Thursday, August 07, 2008

Time for immediate action?

There is a quality blog post over at the Coffee House by Henrietta Bredin noting that the phrase "international condemnation" is pathetically ineffectual.
"Oooh, how awful, listen up everyone. Our violent and bloody military coup is attracting international condemnation. We must desist immediately, apologize profusely to all concerned and give ourselves over to international justice."
On the flip side I can't help but be reminded of Scene 21 in Monty Python's Life of Brian when I think of the United Nations hand wringing over things like Dafir, Rwanda etc.

IN the scene, Judith informs the People's Fornt of Judea that Brian has been arrested just after Reg has been saying that action, not motions is what important in their fight against the Romans. Reg's immediate response to Judith is to say,
Completely new motion, eh, that, ah-- that there be, ah, immediate action--
Sums up the absurdity of the way the "international community" works quite well I think.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Nothing will change until the message becomes "We condemn you.... and the Swiss bank accounts of your leaders are now frozen and if they travel to any civilized country they will be arrested..."

The only problem then are the coups run by the "good guys" (the ones we finance like Sadam Hussain and the Mujahadeen) who then degenerate into "bad guys".