Posts

Murkowski wants to sneak through Law of the Sea Treaty in lame duck session this fall

/9 Comments/in , /by

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) says she’s hopeful that the Law of the Sea Treaty will pass Congress in the lame-duck session after the election, despite the fierce opposition of some conservatives.

Murkowski told The Associated Press the sea treaty will have better prospects in the Senate when the fall campaign is over. The global maritime pact would establish de facto rules for the nation’s oceans, and business interests say it will create opportunities for offshore drilling.

“This is a treaty that I believe very strongly will contribute not only to our national security, but will allow us a level of certainly in accessing our resources in the north,” Murkowski said.

Murkowski and Sen. Mark Begich (D-Alaska) both support the treaty, and Murkowski has championed several other efforts to tap the state’s natural resources. The untapped deepwater oil and natural gas off Alaska’s coast could be a significant economic boon for The Last Frontier and the entire nation, she and many of her Republican colleagues argue.

“I don’t want us, as an Arctic nation, to abandon those opportunities, and we would be doing that if we fail to ratify the Law of the Sea treaty,” Murkowski said.

Read more from this story HERE.

Israeli TV: Decision by Netanyahu, Barak to strike Iran is almost final

/1 Comment/in , /by

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak have “almost finally” decided on an Israeli strike at Iran’s nuclear facilities this fall, and a final decision will be taken “soon,” Israel’s main TV news broadcast reported on Friday evening.

Channel 2 News, the country’s leading news program, devoted much of its Friday night broadcast to the issue, detailing the pros and cons that, it said, have taken Netanyahu and Barak to the brink of approving an Israeli military attack despite opposition from the Obama administration and from many Israeli security chiefs.

Critically, the station’s diplomatic correspondent Udi Segal said, Israel does not believe that the US will take military action as Iran closes in on the bomb.

The US, the TV report said, has not provided Israel with details of an attack plan. President Obama has not promised to attack Iran if all else fails. Conditions cited by Defense Secretary Leon Panetta for an American attack do not calm Israeli concerns. And Obama has a record of seeking UN and Arab League approval before action. All these factors, in Jerusalem’s mind, underline the growing conviction of Netanyahu and Barak that Israel will have to tackle Iran alone, the TV report said.

Israel’s leaders have also noted that president George W. Bush vowed repeatedly that North Korea would not be allowed to attain a nuclear weapons capability — a vow that proved empty.

Read more from this story HERE.

UN Arms Trade Treaty deadline today: Revised draft gives hope to gun control advocates

/3 Comments/in /by

Photo credit: paljoakim

A revised draft of a new U.N. treaty to regulate the multibillion dollar global arms trade raised hopes from supporters and the British government, which has been the leading proponent, that an historic agreement could be reached by Friday’s deadline for action.

The draft circulated late Thursday closed several loopholes in the original text, though the Washington-based Arms Control Association said further improvements are still needed to strengthen measures against illicit arms transfers.

A spokesman for Britain’s U.N. Mission, speaking anonymously because he was not authorized to speak publicly, said the new text is “a substantial improvement” and “an historic agreement that effectively regulates the international trade in conventional arms is now very close.”

The estimated $60 billion international arms trade is unregulated, though countries including the U.S. have their own rules on exports.

Opponents in the U.S., especially the powerful National Rifle Association, have portrayed the treaty as a surrender of gun ownership rights enshrined in the U.S. Constitution. The issue of gun control, always politically explosive one for American politicians, has re-emerged since last week’s shooting at a Colorado cinema killed 12 people.

Read more from this story HERE.

United Nation’s Commission wants to legalize prostitution, IV drug use worldwide

/2 Comments/in /by

A report issued by the United Nations-backed Global Commission on HIV and the Law recommends that nations around the world get rid of “punitive” laws against prostitution – or what it calls “consensual sex work” — and decriminalize the voluntary use of illegal injection drugs in order to combat the HIV epidemic.

The commission, which is made up of 15 former heads of state, legal scholars and HIV/AIDS activists, was convened in 2010 by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon and is jointly backed by the United Nations Development Programme and UNAIDS – the Joint U.N. Programme on AIDS/HIV.

The commission recommends repealing all laws that prohibit “adult consensual sex work,” as well as clearly distinguishing in law and practice between sexual trafficking and prostitution.

The report–“HIV and the Law: Risks, Rights & Health”–cites a recommendation by the International Labour Organization, which recommends that “sex work” should be recognized as an occupation in order to be regulated “in a way that protects workers and customers.”

Specifically, the commission wants to: “Decriminalise private and consensual adult sexual behaviours, including same-sex sexual acts and voluntary sex work.”

For other actions that the UN commission wants to take, please read more from this story HERE.

UN trying to sucker the US into another bad treaty, this one gutting parental rights

/3 Comments/in , , /by

Photo Credit: Gage Skidmore

This past week, 34 senators, the bare minimum, were convinced to stand against the internationalist Law of the Sea Treaty.  Today, Obama may attempt to subject the US to the UN’s Arms Trade Treaty.  But another bad UN treaty that has not received the same amount of publicity as LOST and the Arms Trade Treaty, is also being considered.  This proposed treaty addresses national laws pertaining to persons with disabilities.  According to Rick and Karen Santorum, parents of a disabled child, the proposed treaty is an attack on the fundamental rights of parents to educate, care, and raise their disabled children:

On the surface, United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (“CRPD”) calls for numerous protections for people with disabilities. Many of these protections are consistent with the Americans with Disabilities Act. However, CRPD also includes provisions that were drafted by the United Nations and should concern all Americans. If ratified, CRPD would become the law of the land under the U.S. Constitution’s Supremacy Clause, and would trump state laws, and could be used as precedent by state and federal judges. Since it is a treaty, the Constitution requires that it must be ratified by two-thirds of the United States Senate.

