Is Loss of U.N. Seats a Message to U.S.?

It seems that the Bush administration promises a new era of decline in U.S. global power. By apparently abandoning the Korean negotiations, the Kyoto treaty and the ABM treaty; by keeping a low profile with respect to the Israeli-Palestinian and other global conflicts; by shunning China at every turn, President Bush is demonstrating our arrogance and sending isolationist and unilateralist signals to our allies.

The president has it all wrong. In today’s world, we do not gain power by standing alone in strength. We gain power by standing united in compromise.

Eric R. Crowther

Los Angeles

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Re “U.S. Has Lost Not 1 but 2 Seats on Key U.N. Panels,” May 8:

Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright attributes the expulsion of the U.S. from two United Nations panels to “several unilateral moves the United States has taken recently.” She is in denial, for the resentment felt around the world of U.S. policies and actions did not build up in the 110 days Bush has been in office. It has built up over time, over arrogant and uninformed policies she was instrumental in making.

Bassim Shawaf

Los Angeles

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Washington expressed shock at not getting a seat on the U.N. Human Rights Commission (May 5). Perhaps other countries did not like being lectured on human rights by a country that has never signed the U.N. Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Jim Goodenough

Canoga Park

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After 54 years, the U.S. was booted off the U.N. Human Rights Commission, and Sudan, where human beings are sold as slaves, was elected to a seat at the table populated by such countries as: Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Libya, Sierra Leone, China, Uganda, Vietnam and Togo, human-rights violators all. If this scenario weren’t so deadly serious, it would be downright ludicrous.

Jessie G. DeMassa

Huntington Beach

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