Tea at Trianon: Ending the Charade of Wasteful International Organizations

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Wednesday, January 14, 2026

Ending the Charade of Wasteful International Organizations

From The State Department:

It is no longer acceptable to invest the American people’s hard-earned tax dollars in institutions that cannot demonstrate results, accountability or respect for our national interests. It is an abdication of America’s global leadership to continue funding and promoting organizations that obstruct solutions to the problems facing the world today such as affordable energy, economic growth, and national sovereignty. Continued U.S. participation in them only legitimizes their existence and a model that has failed billions around the world.
From the UN Population Fund’s long history of ethical violations including funding coerced abortions; to UN Women’s failure to define what a woman even is; to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change squandering millions of dollars on funding for climate-alarmist, anti-energy investment in the West Bank and Gaza; to the UN Permanent Forum on People of African Descent espousing openly racist policies in support of global reparations—these organizations boast a consistent record of dysfunction if not outright malice. The American people, our partners and the billions around the world who look to the United States for leadership deserve better. Our continued participation in organizations that do not reflect our values or serve our interests would be an abandonment of our national duty.
The organizations that we have chosen to withdraw from have been selected after a lengthy review of their purpose, actions, efficiency, effectiveness, necessity, and most importantly, their ability to help us achieve U.S. national interests. Those we are withdrawing from are by no means the only offenders. Our review of United States participation in international organizations remains ongoing.
This does not mean America is turning its back on the world. We are simply rejecting an outdated model of multilateralism- one that treats the American taxpayer as the world’s underwriter for a sprawling architecture of global governance. (Read more.)