United Nations, New York

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The question posed by Professor James Burnham of blessed memory in a 1965 number of National Review was typical:

Why in the name of minimal common sense does our government allow itself to be denounced, vilified and lied about day after day in the halls of the United Nations by a mob of terrorists, savages, revolutionaries, bankrupts, demagogues, voluptuaries and half-educated opportunists masquerading as representatives of newborn sovereign nations?

The word “savages” is no longer welcome at the National Review; otherwise, Burnham’s query could have been posted at The Corner this morning.

Again, that’s the trouble.

Who’d have believed that of all the scourges tormenting mid-century Birchers and Buckleys, the Soviet Union would be the one that’s more or less extinct, but that damn UN would still be around?

Decades of “right wing” sound and fury, signifying diddly squat, in Turtle Bay terms.

As I’ve noted before: Besides Mecca, UN headquarters is the only famous landmark that is never destroyed in disaster, monster, or alien-invasion movies. Only two rarely seen B movies have dared to target the thing: a massive mutant vulture bites off the roof in The Giant Claw, and the titular Colossus of New York goes on an all-too-brief murderous rampage in the lobby, beneath the “Isaiah Wall,” which, contrary to popular belief, doesn’t actually exist. Phew!

Both films came out in the 1950s. The UN has not even been in imaginary jeopardy since the Eisenhower Administration, let alone in any danger of real-life demolition. We just bitch about it, like the weather.

Funny: At least our progressive enemies think they can do something about the weather, as stupid as that sounds. Right-wingers, as usual, seem content (if that’s the word) to do nothing more than moan about an institution we keep insisting is practically satanic.

Anyway, I’m obliged to sign off. My neighbors give me dirty looks if I leave the decorative mosquito netting up after the first of November.