Should the UN be called in to observe US elections?

[CptStern]

"Recalling the contentious Florida vote count in 2000, the lawmakers urged the international body to "ensure free and fair elections in America," said a statement by Rep. Eddie Bernice Johnson, D-Texas, who spearheaded the effort... The letter was signed by nine members of Congress. "


seems kind of ironic that some members of congress would ask the UN for help. What do you think? how did you vote? discuss

 

[craig]

Not being American, I didn't vote, but I thought it was ourageous that Bush was called to power, and in hindsight wonder how many lives would have been saved had Al Gore been considered the winner (which IMO he was).

If it's possible to have the UN council preside over the voting then I'm all for it, because clearly some places (Florida) for one.. need watching!

 

[CptStern]

hmmm Jeb Bush was governor of Florida ....coincidence?

 

[el Chi]

Well, seeing as the UN gets the lion's share of its funding from the US, I doubt it would happen or help. Let's face it, the US govt has shown in the last couple of years that it doesn't give a damn what the UN thinks.

 

[craig]

Well, seeing as the UN gets the lion's share of its funding from the US, I doubt it would happen or help. Let's face it, the US govt has shown in the last couple of years that it doesn't give a damn what the UN thinks.

Which also begs the question, should the US be kicked out of the UN? I mean are they assuming that throwing bags of money at something means that international law does not apply to them?

 

[Razor]

If the United States of America are incapable of running an election without the United Nations having to be called in to make sure everything is far, the American government should be ashamed that they try to force their politics on other nations.

 

[ShadowFox]

Heh.. you guys and your conspiracies.

No, the UN is not needed nor wanted to oversee our elections.

 

[CptStern]

Heh.. you guys and your conspiracies.

No, the UN is not needed nor wanted to oversee our elections.

ah shadowfox ...reading comprehension!! We are not saying they should step in ...members of congress have asked the UN to step in

 

[ShadowFox]

Yeah.. probably some democrats with wild theories.

The fact is, it is good to have connections in high places, and Bush had those in Florida and in the Supreme Court. If we eliminated the electoral college, the point would be moot.

 

[CptStern]

I forgot to include the link. Here, Shadowfox read the article

 

[el Chi]

Which also begs the question, should the US be kicked out of the UN? I mean are they assuming that throwing bags of money at something means that international law does not apply to them?

No they shouldn't be thrown out. The UN needs their money and needs to put a tighter reign on them. One way to do this is to give the whole organisation a long-overdue shake-up. For example, the current system is an anachronism, still punishing Germany for WW2 despite the fact that it is one of the largest economic powers, a significant political body and a very stable country. It needs to give more evenly spread power - especially to smaller, poorer developing nations otherwise they'll always be kept down. It was fantastic to see so many Third World countries rallying together at the last WTO summit and destabilising the usual unfairness of the WTO.
Besides, I don't believe any nation has ever been thrown out of the UN, no matter what their crimes.

 

[lePobz]

[OPINION=Pobz]

The UN has its strings pulled by the same people that pull the strings for the Bush presidency, even if they do step in it would change nothing. Bush will either postpone the elections or fix them, either way America is going to war with itself.

[/OPINION]

 

[el Chi]

The UN doesn't have its strings pulled to the extent you suggest. There are too many outside influences to make it as easy as you seem to think; other nations or NGOs (non-governmental organisations, eg: Unicef) that the US would have a hard time influencing, for example. Besides, Kofe Annan and other UN leaders have criticised the US on more than one occassion on more than one issue; most recently he criticised the US' spending on AIDS research. Whilst they put a lot in, the proportion isn't that high and it's simply so important to the general well-being of the planet that they ought to.
The UN is weak in many ways but it can become stronger with a shake-up which it desperately needs or else it, as many historians and political theorists have observed, runs the risk of becoming a new League of Nations.

 

[Fat Tony!]

The election clearly wasnt rigged and neither will this one

 

[Adrien C]

We all know that Bush won with fake votes. His dad use to run the CIA.

 

[slicktick]

If the United States of America are incapable of running an election without the United Nations having to be called in to make sure everything is far, the American government should be ashamed...

I totally agree, we should be ashamed if we cant hold a fair election in our own country.

In my opinion bush saw an opputunity to win with the electoral college and he took it. He followed the law and that is that. And no one is going to try and change it, because one day the democrats knew that it would work against them if they took it away. That is why there is always a big uproar about it around the election and it dies down within a year.

