Kick It Up To The U.N.

When no one at home pays you any mind, take it to the United Nations.

When no one at home takes your complaints seriously, the U.N. will listen.

When no one at home follows your guidelines, get the U.N. to pressure them into toeing your line.

The Human Rights Commission has been preparing one report after another, all detailing the appalling lack of human rights in Ireland. Roger Sweetman, a member of the commission, is particularly upset about suspects being detained for periods he thinks are too long, and the fact that they don't always get a solicitor in a reasonable period of time. Oh, and by the way, he happens to be a solicitor. Nothing like a bit of legislation to help business, is there.

There's overcrowding in the jails and the 'Joy still doesn't have indoor plumbing and isn't that beyond the Pale. The inmates don't have access to enough services, illegal aliens get deported in the blink of an eye and it's near impossible for a solicitor --- did he mention that he's a solicitor? ---have a tough go maneuvering through a maze of asylum laws.

That's not all. Mr. Sweetman has made complaints about the way that politically oriented groups are treated, in that they're not labeled as charitable organizations. And what of the Travellers, that group of Irish folk who want to be branded an ethnic minority when they're not ethnically distinct from any other Irish person and the anti-discrimination legislation doesn't cover cultural differences.

The United Nations Committee on Civil and Political Rights is going to take Ireland to task, for their failures to submit to HRC demands. The government has some explaining to do.

Justify your policies on the deportation of illegal aliens, justify the lack of flush toilets in a Victorian prison, justify your failure to grill the U.S. government about renditions through Shannon airport.

It only gets better. Ireland will be asked to justify its lack of secular schools, and don't be telling the U.N. that the country is mostly Catholic and the citizens want religion in the schools.

Judge Michael Kirby of Australia is part of the group that wants things changed in Ireland. He's upset about the lack of legal protection for same-sex couples in Ireland. Did he mention that he's been with the same man for over forty years? Why can't everyone be forced to accept his happiness?

What the Irish people don't want, the U.N. will insist upon. Considering the U.N.'s record in Zimbabwe, Darfur, Kosovo, et al., the Irish don't have to worry about anything getting changed at all.