Posted on by Nathan Riley

World Government Could Prevent War in the Middle East

During my college years I concluded that in Vietnam the United States was the bad guy. I still believe that.

The October 7th massacres in Israel ironically happened in areas well known as centers of support for those Israelis working to improve relations between Israel and Palestine.

Current standards in international affairs give Israel, the victim, free rein to punish its attackers.

The wisdom of this arrangement is doubtful. If my sister is attacked the law stops me from punishing the attacker. A neutral party, the police, investigates, and their findings are reviewed by lawyers and judges. The victim may be heard but is sidelined.

That didn’t happen in Gaza, Israel, the victim, imposed the punishment. The Israeli Defense Forces were told to meet violence with violence and punish Hamas, designated an Iranian proxy.

Almost simultaneously, it came to light that Israel had sent millions to Hamas. A finding contradicting the notion that Hamas is an Iranian proxy.

There is no world government to investigate this complicated relationship. Israel controlled the facts and determined the punishment without any neutral investigators intervening. Well-organized groups in the United States prevailed on the President and Congress to assist Israel’s war against Hamas, as if Hamas were a sovereign nation, and Israel’s conclusion that war against this group was the best course of action.

A world government would have prevented Israel from striking back and from deciding the facts and imposing the punishment.

“Draconian” does not do justice to Israel’s conclusion. As a secular Jew I keep silencing the voices in my head saying Israel is proposing a final solution, or, as the Israeli Defense Minister promised, “to remove the evil threats against us.” They are using violence to destroy Hamas. This war aim makes peace doubtful; Hamas is in a fight to the death.

In turn, Israel, like the United States in Vietnam, becomes the bad guy. Israel is way more powerful than the Palestinians, just as the U.S. was over Vietnam. Using bullets, however, brings unpredictable results—the U.S. was forced out of Vietnam.

A simple empirical test will help clarify the reason Israel has decided to punish all Palestinians for the acts of Hamas. When the fighting stops, will the Palestinians return to their homes or will Israelis live in what used to be Gaza?

Posted on by Nathan Riley

Obstacles to World Government

The rising death toll in Gaza should be linked to the tens of thousands of deaths in Ukraine. By the time the United States left Afghanistan, starvation had become a problem for the supposed victors of the invasion following the September 11th attacks on the World Trade Center.

Syria and Iraq and various states in Africa confront persistent violence.

In my last blog, I argued that world government was the best way to end the constant eruption of wars.

A major reward of turning the United Nations into a world government is historical greatness. The change is as drastic as going from the Articles of Confederation to the Constitution of 1787. From a system of voluntary cooperation to the establishment of a central government that had overall responsibility for preserving the peace of the new nation.

This has proved a daunting task: ending slavery with a bloody civil war demonstrates that the founders’ solution was far from perfect. Nonetheless, students of history still recognize the great achievements of Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, to name just a few of the historically great leaders who turned victory over Great Britain into a system of united states.

Creating a world government would be just as great a historical achievement as turning the revolutionary victory into a permanent government. If you want the world to remember you for generations then you want to become a patriot establishing a functioning world government.

Overcoming the obstacles to world government will mark you as a great person, a maker of history. In this blog, we will look at what happens to U.S. power if the United Nations becomes the seat of world government.

Stated baldly, this means the United States and presumably its allies cannot go to war without the permission of the United Nations.

World government requires that before a nation can turn to mass violence it must first make its case to the lawyers and diplomats at the U.N. This system of resolving conflict is well established in the United States. Our courts are respected and there are dozens of ways that grievances can be heard without resort to violence.

Transferring this system to the United States and the world would be a stupendous achievement. To take the example of Palestine, Israeli soldiers would no longer occupy this country. Creating a safe border between Israel and Palestine would be the responsibility of the United Nations. U.N. soldiers would have the task of preserving peace along the borders between these two nations.

Recruiting troops and their supplies is expensive. If the U.N. had the taxing power to pay for an international police force, then presumably the United States would provide the cash and presumably have influence over final decisions.

Or an even more dramatic change, the U.N. has the power to directly impose taxes. The United States was broke under the voluntary system of the Articles of Confederation. Washington, Hamilton, and numerous generals constantly begged for money to buy supplies.

In the end, the United States depended on loans from European nations. Under the Constitution of 1787, the new central government was guaranteed the opportunity to raise funds, especially through the tariff and selling U.S. bonds. Revenue came from taxes and borrowing.

Making the U.N. the world government would require that it could raise billions of dollars every year.

The political problem is sovereignty or who runs the show. Right now the United States funds the U.N., but with world government it’s entirely plausible that the United States, China, Russia etc. would depend on U.N. funding.