There are two very troubling provisions in this treaty. The first spreads the identical standard for the control of children with disabilities as is contained in the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child. This means that the Federal government, acting under U.N. directions, can determine for all children with disabilities what is best for them. The second, the education provision of CRPD does not support the parental rights rules of past U.N. human rights treaties. Omission of these rules would potentially eradicate parental rights for the education of children with disabilities.

Over the years we have seen many U.N. treaties which can endanger the American way of life by attempting to trump U.S. laws. As a matter of foreign policy, we firmly believe that we should never allow our beliefs and values to be outsourced to outside entities that may not always have our best interests in mind.

On this particular treaty, however, we come at it from a more personal experience.

During our campaign for president, many of you learned about our daughter Bella. She is a special-needs child who has blessed our hearts. In working with health-care professionals, we found that a few advised treatments were not only not helpful to Bella, but could actually be quite harmful. As parents, it was crucial to be involved to make the proper decision for the best benefits of our child. And through our experience caring for her, we found that we are far from alone.

Read more from the Santorums’ critique of the CRPD .

Photo credit:

Time for the U.S. to Abandon the United Nations

/9 Comments/in , , /by

For years, pundits, politicians and columnists – including me – have fiercely criticized the United Nations. This institution has become a political cesspool controlled by totalitarian states and rogue nations that despise democracy, liberty and freedom. It’s only getting worse with time.

Look what’s happened during the past two weeks:  Syria is likely to get a seat on the U.N. Human Rights Council. U.N. Watch reported Iran will get a “top post” on the U.N. Arms Trade Treaty conference, which it described as being “like choosing Bernie Madoff to police fraud in the stock market.” Meanwhile, U.N. and Arab League envoy Kofi Annan claimed to have had a “very candid and constructive” meeting with Syrian dictator Bashar Assad.

These are all ridiculous stories, but honestly, should we be surprised? I’m not. The U.N. has a long, sordid history of electing tyrannies and dictatorships to its various agencies, boards and councils. For an organization that vigorously claims to support world peace, it also vigorously – and controversially – supports countries that don’t have the slightest grasp of this concept.

For example, Libya chaired the U.N. Human Rights Commission in 2003 – and was a U.N. Security Council member in 2008 and 2009. Syria has twice headed the U.N. Security Council, in June 2002 and August 2003. Iran and Iraq were scheduled to co-chair a U.N. nuclear disarmament conference before Saddam Hussein was toppled from power in 2003. Additionally, North Korea – a major nuclear threat – headed the U.N. Conference on Disarmament just last year.

Not to be overlooked is the U.N.’s repeated condemnation of Israel’s policies for more than five decades while ignoring the terrible slaughter of Rwandans and Bosnian Muslims in two bloody civil wars, publicly supporting an antiterrorism conference held in Tehran, and refusing to expel members that openly support and finance terrorist groups. The list goes on and on.

Read more from this story HERE.

Photo credit: FreedomHouse

More UN idiocy: Iran to Oversee Arms Treaty Conference

/1 Comment/in , /by

Iran has been chosen as a member of the “bureau” overseeing a month-long United Nations conference in New York aimed at finalizing a controversial global “arms trade treaty.”

The move, which came as the conference got underway last week but received virtually no attention, is the latest example of Iran taking up leadership positions at the United Nations despite its defiance of Security Council resolutions relating to its nuclear program.

Furthermore, according to an expert panel monitoring U.N. sanctions on Iran, Tehran continues to flout a Security Council ban on exporting its weaponry, with Syria the main recipient.

“This is like choosing Bernie Madoff to police fraud on the stock market,” said Hillel Neuer, executive director of UN Watch, a non-governmental monitoring group based in Geneva, which drew attention to Iran’s elevation to the conference bureau.

UN Watch is urging U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to condemn the move: “He should remind the conference that the Security Council has imposed four rounds of sanctions on Iran for refusing to halt its prohibited nuclear program, and that Iran continues to defy the international community through illegal arms shipments to the murderous Assad regime . . .”

Read more from this story HERE.

Photo credit: scazon

Video: Larry Pratt hammers Obama for trying to violate Constitution with UN Gun Control Treaty

/2 Comments/in , /by

Larry Pratt hammers the Obama Administration’s attempt to foist the unconstitutional UN Arms Control Treaty on the American people.

Photo credit: Gage Skimore

UN calls for international tax on billionaires to transfer wealth to poor

/2 Comments/in /by

The United Nations on Thursday called for a tax on billionaires to help raise more than $400 billion a year for poor countries.

An annual lump sum payment by the super-rich is one of a host of measures including a tax on carbon dioxide emissions, currency exchanges or financial transactions proposed in a UN report that accuses wealthy nations of breaking promises to step up aid for the less fortunate.

The annual World Economic and Social Survey says it is critical to find new ways to help the world’s poor as pledged cash fails to flow.

The report estimates that the number of people around the globe worth at least $1 billion rose to 1,226 in 2012.

There are an estimated 425 billionaires in the United States, 315 in the Asia-Pacific region, 310 in Europe, 90 in other North and South American countries and 86 in Africa and the Middle East.

Read more from this story HERE.

Photo credit: Jorbasa