Our Honored Guests
Kelly spotted an article on diplomatic immunity in Reader's Digest. It's not entirely shocking to learn that many "diplomats" abuse the privilege in extreme ways: tax evasion, slavery, drug smuggling, child enticement, and even rape. It's just disturbing that no one can find a way to deal with the problem.
We allow diplomatic immunity to guests from other countries in exchange for the same protection for our representatives. This creates a catch-22 scenario, a potential for retaliation and an end to diplomatic relations, if we act against a foreign representative.
One would hope that an agent of another government, who is treated as if he is on his home soil, would still be subject to the laws of his homeland. But, that just doesn't happen. Some of these diplomats get away with drug smuggling and violent crimes that are quite clearly illegal almost anywhere. They return home and aren't prosecuted.
The Reader's Digest article also states that our own diplomats aren't always on their best behavior. Somehow I doubt that our representatives could rack up $18 million in parking fines or smuggle pornography into Turkey without it turning into an international incident.
The fact of the matter is that different standards will always be applied to the United States and other world powers. If we want to maintain a dialogue with crooked third-world governments, we need to play by their rules. That means we have to accept the losers they send for us to deal with and there's not much we can do about it. I don't know what to say, other than it's just plain frustrating.
We allow diplomatic immunity to guests from other countries in exchange for the same protection for our representatives. This creates a catch-22 scenario, a potential for retaliation and an end to diplomatic relations, if we act against a foreign representative.
One would hope that an agent of another government, who is treated as if he is on his home soil, would still be subject to the laws of his homeland. But, that just doesn't happen. Some of these diplomats get away with drug smuggling and violent crimes that are quite clearly illegal almost anywhere. They return home and aren't prosecuted.
The Reader's Digest article also states that our own diplomats aren't always on their best behavior. Somehow I doubt that our representatives could rack up $18 million in parking fines or smuggle pornography into Turkey without it turning into an international incident.
The fact of the matter is that different standards will always be applied to the United States and other world powers. If we want to maintain a dialogue with crooked third-world governments, we need to play by their rules. That means we have to accept the losers they send for us to deal with and there's not much we can do about it. I don't know what to say, other than it's just plain frustrating.
2 Amendments:
If you liked the behavioral self-evaluation forms, you might enjoy my stories on diplomatic immunity. Cuz I've got first-hand experience. About 21 years of it.
That's why the world's diplomats want to keep the U.N. in New York. They can wreak havoc there without any sort of punishment---and over the years they have done so, gotten away with it, and so every year it gets worse.
The U.N. was started with about 45 fairly civilized countries. Since then it has grown to about 150 countries, most of which are fairly "uncivilized" and have no clue about diplomatic decorum.
So we need to get rid of them on our soil. We can begin with them and then tackle the rest.
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