The justification for this dramatic change in power is peace. In return for making every country, big and small, dependent on the U.N. these nations obtain the right to bring their complaints to U.N. agencies. The arguments would be settled by quasi-judicial rulings, without bullets or bombs.

What appears to be a loss of power by the United States becomes a boon to the people of the world. The risks of invasion, war, and tribal conflicts become minimized if the U.N. has the soldiers to stop another country from going to war.

Undoubtedly a major source of U.N. troops would be American soldiers who volunteered to serve as U.N. enforcers. Even with their sworn allegiance to the U.N., U.S. soldiers are unlikely to attack the United States. Thus the safety of the population of the United States can be assured. Similar considerations can be made for other large nations.

Taxes and soldiers, international cooperation to confront climate change, and using world wealth to build hospitals and schools in impoverished nations would clearly benefit from world government.

It is likely that world government would create tens of thousands of projects that would improve living conditions and put the world on the path to growth and prosperity.

Posted on by Nathan Riley

World Government Could Prevent Palestinian Crisis

No matter what happens. Freedom Democrats will grapple with the U.S./Israel invasion of Palestine.

As I write this, police across the nation are arresting protestors angered by the displacement of the Palestinians in Gaza. As you read this, it is clear I am no friend of the Israeli counterattack following the mysterious October 7th massacre by Hamas. I am no expert on the Middle East, and the U.N., which possesses such skills, is being ignored. My gut feeling is that when Israel has moved the Palestinian population Israel will move and rebuild the destroyed neighborhoods in Gaza. With this big difference, Israelis will replace the Palestinians.

My conclusion sees this conflict as a real estate deal. The Palestinians are being replaced, just as settlers replaced the American Indians.

This affects Freedom Democrats because although it is still early in this conflict, it appears that the Democratic coalition could split. The Vietnam War tore apart the Democratic Party and ended the Roosevelt coalition that started during the Great Depression in 1932. The split over Vietnam followed a split between Segregation Democrats and the progressive forces demanding that racial distinctions end and that the U.S. integrate everybody regardless of skin color. In the long aftermath following the Warren Court striking down school segregation and the passage of Civil Rights legislation, the Democrats lost the South. It became Republican, and the Democratic party gained support in the Black and Hispanic communities. Democratic hawks and peaceniks learned how to work together.

Right now, it appears that the Democrats will split over Palestine just before the election in November. Freedom Democrats, like all voters, will have to decide whether to stay loyal to President Joseph Biden, with Donald Trump as the alternative. Their other choices are staying home or hoping that Cornel West will get on the ballot. None of this is good news for Democrats.

The point is that Freedom Democrats would have serious decisions to make and be able to enter into conversations with thoughtful people. It would be a way to expand contacts and win converts.

My perspective is radical. The 250th anniversary of the American Revolution is two years away, and founders like Alexander Hamilton, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, and the dozens of other people who created the first European style government without a hereditary ruler are still celebrated. The American colonists who created first the Confederacy and then drafted the Constitution of 1787 devised a system of term limits. Members of the House of Representatives would need majority approval every two years, Senators every six years, and the President every four years. In Europe, many of these positions were inherited, but the U.S. rejected this approach. The leaders of the new nation would be selected by majority rule.

Over the decades, the system has changed dramatically, but the founders of the United States are still prominent figures.

I believe it is time we find new heroes that will make the United Nations a global government. This is a daunting task. If the U.N. is the world sovereign, then the United States government becomes subordinate to this world government. A prospect guaranteed to generate hostility in the United States.

The advantage of making the U.N. sovereign is that member nations would have to hire lawyers to settle their disputes. If Vladimir Putin feels threatened by the changes in Ukraine, he can start a legal action. The United States and Ukraine would, under international law, be compelled to respond.

This is only possible if the U.N. has the troops to enforce its orders. Russia, the United States, and Ukraine lose their ability to ignore U.N. decisions. Member nations, including the U.S., must agree that their troops will be commanded by the U.N.

This is a huge step. But it holds out the promise that missiles and bullets will stop being a way to settle international disputes.

A major and immediate task of the U.N. is to protect people from being removed from their homes. Whether it’s drought, tribal hostilities, or the hope of living better in a rich country, people should not be forced to leave their homes.

The U.N. must have the funds and expertise to create stability in nations all over the world.

The people who do this will become as famous as George Washington and Benjamin Franklin. The reward for the creators of this new world will be that their fame lasts generation after generation.

If the U.N. were running the show, the Israelis would not be able to invade Palestine, and Hamas would be hunted by U.N. police. Their object wouldn’t be to kill Hamas or eliminate it as the Israelis wish. They would have a more reasonable goal: arrest and trial.

In short, giving the U.N. sovereign power would allow lawyers and diplomats, rather than soldiers and drones, to solve problems.