Commencez le cirque!
The UN General Debate began today, with all the motorcades, Secret Service, media vans, NYPD, diplomats and general bedlam that implies. First Avenue is completely blocked from sight by NYPD sport utility vehicles lined end-to-end on both sides. Small NYPD trailers are posted at 50 ft. intervals, ready to unload their shotguns and automatic weapons at the first sign of need. Snipers patrol the roofs, helicopters whir overhead, suited men with coiled cords behind their ears stand impassively at strategic intervals, and the sidewalks are populated with enough police officers to fill Giants Stadium.
It’s all such a peacock parade. I counted no fewer than 18 NYPD motorcycles preceding the black SUVs of the American Presidential motorcade. If that isn’t a giant Presidential phallus, I don’t know what is. The message is clear: he who has the biggest rack is the Alpha Male in this herd.
Once I had gathered the innumerable badges I required to get onto the premises, I went to watch Kofi Annan deliver his final speech as SG, followed by Lula (bless his socialist heart), Dubya and the snooze-inducing Thabo Mbeki of South Africa. (Thabo – you need to look up, dude. Nobody listens to somebody who won’t even look at them!)
Bush was different than I have seen him in past years. Gone was the smug smile, the “don’t-you-get-it-stupid” nod he has become so famous for. Maybe I’m imagining it, but he seemed… almost desperate somehow. He wanted so badly to overcome the antipathy in the room and make the assembled Heads of State see that he was right. The swagger seemed to have gone.
Of course, that didn’t stop him from using gratuitous phrases like “the enemies of humanity”, “the great ideological struggle”, and so forth. His entire speech was about freedom in the Middle East, although he did take a moment to announce the appointment of a Special Envoy for Darfur – a major victory for those who want the US to increase its pressure on Sudan to allow peacekeepers in.
On the subject of Darfur, a couple of interesting newspaper articles, the first from the UK’s Guardian and the second from the Washington Post. Worth reading, if you’re even marginally interested in the subject.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,,1875702,00.html
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/09/18/AR2006091801030.html
posted by E @ 2:16 PM
4 Comments:
Did you see Chavez give his speech wherein he -- apparently -- called Bush the devil at least 8 times?
"Still smells like sulfur up here."
Hee! :)
Cheers
I didn't attend that particular speech, but I do have a copy of the statement, if you're interested. It's pretty funny.
For my crazy dictator intake, I chose to watch Robert Mugabe. May I say how very strange it is to be 5 feet away from a mass murderer? After the speech I happened to bump into his retinue outside the chamber. There were a bunch of sycophantic well-wishers there waiting to shake his hand. I could have joined them, and there was a kind of car-crash rubbernecking appeal to the notion of having shaken hands with him. But in the end I didn't. I mean, what the hell would I have said?! "You may be a murdering bastard who has driven his country into the ground, but I thought your speech was wicked cool."
Sure -- I'd love the complete statement.
It seems that news coverage of it is spotty and sketchy at best.
Not that that's a surprise.
Cheers
You can watch the webcast here:
http://www.un.org/webcast/ga/61/gastatement20.shtml
It's actually possible to hear the translator trying not to laugh, which is really unusual.
He did not read much from his prepared statement, so protocol has not put it up on the website yet. But I can email you a transcript.
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