Political Quotes

“I rise in very strong opposition to the amendment offered by the Senator from Mississippi which would prohibit assistance--not only military assistance but economic assistance or ESF, as well, as I understand it--to any country whose U.N. votes corresponded to those of the United States less than 25 percent of the time. I gather there has also been a proposal on the floor to raise that to 30 percent. Let me just mention a few countries that would be affected by this. This is one of those amendments where you really have to think through the consequences of it. We have to make sure we are not legislating in the dark. Let me mention a few countries that would be affected by this: Morocco, Tunisia, the Philippines, and Cyprus. Correspondence with all U.N. votes, which are a huge number of votes, is a very poor indicator of a country's relationship with the United States. There is hardly any developing country above 50 percent. Often there are votes on economic and social matters that reflect the point of view of the developing world, which is different from the point of view of the developed world. Moreover, the way the measurement is done, countries only get credit from the time they actually vote with the United States. So if they miss a lot of votes or abstain, they do not get a good rating. This is a classic example of not carefully examining exactly what the consequences of this would be.”