Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
My friends.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
The next story of the day is the fact that
we went into Venezuela and arrested wanted criminal, allegedly Nicholas Maduro,
president of and I'm not gonna call him psident anymore.
I'm gonna call him dictator of Venezuela because there was
recently an election and after promising, Oh, you guys may
have forgotten this. But Biden, when he was in office,
(00:27):
this is the Biden foreign policy versus the Donald Trump
forne policy. When Biden was in office, he actually offered
to reduce the sanctions, eliminate the sanctions on Venezuela if
they would commit to free and fair elections, and then
they didn't and he released the sanctions anyway. But talking
about international law with us today, as my friend from
(00:48):
hot air dot com, David Strom, who wrote a scorcher
of a column today, the headline I think says it
all international law. Really you're going with that now, David,
I've never asked you this before. Do you get to
write your own headlines?
Speaker 1 (01:05):
I do, and I'm generally quite bad at it.
Speaker 2 (01:07):
Oh I love that.
Speaker 3 (01:10):
Yeah, I actually have a colleague be's well born who
it makes me look like I have no stark at all,
and she comes up with the best headlines. In fact,
I've offered her several times money to write my headlines
and she says, no, this is my superpala.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Well, I don't know if you know this, but I
am an extremely good headline writer. So I have a
great deal of appreciation. One of my goals in life
for a long time was to be a headline writer
for the New York Post. And obviously I'm not doing
that because I don't work in that field at all,
but I feel it's a gift of mine if you
ever need any help. Let's get to the column before
we run out of time. Kibbittzing, you are writing about
(01:54):
one of the objections that I'm hearing from some on
the left, and that is this the violation of international law.
How absurd is that?
Speaker 1 (02:06):
And why.
Speaker 3 (02:08):
Well to say that it's absurd, it's just way too
kind to the whole idea of international lawn. All you
need to know about international law can be boiled down
to can you hear me?
Speaker 2 (02:29):
No, I know, I'm sorry. I'm having a very bad
headphone problem right now. It sounds like the predator is
in my headphones. So David I'm going to do this
very quickly. It's live radio, so hang in there. Don't
try this at home. I'm gonna go plug my headphones
into another headphone jack and see if that works. So
just bear with me, David Vamp for a moment. Give
me a little bit more for like thirty more seconds
(02:50):
on how the notion that international law could even exist
in a country that has gotten rid of the rule
of law. Let's do that one.
Speaker 3 (02:59):
Yeah, well, all you need to know about international law
can be boiled down to the fact that right now,
the president of the United Nations Security Council, which is
theoretically in charge of making sure that the world is
safe for democracy, is Somalia, and that the Somalian ambassador
(03:23):
to the United Nations actually owns a healthcare company in Ohio.
All right, So, I mean, you know, when somebody comes
out and says, well, you violated international law and the
United Nations is very worried about this, it's like the
President of the UN Security Council is a Tamali scammer. Yeah,
(03:44):
it's tripping off the American taxpayers. I mean, it's the
most ridiculous idea. I mean, laws require a sovereign if
you do not have a sovereign then it's pointless to
talk about the law.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
And as a practical matter.
Speaker 3 (04:04):
The law is the law of the jungle. It's the
state of nature among I mean to give you put
this in another perspective. You can read The Atlantic, the
oldest magazine in the United States of America, one of
the most prestigious magazines in the world, and they actually
(04:26):
had an article that argued that, well, now that Trump
has done this, Jijingping and Vladimir Putin will no longer
obey international law. It's like, oh, yeah, they've been they've
been great up to now.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
I mean, nately, David, it comes down to nations like Russia,
nations like you know, China, and frankly, nations like the
United States are going to do exactly what they know
they can get away with.
Speaker 3 (04:54):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
And that's the ultimate sort of revelation that we all
need to have a bigger conversation. The notion that there
is anybody that is going to, i mean, outside of
the Hague when you have a trial for war crimes
and things of that nature. That's one thing, But the
reality is is that the Hague is not going to
indict the entire country of the United States of America.