 

[ShadowFox]

We all know that Bush won with fake votes. His dad use to run the CIA.

Neither of the things you said have any relevance to eachother. Keep trying...

 

[Gunner]

Neither of the things you said have any relevance to eachother. Keep trying...

He's french you know

And that's an interesting question Stern but I don't think it's necessary I honestly believe John Kerry will win the election.

 

[DreamThrall]

I wonder how many people would kill themselves rather than deal with another 4 years of Bush....

 

[ShadowFox]

I wonder how many people would kill themselves rather than deal with another 4 years of Bush....

While it pains me to see the fool, anybody who would resort to such extremes would have some underlying problem to begin with.

 

[Direwolf]

I think pulling the UN into the mess would be disastrous. And I agree...theres not anyone pulling the strings over there at the UN. If there were they'd be much more organized and focused, instead of frequently running around like a chicken with its head cut off.
My opinion on the last election is that it came down to political wrangling, and Bush won at that by a nose. I don't think there was a rightfully elected candidate, and if Gore had taken it the entire right would be throwing around the same accusations.

 

[CptStern]

maybe if most americans voted bush wouldnt have won

some interesting facts around the election:

"57,700 voters were incorrectly listed as felons on a "scrub list" and thus their votes were not counted. (In some cases, the alleged felonies were dated several years after the election and the vast majority of the listed were not felons.) These persons were disproportionately Democrats of African-American and Hispanic descent."

"Some 179,855 ballots were not counted in the official tally. These were ballots which were mistakenly filled out, however, in some counties the voting machines (Accuvotes) would return the ballot and allow voters to try again, whilst in other counties the reject mechanisms were not enabled, thus giving voters only one chance to correctly mark the ballot. As a general trend, reject mechanisms were disabled in disproportionately African-American and Hispanic counties. "

"The result of the Florida U.S. Presidential race was so close that some Democratic Party officials argue that one Florida county's hard-to-use ballot may have unfairly decided the presidency. Critics argue that some voters in Palm Beach County, Fla. might have accidentally voted for Reform Party candidate Pat Buchanan, when they thought they were voting for Al Gore, on a so-called "butterfly ballot". The Democrats are listed second in the left column; but punching a hole in the second circle actually cast a vote for Buchanan. Voters who punched this second hole, however, would have ignored a prominent arrow on the ballot showing which hole was to be punched."


source

 

[Direwolf]

When it comes to technical issues like those, they've always been present. Hell, the upcoming election is going to be full of them thanks to the new evoting machines which have had a terrible track record so far.

 

[gh0st]

this begs the question:

what would the UN be without the US.

 

[CptStern]

more effective

 

[Letters]

Let other countries help run ours? No...

 

[gh0st]

how would it be more effective stern?

 

[CptStern]

well for one thing the UN wouldnt have to fight the US on every issue:

US shields Israel

US vetoes protection for aid workers

US vetos UN peacekeeping in protest of International criminal court

US Vetoes UN Observer Force to Protect Palestinians

 

[gh0st]

yeah the UN wouldent have to fight us. unfortunatly they would lose the capacity to be a world "peacekeeping" organization.

 

[N0N1337H41]

Which also begs the question, should the US be kicked out of the UN? I mean are they assuming that throwing bags of money at something means that international law does not apply to them?

I think that the UN should CERATINLY punish the US for our governments actions. This might send the messege that even though we are capable of picking on a bunch of small countries, these small countries can give us a good swift kick in the ass, too.

Many of my fellow American's are SO cocky, and I think if we were put in our place many people would see that we AREN'T infallible. I love my country, but we're like great brittan was before everyone kicked thier ass and sent them home.

Just my opninon.

 

[Tr0n]

I think that the UN should CERATINLY punish the US for our governments actions.

I don't see that happening anytime soon...Anyways if they wanted to they couldn't do anything.I say we should just leave the UN.

 

[CptStern]

no they wouldnt ...contrary to popular belief the US peacekeeping force is relatively small.

"The principal countries contributing to the UN peacekeeping programmes are Bangladesh, Pakistan, India, Nepal, Nigeria, Ghana, Ethiopia, Kenya, Fiji and Ukraine. Pakistan constitutes about 15%, Bangladesh 14%, Nigeria 8%, India 6%, and Ghana 5%, and Nepal 5%. Ghana’s 2,200 UN peacekeepers constitute about a third of its total troops. "

 

[N0N1337H41]

I don't see that happening anytime soon...Anyways if they wanted to they couldn't do anything.I say we should just leave the UN.

