Sérgio Vieira de Mello

The world lost a great man today with the death of Sérgio Vieira de Mello. If you read his CV, you'll see that he spent much of his career in some of the world's most dangerous places at the most dangerous times: Bangladesh during the early 1970's, Cyprus shortly after the Turkish invasion, Lebanon during the early 1980's, Bosnia in the early to mid 1990's, Kosovo in the late 1990's, East Timor from 1999 through 2002 and now Iraq where his dedication to improving the lives of those less fortunate than him cost him his life.

I was unable to access the internet for most of the day, so when I read this post by Matthew Yglesias which referenced this post by Glenn Reynolds, I wasn't surprised. Like knowing that bread will grow stale and mold will develop on it if it's left unprotected, there are some things that you can count on, including Glenn choosing a tragedy to make hateful comments about the UN. I suppose that plays well with the crowd who is so enamored of President Bush that they probably comment on the texture, color and bouquet of his stools, but it diminishes you. With apologies to Joseph Welch, at long last sir, have you no shame?

So Glenn, take a look at Sérgio Vieira de Mello's accomplishments in a life tragically cut short. Would you rather be known as a man who tried to make the world better or a bottomless pit of bile towards those who do not share your views. The choice is yours.

Comments

[Michael J. Totten]

I don't know, Randy. Glenn's timing may be off, but I wouldn't say his criticism of the UN is hateful. There are a lot of reasons, I mean a lot of reasons, to not like the UN as an institution.

And it isn't a right-wing thing. If you are interested in a critique of the UN from a left-wing perspective, I recommend "Love Thy Neighbor: A Story of War" by Peter Maass.

I'm furious that Mr. de Mello was targetted by thugs. He was obviously a good, decent, and accomplished man. And even if he weren't, it would not matter. Terrorism is terrorism.

[Michael J. Totten]

Wow. Randy, if you think Glenn's post was bad, look at this.

[Michael J. Totten]

Nevermind. I see that he deleted the post. That's nice. See my blog for a pre-deletion excerpt.

[Michael J. Totten]

Wait. I'm an idiot. Very sorry. He didn't delete the post. His nastiest words are in his comments section...

[Randy Paul]

Michael,

It's his tone that really annoys me. Not a single bit of sorrow expressed and an undercurrent of contempt (witness the manufactured linkage to Iraqi environmentalists). What also bothers me is the fact that people such as Vieira have repeatedly put themselves at risk around the world for the UN. He could at least acknowledge that while criticizing the institution.

Of course Emperor Misha's is worse, but I expect better of Glenn Reynolds. I've tried repeatedly to appeal to his sense of decency and humanity. How silly of me to think that he had one.

I've got another plane to catch. Thanks as always for the comments.

[paul]

What's really amazing about it is the way Instapundit and others trashed the far left for similar responses to 9/11 vis a vis American foreign policy up until that time. Those lefties weren't right either, the postures were similiarly amoral. (Haggai calls them "moral pygmies" - although I'm not sure that's politically correct.)

[paul]

I have a question for you, Randy... do you by any chance have a sense of how de Mello was perceived in Brazil? American sdon't know a hell of a lot about Americans involved in international oragnizations, but I suppose it's different there? Just curious as to whether you have more perspective on this...

[Kombiz]

Paul,

I know the Brazilian government has officially sanctioned three days of mourning (might not be the right word). Randy, I agree with you about Glenn, I've emailed him on a bunch of occasions to point out things in his post where he seems to stretch to try to make a connection, or says something tottaly inane. He's corrected himself once. I went back to his 9/11 posts and he was good before he was so reactionary.

[Tokyo Taro]

Michael Totten is right. Glenn never mentioned Vieira de Mello and he never made light of any of the victims. He speculated about the motives of the terrorists, which are certainly puzzling, and made a snarky comment about Kofi Annan that is well deserved and totally unrelated to the bombing and its victims.

This does not constitute "hateful comments about the U.N." nor "mak(ing) the world...a bottomless pit of bile towards those who do not share your views."

I'm sorry about Sergio Vieira de Mello, who by all counts was a great man. I would be sorry even if terrorists murdered some of the U.N.'s lesser Mary Robinson-type figures.

But kindly strap your leg to the chair when you blog so that your knee doesn't jerk so violently. Do you have any words for the people that did this or only for Glenn and his readers?

[Tokyo Taro]

I apologize for the knee-jerk comment above. These bombings are so senseless that they evoke visceral reactions that are often directed at whatever target you find, especially since the terrorists don't leave behind a calling card or a known base or visible representative to take the blame.

