tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-466263122785740606.post7100506788756388885..comments2009-05-13T21:14:16.528-04:00Eyck Freymannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18346193488247699426noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-466263122785740606.post-79179976227462708602009-05-13T21:14:00.000-04:002009-05-13T21:14:00.000-04:00@ Sectori:<br /><br />"Ipsos" is a word added in the original Latin purely for emphasis. Most of the time, forms of ipse/a/um are used for this purpose alone and are commonly ellipsed. Seeing that it is a grammatically unnecessary part of the sentence, I don't see why it needs to be retained. I have a personal beef with this pronoun: the "he himself..." construction used in Latin prose annoys me greatly.<br /><br />The veto power is indeed a holdover from the post-WWII world order. But, as should be clear, it is not likely that the countries with veto power will vote <I>unanimously</I> to cede their veto power.<br /><br />One of the many reasons why the UN accomplishes very little. If the world wants to reap the tangible benefits of having such an international agency, they must decide to endow it with both disciplinary power and sufficient funds. Post coming soon on the need for an overhaul of our international institutions.Eyck Freymannhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18346193488247699426noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-466263122785740606.post-73584919897160338972009-05-12T22:49:00.000-04:002009-05-12T22:49:00.000-04:00*<I>quis custodiet ipsos custodes</I> is the usual Latin. At any rate, yes. This is both a great weakness of the UN and a great strength. On the one hand, it is bizarre and leads to such incongruities as North Korea being on the Disarmament and International Security committee. To a certain extent it can lead the UN to hypocrisy (it's worth noting, though, that "do as I say, not as I do" is a legitimate point; doing otherwise is an <I>ad hominem</I> circumstantial). On the other hand, the UN's ability to actually represent every single recognized governments (± observer states) is one of its great strengths, in that the UN can fairly legitimately claim to be universally representative.<br /><br />On the subject of the UN, one important issue of UN reform that never comes up (to my mind more important than many others): the veto power of the permanent members of the Security Council. It shouldn't exist. It's a holdover from the idea of the global policemen, and it reeks of imperialism. It also messes things up for everyone. However representative the UN may be, it can only truly claim to speak for the world's governments when the veto-empowered states lose the ability to overrule the rest of the world.Sectorihttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08798662855145544507noreply@blogger.com