Clientitis at the U.S. Mission to the United Nations?

Brett Schaefer / February 15, 2011

Ambassador Susan Rice, the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, gave the first of a series of scheduled speeches last week in Portland, Oregon. The focus of the speeches is “Why America Needs the UN” and was inspired, apparently, by congressional efforts to include U.S. payments to the U.N. among efforts to cut the U.S. budget deficit.

Her speech was dominated by unstinting praise for the U.N. and arguments intended to instill that viewpoint in her audience. Describing it as hagiographic would be going too far, perhaps, but not by much. Rice acknowledged some of the problems of the U.N., including its poor management, its anti-Israel bias, and its inability to punish peacekeepers who commit rape or other criminal acts. She argued that the U.S. is tirelessly trying to address these problems and provided a few tepid examples of the Administration’s successes. But throughout the speech was an unambiguous message that the U.N.’s foibles were an acceptable cost in exchange for the good done by the organization: (more…)