Word: argumentative
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...conservative argument against the U.N. is similarly radical. It conforms, strangely, to the central assumption that the U.N. has failed as an agency of global governance. The Security Council is too structurally obtuse to make war, prevent war or even to enforce its own resolutions. The paralysis of the Soviet era has been succeeded by a tyranny of the irrelevant - with France, and its anachronistic veto, as Exhibit A. There is, of course, a fair amount of truth to this: the U.N.'s performance in Bosnia and nonperformance in Rwanda were disgraceful (although the U.S. had a hand...
...Unfortunately, the case for the U.N. is relentlessly pragmatic. The threshold argument is as compelling as tapioca: it exists. You can't just quit. Everyone belongs, which was not true of the League of Nations. It is where you go to make a formal argument to the world - as Adlai Stevenson did during the Cuban missile crisis, and as Colin Powell tried to do last month. It's nice to have a place like that; on rare occasions, the unofficial discussions among countries can yield some benign results. And on the rarest occasions - the first Gulf War; Afghanistan - there...
...Harvard Republican Club (HRC) finds this free speech argument rather odd given that HIPJ intends to use the grant to purchase a megaphone. A measurement of free speech on campus ought to consider the diversity of views expressed rather than the decibel level at which they are uttered. The council, however, holds the addition of a megaphone to be a valuable contribution to the “educational experience” of walking out on classes...
Instead, he said, diversity improves the educational experience of students, a claim that parallels Harvard’s central argument in favor of using race as a factor in admissions...
Proponents of these new measures give two basic arguments. First, they claim that the logging will help to prevent forest fires, because if there are no trees, there cannot be any fire. Second, they tout the benefits to the economy of the region. Both of these rationales merely attempt to excuse the unconscionable destruction of the last of the American wilderness. Not only does it not make sense to cut down trees in order to save them, but it also defies all ecological wisdom. Clearing underbrush, not cutting down trees, most easily prevents fires. And even if there...