ceddeeoo Wrote:
U.N. delegates are a different the politicians however since they actually advocate human rights and frown upon the infringement of countries' sovereignties,...

The UN is just an arm of US foreign policy, you can't do squat in the UN without the US agreeing. I'm not only talking about the voting system in the Security Council, you should see what happens 'behind the scenes'. The US is the empire of this age, just like the Roman Empire was at one point. You could compare the current world system, with the UN and NATO (dominated by the US) with the Metternich system of the Austrian Empire.
It may be fucked up that it is all this calculated and cold but that's just the way it is. I'd rather live in a world dominated by the US than in one dominated by Saudi Arabia, but that's just maybe because I live in Belgium and the 'US collateral damage' doesn't affect me.

ceddeeoo Wrote:
...in moments that need decisions and immediate action, such the Rwanda conflict when the UN did not even budge a little finger despite various first hand reports and sources of the genocide taking place.

Don't know, is a strong military involvement the best option in those cases? Half warm commitments like in Rwanda or Bosnia (Srebrenica) are a terrible option. If you don't have a strong mandate, your opponents will know and exploit that and it usually makes things worse (think about Syria). On the other hand you could commit yourself to a big military operation. But are you gonna put out every fire in the world (Darfur, Congo, Rwanda, Yugoslavia,...) with an operation that costs a lot of money, effort and lives? Are you gonna free every country of its oppressive leaders (too much to name) ? It just doesn't seem possible. Those politicians are not 'pure evil', most of them care (there are exceptions), but they can only commit to 'save people' when their country has something to gain as well.

That fact is that the US got involved in Yugoslavia because it was an opportunity to get influence in that area, after years of domination of the USSR. Russia was weak in that area in the 90's so they took the chance.
They didn't get involved in Darfur because it was something they saw as too risky with few advantages.
Etc, etc...


And about Ron Paul's foreign policy ideas. His ideas about a defensive postion for the US are a big break with current policy. The US tried that after WWI. What happened? End thirties Germany and Japan were on the brink of 'taking over the world', and the US got involved. If the US would abbandon its involvement in the Western Pacific and the Middle East, there are other countries ready to take its place. And believe me, human rights won't be their first priority. Would the US like to lose its number one position and get pushed around on several issues? I'd like to see that.

Don't get me wrong, excesses must be strongly criticised, otherwise power rolls over everyone. But it's not as simple as it seems.