“I call upon President Obama to stop Ahmadinejad from coming to the UN,” Michele Bachmann said in a statement issued this morning. “This administration tried and failed to do ‘outreach’ to Iran, reminding us once again that appeasement of deadly dictators is never a wise or effective strategy. The President must not continue to lead from behind on key issues of national and international security.”
“In his repeated statements wishing to see another sovereign nation ‘wiped off the map,’ he has proven that he is in violation of the United Nations charter, and of international law,” Bachmann said.
Did you guys hear something? Kinda sounded like irrelevance.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWhat I heard was wisdom.
Polls or no polls, I can't help but like this lady.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBachmann is right. Ahmadinejad is Hitler without a tailor. He should be shunned.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBachmann is right. This disgusting cretin shouldn't be allowed to step foot on US soil.
Which raises a larger question; when is the US going to kick the UN out of NYC? We can't strongly support our Israel ally on one hand, and on the other support an anti-Semitic organization.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe problem is that we signed a treaty with the UN that requires that we allow free passage of members to meetings of the UN, so we cannot ban him from travelling into the US to attend the meeting. We CAN, however, restrict him to the Iranian mission in New York, the UN grounds, the airport, and travel directly between the two.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWe could abrogate the treaty and then tell him to buzz off.
I'm just saying...
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWe could. Would it be worthwhile?
If Michelle Bachmann wants to argue that we should abrogate that treaty (I'm not sure precisely which treaty is involved) then she should come out and say that. She should explain what the negative consequences would be of abrogating said treaty, and explain why she still thinks it's worthwhile.
Basically she needs to comunicate that she's actually thought this issue through, and isn't merely proffering nice-sounding solutions with negative consequences that haven't been thought through. Because, y'know, we've had enough of politicians who do that.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI was never suggesting that Bachmann was saying we should abrogate the UN Charter.
I was simply using sarcasm (poorly, I guess) to state my belief that we should consider it.
If you're asking me personally if it would be worthwhile, it is certainly worth considering. Leaving the UN would remove the legitimacy US presence gives it. Legitimacy its actions certainly show that it doesn't deserve. It's a broken organization.
John Bolton's book on his time as UN Ambassador is an excellent place to start if people want more details as to why we should consider leaving it (though he doesn't explicitly state or even imply that we should leave it if I remember correctly).
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAs an aside, this is another example of Bachman grandstanding without knowing what the heck she is talking about - like her discussion of the HPV vaccine. You can criticize Perry's order on procedural grounds or on libertarian philosophy, but not on the safety/efficacy of the vaccine, which has been established empirically. Sometimes I think she is the right-wing version of Maxine Waters.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseFoolish. Did Bush do this? The nonsense coming out of Republican mouths is unbounded.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseNo he didn't, but that doesn't mean he was right.
I look forward to your enlightened, fact-based argument why this was nonsense.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAt the very least, we should demand he release the hiker hostages before he enters the US. Can we use no leverage?!? Bush was wrong to admit him as well. Calling for a nation's anihilation should get you banned - but not with the UN.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBachmann is starting to really embarass herself. We can't stop that louse from coming to the UN, but I think we can prevent him from going anywhere else. We can tell Columbia they lose all federal money if he speaks there and we can also announce that any organization that receives federal funding will lose it if they patronize the hotel he's staying at. Let him stay at the Red Roof in Staten Island one night and then go back to Tehran to slaughter his subjects.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseRepublicans, and conservatives especially, should respect the rule of law. As has been pointed out, we signed and ratified the UN Charter treaty. As such, we're legally bound by that treaty, and because of that, we have to allow the Iranian president, or any other president or diplomat, unencumbered travel access to the UN grounds.
But, as has also been pointed out, we can (I believe) limit his ability to move around our country, including precluding him from traveling to Columbia. That is what we should do, or (again as has been pointed out), at least until those hikers have been released.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbusePS - Bachmann's an attorney, and surely she learned about the binding obligation of ratified treaties in law school, even Oral Roberts law school.
She knows how wrong her statement is, which makes it even that much worse and that much more pandering.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWhy should the UN Charter treaty be more sacrosanct than our treaty with Israel?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWe have a treaty with Israel that prohibits Iranian nationals from entering the US?
Can you provide a link to said treaty? I'd really like to read it.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMichele Bachmann's fifteen minutes are up. She has great moral convictions, and tremendous courage, and she is very bright. But her temperament is ill-suited to politics, she often forgets that leadership requires going places where people are willing to follow, and the shamelessness of her self-promotion is increasing proportional to her realization that her moment has passed. She is now dangerous to conservative ambition because she hews too close to the media caricature of what conservatives represent. Ask yourself this question: what possible positive outcome of her "call" on President Obama have, other than to marginally extend her moment in the limelight? This ploy for media exposure is both naked and ridiculous -- two things one should never go out of one's way to be simultaneously.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI like her ideals, but I also think they shouldn't be implemented.
In my ideal world, we'd kick the UN out of the USA. We'd also cut off all diplomatic ties with China, declaring the current Chinese regime to be illegitimate and the government of Taiwan to be the closest thing to a legitimate Chinese government. In fact, we'd declare *all* unelected governments to be illegal, and make a list of foreign dictators to be captured and tried.
But this is why I should not be President. I would, for the sake of principle, take a stand which in all probability would wind up screwing the world up in unpredictable ways rather than making it a better place. Michelle Bachmann is similar.
I am an idealist, and I can afford that luxury because nobody does what I say anyway. But anyone holding the office of President of the United States needs to be a pragmatist, and that's part of what makes Michelle Bachmann (or for that matter Ron Paul) completely unsuited to the job.
Both of 'em can make a positive contribution in the house, though.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBachmann has become a car wreck- you want to avert your eyes, but just can't. This latest statement about Irans President in NYC is just one more example of her utter inability to understand or deal with the world that we live in.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse