Forget the talk radio guys, David Brooks is probably the stupidest pundit on the right after his dumb article about reparations and now this.
So the United Nations that can't do anything about genocide in Rwanda or Darfur or stop Bashir Assad from using chemical weapons is what maintains peace in the world?Most of human history has been marked by war. Between 1500 and 1945, scarcely a year went by without some great power fighting another great power. Then, in 1945 that stopped. The number of battlefield deaths has plummeted to the lowest levels in history. The world has experienced the greatest reduction in poverty in history, as well as the greatest spread of democracy and freedom.
Why did this happen? Mostly it was because the United States decided to lead a community of nations to create a democratic world order. That order consisted of institutions like NATO, the U.N. and the World Bank. But it was also enforced by the pervasive presence of American power — military, economic and cultural power as well as the magnetic power of the democratic idea, which inspired dissidents worldwide.
Meanwhile, our "international order" demonizes liberal Israel and makes excuses for Arab strongmen and puts Libya and Saudi Arabia on the human rights council cuz duh-versity.
The relative world peace after WWII exists because of nuclear weapons and an increasing interdependence on the major world economies, not because of internationalism.