SEE?! Cockiness at it's most extreme. You don't think that if the rest of the nations that make up the UN came together against us that they couldn't do anything? Our lawmakers LOVE people like you.

 

[DarkStar]

I think having the UN come in and observe US elections is a little much. I mean this is the United States of America, not Zaire or some shit. If we can't take care of somthing as simple as an election by ourselves, we're in far more trouble than anyone is admitting.

 

[blahblahblah]

Wow.

I find it offensive that other people think that American's are incompetent. I am sick and tired of hearing from Canadians, UK, and from every other country on the planet saying "I disagree with this, that and the other, and I also think the US is run by big business". I really don't see Canada or the UK really blowing the US away in terms of economics or foreign policy. Maybe you people should worry about your own country rather than caring so much about the United States.

I'm not saying the United States is perfect, but common this is getting ridiculus. The electoral college was established long before the 2000 elections. People can't cry foul, they could have changed it before the 2000 elections. I was even taught in my government class back in 1997 about the problems of the electoral college.

As for the votes, it was a close election. Maybe it is about time people should start caring about voting. Or restrict the people who can vote. I don't care.

As for the UN, I think it is a worthless beaucracy that is designed to create results through inaction. In case you people have forgotten, inaction and appeasement created World War 2.

I think that the UN should CERATINLY punish the US for our governments actions. This might send the messege that even though we are capable of picking on a bunch of small countries, these small countries can give us a good swift kick in the ass, too.

Many of my fellow American's are SO cocky, and I think if we were put in our place many people would see that we AREN'T infallible. I love my country, but we're like great brittan was before everyone kicked thier ass and sent them home.

Just my opninon.

You just proved my point. The UN won't act against violating countries whether it is Iraq or the United States. The UN's version of peace is created by inaction.

In case you haven't figured it out, I am against the UN to observe voting. I will vote against any politician who supports such a measure.

I am sure you would be against the UN observing voting if they wanted to do the same thing to your country to.

 

[CptStern]

it's been suggested the UN observe the election because many people (mostly minorities) were barred from voting (due to technicalities, human error etc)

oh and the UK, canada etc critise the US because the US media wont

 

[Tr0n]

SEE?! Cockiness at it's most extreme. You don't think that if the rest of the nations that make up the UN came together against us that they couldn't do anything? Our lawmakers LOVE people like you.

Yea I am cocky...got a problem bitch?

 

[gh0st]

it's been suggested the UN observe the election because many people (mostly minorities) were barred from voting (due to technicalities, human error etc)

oh and the UK, canada etc critise the US because the US media wont

since when does the UN make less mistakes then the US government? *cough* bosnia *cough*.

if minorities were barred from voting due to "technicalities" what "technicalities" is the UN going to remove? are you now suggesting that theyd change our laws?

 

[CptStern]

congressmen are calling for UN intervention ..not the UN

 

[blahblahblah]

it's been suggested the UN observe the election because many people (mostly minorities) were barred from voting (due to technicalities, human error etc)

oh and the UK, canada etc critise the US because the US media wont

I hear enough criticism from US media thank-you. I live in the freakin country when the 2000 elections happened. Trust me, the US media is, has and will criticize the US groverment. I hear about US soldiers dieing in Iraq everyday of the week on the news. I don't need to hear some the news from somebody from another country saying that the US media can't properly critize the US. The US media has specific nuances about how it does its criticism. Trust me, even the staunchest supporters of Bush have heard about the shortfalls and criticisms as president. It may not be apparent to people in other countries, but it is apparent to people who live in the United States.

As for voting, the voting systems themselves are the problem. That can be fixed by spending money on a new voting system. I was a victim of malfucntioning voting system when my voters registration card incorrectly selected my voting precinct which conflicted with my home address. As a result, neither precinct would let me vote. I spent most of a day getting the situation sorted out. Having the UN observing elections would not solve the problem.

[Edit]: CptStern, your original link doesn't work. Anyways, 9 congressmen is nothing. I'm sure you can easily get more congressman to support taking over some random country (like Canada ) than having the UN come in and observe the elections.

[Edit 2]: In case you can't tell, this topic really steams me. Maybe because I am a cocky American. Or I have pride for my country. Or I hate the UN. Take your pick.