelevant that the technology Napster created can be used illegally when it was launched and may be used for a legal purpose. A significant percentage of copies made on photocopiers violate copyrights, so should we ban photocopiers?

The unknown performers who write and perform most of the music are willing to give it away and have it distributed via Napster – this is so when they come to your town and perform for $500 they have an audience. Do you really believe that recording companies want a technology around that makes it possible for GREAT musicians and performers to distribute their works without them? Do you really believe the record companies want artists to have that much artistic freedom? Do you really believe the record companies hired expensive lawyers and spent millions of dollars to protect the artist or a copyright?

Do you think the street musician, the garage band that practices every weekend, or the waitress-blues-singer believes it was about protecting copyrights? It was not to protect copyrights that the record industry went after Napster–it was to protect their DISTRIBUTION MONOPOLIES—the SPIN was that it was to protect artists’ copyrights. And, it appears that the spin worked.

The great Hollywood studio system died when it was broken up by the courts. This was because they controlled the entire process: the writing, filming, hiring, distribution, and cash collection at the theatres. Just as now, the entire music publishing and distribution process is controlled by the record companies. The great independent films that we now enjoy are a result of the breakup of this unholy monopoly. And so it will be true for the music industry. Napster was the first pioneer and it is just the first victim. This is the musical equivalent of the film industry’s early battles with the Eastman-Kodak cartel: the smashing of cameras, the beatings and murders of the secret producers, the destruction of the theatres that showed independent works, and the burning of precious celluloid they created.

The argument of the safari being brought on to my game reserve is a great argument. My hat is off to you! But there is a hole in the argument: This game park doesn’t belong to me or to anyone else. The park is owned by the public (artistic freedom AND the Internet). A chain link fence has just been erected around the game park, the music company executives hold the keys, and the public has to pay admission. The sign outside the park reads, "Welcome to Hotel California."