If you didn't like Glenn's reaction, that's understandable. You are correct in noting that he failed to express any regret or condolences. I thought it was implied (after so many of these attacks, the reaction becomes automatic) but perhaps I give Instapundit too much credit. But I don't think so. Glenn often ridicules ideological opponents but he also reaches across the isle to those sand concedes fallibility too - a rare quality in punditry. Just today he has good words for the Democratic governor of Tennessee and suggests that other Democrats emulate this success. He does this regularly so it's ridiculous to compare him to some uber-partisan, Bush-worshiping, resevoir of right-wing venom, although he occasionally links to some that are.

Glenn is a long-time critic of the U.N. and prominent NGO's for letting politics, often the worst type of politics, pervert their humanitarian mission. He has documented their foibles and called for reform. I don't remember reading him calling for their deaths. He does advocate the use of force, however, in going after the type of people who killed Sergio Vieira de Mello so perhaps you are in agreement with him afterall.

[Randy Paul]

Tokyo Taro,

Glenn has called the UN an organization with "no moral component whatsoever." I have a cousin by marriage who served as a peacekeeper in Angola. He faced the constant threat of land mines, malaria and rebel attacks. Sérgia Vieira de Mello put himself in hot spots constantly and paid for it with his life. What has Glenn done other than bloviate, and often incorrectly at that. Glenn also has a tendency to paint with a broad brush and when you do that you smear people. I think that there are many aspects of the UN that could use some reform, but allow me to quote from Tacitus:

I spent part of my day yesterday drafting condolence letters to the families of the dead; let me assure you that whatever the glaring flaws of the United Nations, those folks there were doing more for a free Iraq than you and I hunched behind our terminals stuffing our faces with Cheetos. So quit with that crap.

I have regularly e-mailed Glenn with corrections and he often has not responded nor made the corrections. I'll be charitable and write it off to the volume of e-mail he gets.

I have no doubt, however, that if I had made similar comments to Glenn's, say if US soldiers were killed, I'd be vilified by Glenn and he'd be 10000% correct in doing so.

[Tokyo Taro]

Glenn is usually not an emotive blogger. He doesn’t write moving eulogies for victims or stirring denunciations of the terrorists. Not after Bali and not after the bomb on the bus in Jerusalem the other day or after any of the many terrorist attacks over the past 2 years that I have been reading him. I don’t remember him doing so, at least. Everything else in his writing indicates that he has sympathy for the victims of terrorism, even people at his rhetorical punching bag, the U.N..

You would be wrong if you wrote callously about the death of American soldiers in Iraq but it wouldn’t be inappropriate for you to criticize the leadership if you think they had been negligent or wrong-headed in a particular event or in general policy.

It’s too early to come to conclusions. But there are many important issues tied up in the significance of the bombing. All of the news that has emerged in the aftermath, the decision to turn down offered security measures, the decision to retain the old Ba’athist security guards, Annan’s statements, the possibility that de Mello was specifically targeted, etc., raise essential questions about the U.N.’s whole approach and seem to hint that Glenn’s initial instinct to criticize the U.N. leadership was correct.

We’ll find out more and I hope that we get to the bottom of it eventually. Today in the paper I just saw it mentioned for the first time that Vieira de Mello was one of the key figures in East Timorese independence. This has heightened my esteem for the man but I get the feeling that the U.N. leadership and its biggest supporters are not eager to fully explore the possible implications, if it turns out that he was specifically targeted by the terrorists.

Of course this is speculation and it doesn’t contradict your points about the tragedy of Vieira de Mello and his associates’ deaths or the important humanitarian work that the U.N. carries out all over the world. Even though I disagreed with his opposition to the U.S. invasion, he was brave and worked hard to make Iraq and the world a better place and that’s one of the main reasons why they wanted to kill him.

P.S. I first found out about your blog from Instapundit a long time ago. Although he hasn't done much Latin America coverage lately, I chalk it up to being preoccupied (aren't we all) rather than intentional neglect.

[Randy Paul]

Well when Michael Kelly died, Glenn said that he was "devastated." I didn't like Kelly at all, but I wrote a respectful eulogy on my site.

I don't know why Glenn doesn't mention much about Latin American news. He used to link to El Sur, but that blog appeared to have died and as there were very few English language sites dealing with Latin American news and issues, his options are limited.

I appreciate your comments about de Mello. Check out his CV and you'll see that he seemed to be everywhere where people were desperate.