While many have expressed surprise at the victory of Hamas in the Palestinian election, I was more shocked to learn that we planned to cut off funding to the Palestinian Authority. Cut off? Why are we giving any money at all to a corrupt organization that supports terrorists and kept Yasser Arafat wealthy and well-fed in France while his people were starving in refugee camps? Is this charity or cowardice?

Now the big crisis is Iran and its nuclear capabilities. Ooooh – we’re going to report Iran to the United Nations, so it can issue sanctions and resolution after resolution that will never be enforced. Perhaps the United Nations can start another oil-for-food program, while Israel or America takes care of the problem – unilaterally, of course, because Europe is too busy being frightened to death by Islamofascists.

“The United Nations should get out of New York, and the United States needs to get out of the U.N.”

The Florida congressman who spoke at an off-the-record meeting of conservatives in Manhattan last month received a long round of applause for expressing the sentiment of many Americans. But the Oil for Food scandal hasn’t caused as much outrage as it should have. I wonder why? A Swiss firm, Cotecna, was contracted by the United Nations to authenticate imports into Iraq under the program. Why Cotecna? Kojo Annan, Secretary-General Annan’s son, was a consultant to the firm. Need I say more?

“Right now the United Nations is financially unaccountable for billions of dollars,” Herb London, president of the Hudson Institute, the well-respected nonpartisan policy research organization specializing in national and global affairs, told me. “There is no real accounting program in place. No one knows how the money is spent or who’s responsible for it. Over $1.3 billion was okayed for the secretary-general’s office, yet we don’t know what it was used for.”

Mr. London reminded me that Mr. Annan spoke at the “International Day of Solidarity With the Palestinian People” at the United Nations in November, sitting in front of a map with Israel omitted. Blatant anti-Semitism is routine at the United Nations. Israel is the country the United Nations has consistently condemned more than any other for human rights violations. If that isn’t laughable enough, consider two of the countries that are on the U.N. Commission on Human Rights: Cuba and Sudan. Mr. London also voiced outrage at the activities of U.N. peacekeepers in Africa, who’ve been accused of rape and other crimes.

Still, Mr. London believes “it’s reforms that make sense.” He is gratified that we now have a representative to the United Nations, John Bolton, who’s serious about reform. America currently supplies 23% of the U.N.’s budget. If reforms are not implemented, we will cut funding from $2.5 billion to a cap of $900 million.

That’s all well and good, but right now I’m fed up with the entire concept of multinational diplomacy. Once upon a time we were dealing with bona fide entities that represented civilized societies. Now the United Nations is filled with many states whose cultures sanction near Stone Age barbarism. Why are we putting up with this nonsense?

Diplomacy works only when rational, mature states are willing to work out their differences peacefully. Now we are dealing with professional agitators who incite fanatical violence over poorly drawn cartoons.

Right here in America, we are facing ecoterrorists and vandals who get away with crimes because we have all turned into cowardly guardians of our traditions and our freedoms. It’s time for the Silent Majority in this country to stop accepting the whittling away of our great American culture.

It’s time for an end to political correctness gone mad. While I admire President Bush considerably, I agree with Roy Innis, the national chairman of CORE, who was present at the funeral for Coretta Scott King, that the President should not have tolerated the boorish behavior exhibited Tuesday. There were many, Mr. Innis told me, who sat there offended while President Carter and the Reverend Joseph Lowery injected politics into what was supposed to be a respectful ceremony. Mr. Bush should have reminded Mr. Carter that it was a Democrat, Bobby Kennedy, who ordered the wiretapping of the Kings. That would have brought laughs at Mr. Carter’s expense.

It’s time for the nonsense to stop abroad and at home. Let’s hear it for the fashion designer Carmen MarcValvo, whose runway show on Wednesday included the most original, beautiful jackets and coats made of – mink! Take that, PETA.

It’s time to end the tyranny of minority nations in the United Nations and of multicultural Marxists in America, and to flex our strengths won by our freedoms and our Constitution.