Letters to the Editor
Gwool
Published Letters: 353 Editor's Choice: 40
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Style Over Substance
[Read the article: Revoltin' Bolton]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]So Bolton is an unmade bed and he is gruff. So what?
The UN indeed needs shaking up. It is, as another wrote, highly ineffectual. In trying to learn more about what the heck is going on in Lebanon, it appears we have UN peacekeeping forces stationed there. Hezbollah sets up near them, with the UN forces instructed not to fire upon them unless fired upon first, which Hezbollah won't do. So the UN forces, in essence, wind up as human shields for these folks when they choose to fire missiles at Israel. If any come back and hit the UN forces, then Israel is the big meanie.
What the hell is the point to that?
I had optimism the UN would gain effectiveness in the aftermath of Iraq I. Sadly, it was simply that Iraq I was a no brainer. Sovereign nation 1 attacks Sovereign nation 2 which, in turns, seeks assistance from others.
So we got the coalition and we went in and aided Kuwait. In exchange for stopping (and for which some criticized Bush I for "not finishing the job") we set conditions regarding no fire zones, weapons inspections, and oil-for-food.
Then we sat around while the various conditions were violated and skirted repeatedly for over a decade without being able to get the UN off its ass to enforce its own conditions. Concurrent with that the international community sat on its hands way too long in Kosovo. Folks like to look at the success from the bombing forward forgetting the horific genocide just prior.
By the time the UN will act it's too late. It's like a stage 3 lung cancer patient finally deciding to give up the butts. So what if Bolton holds the organization in contempt. It deserves to be held in contempt. The point is not to simply make nice and socialize while allowing them to do nothing. If we truly want an effective international organization, then we need to shake it up and make it effective. It needs to move faster. It needs more conviction. When it comes to stamping out aggression and the like, it is ridiculously ineffective. We can distribute UNICEF boxes much cheaper. We might even be able to find some folks with some cajones to get to get the food to African refugees rather than stockpiled by warlords.
I want to see an effective international governing body. This one ain't it. It's incredibly angering, disheartening, and depressing to see the way in which the organization fritters while people suffer. Hell, I could even handle the rampant corruption in the oil for food program if the damn organization kept the peace. I mean urban neighborhoods tolerated the mafia because they got protection. These dolts only pilfer.
So we unleashed the hounds on these misguided dilettantes. Good. Let'em wake up and call for action and maybe we can put in a better dressed, more civil participant. For now we need to get these fools' attention that we're serious as to our displeasure. Subtlety hasn't worked.
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Negotiating the Rules of Engagement
[Read the article: We've got an anger management problem]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Knowing how to argue with one another can take a couple quite a while to figure out. I have been married for 23 years and still have difficulty getting it right.
We come at it from the opposite angle here. My wife came from a family where he or she who shouted the loudest won the argument. In my family you needled one another and he or she who lost their composure and shouted lost. This could be because my wife is the youngest or 4 and only daughter. Her three older brothers used to go at it hammer and tong and still have trouble playing nice with one another for more than a few days.
I was the youngest by a large gap and had an older brother and sister. Given they were of different sexes, the arguments never turned physical. Hence why mouthiness was the way to go.
My wife thinks yelling and raging is good. You get it out of your system and get on with it. So she will say all sorts of things at a decible level that forestalls interruption and then be calm again an hour or so later as if all is over.
I, on the other hand, will stew about that which was said in the rage for quite a while and simply prefer not to discuss matters until such time as I can do so without screaming and yelling.
I still remember the first time I yelled back. We were driving on a main drag in the run down section of Boston in which we lived starting out. She was screaming into my ear in a manner which I can still not tolerate. I calmly downshifted the car, shifted in my seat to get closer to her, and screamed in her ear coming up for several breaths in this 15 to 20 second interlude. I then yelled "are you happy now? I now yell and argue like you? Is this what you want?"
She very calmly looked at me and said, "You don't have to raise your voice."
In short we traded places on the sweltery day in dirty Dot for a brief period of time.
So, when we argue, I will get nasty, and she will ask me to minimize the barbs. She will be compelled to yell, and I will calmly ask her not to raise her voice and use that tone.
It doesn't work. We have assumed the worst of both approaches, needling each other at the top of our lungs at times.
Hell, maybe I need to right a letter to Cary opening my kimono and whining about this subject, too.
How you argue/fight is largely going to be a product of your environment. We came from two vastly different -- albeit equally dysfunctional -- environments and have created a third that would give the other two a run for their money in the dysfunction department.
Families: they put the "fun" in dysfunction.