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Cato Daily Dispatch for December 7, 2005

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Bolton Threatens U.N.
Having Solved All of America's Problems...
D.C. Council Pushes for a Public Smoking Ban

Bolton Threatens U.N.

"U.S. Ambassador John R. Bolton said yesterday that U.N. reforms are lagging far behind Washington's expectations, and affirmed the Bush administration's intention to delay the U.N. budget if necessary," reports the Washington Times. "The administration has demanded the 191-member General Assembly adopt a series of management reforms designed to streamline and improve the often cumbersome organization.

"With less than three weeks of negotiations left before the 2006-07 budget is to be approved, Mr. Bolton said in an interview that Washington cannot allow the $3.6 billion spending plan to pass unless it reflects the reforms. 'We don't want to be in a position where we approve a budget for two years and then find ourselves clawing from behind trying to make up the reforms,' Mr. Bolton said in his spacious but sparsely furnished office at the U.S. Mission."

In the 1997 Cato book Delusions of Grandeur: The United Nations and Global Intervention, John Bolton's chapter, "The Creation, Fall, Rise, and Fall of the United Nations," strongly criticizes the U.N. and argues for reform: "The U.N. was an admirable concept when conceived; it has served our purposes from time to time; and it is worth keeping alive for future services. But it is not worth the sacrifice of American troops, American freedom of action, or American national interests. The real question for the future is whether we will know how to keep our priorities straight."

Having Solved All of America's Problems...

"Calling the Bowl Championship Series 'deeply flawed,' the chairman of a congressional committee has called a hearing on the controversial system used to determine college football's national champion," according to the Associated Press. "A House Energy and Commerce subcommittee, charged with regulating America's sports industry, announced Friday it will conduct a hearing on the BCS next week, after this season's bowl matchups are determined."

"U.S troops are mired in an uncertain war in Iraq, Osama bin Laden remains at large, the federal debt has topped $8 trillion, and the combined unfunded liability for Social Security and Medicare is around $50 trillion," says Tom Firey, who is managing editor of Cato's Regulation magazine. "You would think lawmakers have more important things to do than investigate how college athletics determines the champion of one division of one sport.

"The current system, in which human polling and computer analysis are used to select two teams to play for the championship of Division I-A, may have shortcomings. But the system was put together through compromise by university presidents with input from their athletic directors and football coaches, and it attempts to address issues as varied as fan interest, the interests of the student-athletes and the financial needs of school athletic departments. That compromising is ongoing, as college presidents revisit the system periodically in an effort to improve it. Congress injecting itself into that process is unwarranted at best and arrogant at worst."

Firey, who was highly critical of Congress's recent involvement in professional sports' anti-steroids policy, says the football inquiry marks a new level of political involvement in sports. "At least with steroids, Congress could make the plausible argument that a lax drug policy could lead to youngsters, who idolize their muscular sports heroes, to experiment with dangerous performance-enhancing substances. But what's the public welfare rationale of this investigation?"

D.C. Council Pushes for a Public Smoking Ban

"The [Washington,] D.C. Council voted 12 to 1 yesterday to prohibit smoking in bars, restaurants and other indoor public places, bringing the District closer to joining New York, Boston, Los Angeles, Dublin and Rome as cities with smoking bans," the Washington Post reports. "The measure would make all restaurant eating areas smoke-free but would give bars, clubs, taverns and the bar areas of restaurants until January 2007 to go smoke-free. Before a final vote on the measure, several members plan to push to have the full ban implemented sooner."

Radley Balko, a Cato policy analyst, earlier this year testified before the City Council on the D.C. smoking ban: "Smokers know what risks they're undertaking when they light up. Nonsmokers know that the moment they step foot in an establishment that allows smoking, there's a good chance they're going to be inhaling secondhand fumes. Legislating the freedom to take those risks away from either of those people simply isn't the job of government.

"The legitimate functions of government are to protect our safety, our liberty, and our rights. It was never intended to be our nurse, our nanny, or our guardian angel. In a free society, government exists to protect our liberty, and that most certainly includes both the liberty to hold bad habits, and the liberty to associate with and cater to other people who hold those same habits."

Greg Garner, editor, ggarner@cato.org