(05:15):
It's not going to happen. They're not going to indict China, right,
So it gets really hard to argue.
Speaker 1 (05:21):
That there's signatories.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
Oh, I didn't know that. Oh yeah, no.
Speaker 3 (05:26):
And in fact, there is a law on the books
in the United States of America, passed it by bipartisan fashion,
that says that if any American ever gets arrested by
the International Criminal Court, we will invade and take them.
We do not recognize the International Criminal Court.
Speaker 1 (05:48):
It would be a violation of our sovereignty.
Speaker 3 (05:54):
And I forget what it's called it maybe something, you know,
it's loqually known as invade the Hague law.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
You know, you know, I don't mind the notion, like
I would love it if the United Nations functioned in
that actual fashion. But to your point, when you have
a Somalian scammer from one of the most corrupt countries
in the world sitting at the head of the Security Council,
it really undermines your ability to have faith in that institution.
(06:27):
And the reality is is that the United Nations would
only work in my mind, if it was based on
Western values, right.
Speaker 4 (06:35):
Well, exactly, And you know, there is something that's kind
of a parallel to international law, which is agreements among
free nations, or even just agreements among nations, where you know,
we like to have rules of the road so that
we know what can be done in order to avoid
(06:57):
unnecessary conflicts.
Speaker 1 (06:59):
Not necessary, they're.
Speaker 3 (07:01):
Just times when our interests are fundamentally at odds with
the interests of another country, and when that happens, we
decide to go it alone.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
And that's the way that it works.
Speaker 3 (07:14):
And so you'll get these sort of illusions like when
you know, the Korean War or the First Iraq War,
where the United Nations will back something, but that's entirely
based upon interests and what's happening. There is a lot
(07:35):
of stuff happens behind the scenes where people come to
various agreements. So we have laws of the sea what
can be done. But that's really no different than a
business arrangement that people have. You and I make a contract.
You know, you provide this to me, I'll provide that
(07:56):
to you. That's what international law in a practice senses,
And when you're dealing with the fuivelent of an international scammer,
you deal with them on that basis. I mean, you know,
do you think that Vladimir Putin was worried about international
law when he invaded the Ukraine.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
I mean it's absurd.
Speaker 2 (08:18):
Well, I mean there's you can we can sit here
all day. We could talk about smally pirates, we could
talk about Yemen firing on ships in the in the Mediterranean.
I mean, there's there's all of these various violations of
international law going on on a daily basis. But as
long as they are perceived to be oppressed nations, even
if they're oppressing themselves, only we are to be able
(08:39):
to account well exactly.
Speaker 1 (08:42):
I mean, you know, we have.
Speaker 3 (08:45):
You know, we like to talk about law, and we
should like to talk about law, because that's how you
have the development of civilized societies, economies that work. I mean,
you look at lawless places, they don't.
Speaker 1 (08:58):
Work, right.
Speaker 3 (08:59):
But you know, in the real world, you know, MAO
said it power comes out of the barrel of a gun,
and that's even true in societies like ours. I mean,
if you look, I mean, we had laws on the
book saying that you could not cross the American border
(09:20):
and stay here. But when uh, the federal government decided
to open the borders, they were violating. You know, all
these people were violating the law, but since no one
enforced it, it really meant nothing. And now that Trump
is enforcing the law, it means something.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
It really is underneath it all force. And you know
that doesn't mean that you shouldn't.
Speaker 3 (09:46):
Strive to have something like law to constrain force. But
you know, anyone who doesn't pay their taxes knows that.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
You know, if you push it far enough, you can
wind up in jail.
Speaker 3 (10:00):
I mean, one of the most heavily armed groups in
the entire world is the American IRS.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
And there's a reason for that.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
David Strom's column you can read it at hot air
dot com Today, I linked to it on the blog
I joy to see you in. Happy New Year to you, David.
Speaker 1 (10:18):
Happy New Year to you.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
Whoa wow, Oh geez, I don't know what just happened.
I think I ended a meeting accidentally.
Speaker 1 (10:24):
No, wait, what what's up?
Speaker 2 (10:26):
Okay, we'll be right back.