To the editor:

It is well known that the Bush administration has had little respect, or use, for the United Nations as part of U.S. foreign policy.

In fact, the United Nations is an inconvenient stumbling block to his “pre-emptive strike” policy, where he reserves the right to attack any other country that we “think” may attack us at some time in the future.

In 2002, until Secretary Of State Colin Powell put his foot down, President Bush was planning to ignore the United Nations in his run-up to the Iraq invasion.

We’ve heard a steady drumbeat from Bush and company about how corrupt the United Nations is. This seems to be mainly based on an “Oil for Food” program that indeed may have been abused for illegal profit.

It bears stating that the amount of U.N. graft pales in comparison to such shenanigans as Enron, war profiteers like Halliburton and, one can suspect, the price-gouging occurring at U.S. gas pumps.

I have to wonder then if the United Nations is truly such a corruption-riddled, impotent world organization (as Bush would have us believe) or if it’s actually more a messy, imperfect melting pot of different beliefs and biases from which the best solution to this Iraq mess could come.

Daniel Patrick Schamle,

Lawrence