It is nice to see a mainstream pundit push back against the administration dismissal of objections as "black helicopter" nonsense:
There they go again. Like those who say climate change is an emergency too obvious and urgent to allow for debate, some proponents of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, a.k.a. the Law of the Sea Treaty (LOST), say arguments against it are nonexistent. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton says any such arguments “no longer exist and truly cannot even be taken with a straight face.” Favoring condescension over persuasion, she ridicules people who she says think that, because the treaty was negotiated under U.N. auspices, “the black helicopters are on their way.”
Clinton’s insufferable tone is not a reason for the necessary 34 senators to reject ratification. It is, however, a reason for enjoying their doing so.
LOST, approval of which is supposedly somehow suddenly imperative, emerged from the mists of U.N. deliberations that began in the 1950s. The result, three generations later, is pernicious when it is not superfluous.
I really liked that part about being a reason to enjoy Senate rejection. I really find it offensive that Clinton belittled objections to a treaty we've gotten along without joining for decades now. I don't believe in the nearly decade of writing The Dignified Rant that anyone can point to even hints of black helicopter thinking on this site. Indeed, in my job I had the duty of responding to various conspiracy questions and had my own "X-Files" folder where I stored this work. So I fully understand--and resent--the accusation of lunacy that Secretary Clinton has leveled.
Sea rights have a long history without LOST. We don't need to join this treaty to exercise diplomacy on sea rights. We ultimately need a strong Navy to defend our interpretation of sea rights. LOST hasn't prevented crises among those who have already signed it.
And it just sends money to Third World despots and UN apparatchiki who will squander it when they don't use it against us.
The timing of this administration is fascinating. Pile up debt at record rates and choose this time to give away potential revenue streams like money isn't important to us.
Do read it all.
And hope that our Senate has the sense God gave mossy rocks to reject LOST.
