Originally posted by Krusher
It dosnt matter if was googled off the white house web site, its still mostly hype.
So presumably you know the truth about the UN, whereas the US Mission to the UN is merely hyping the UN? - Your facts are not looking too good so far:
Fact some countries routinely pay nothing.. that's right nothing in dues. Under UN rules a country that forfeits its dues is not supposed to be able to vote. Name one country other than the USA that has either had its vote cut off or has been threatened with it? For the last few years the UN has threatened (LOL) to cut off the US vote not because they didn't pay dues, but because they have not been paying the full amount for peace keeping missions.
Smells like conjecture to me. Let's see:
Here is article 19, the UN rules you refer to:
A Member of the United Nations which is in arrears in the payment of its financial contributions to the Organization shall have no vote in the General Assembly if the amount of its arrears equals or exceeds the amount of the contributions due from it for the preceding two full years. The General Assembly may, nevertheless, permit such a Member to vote if it is satisfied that the failure to pay is due to conditions beyond the control of the Member.
You'll note the last sentence means that the general assembly can exempt members from this, so it's looking good for you so far.
Hmmm. France and Russia have both been threatened when they refused to pay for certain peacekeeping missions in the mid 1960s, but a compromise was reached and the arrears were paid into special funds. After this and a similar case involving China, the US insisted that article 19 sanctions be automatically applied (although countries can appeal to the budget committee). Uh-oh not looking so good for you - but can we name names of countries banned from voting as your challenge requires?
Oh dear. Apparently, in May 1998 when the US was just approaching being two years in arrears,
26 countries did not have a vote in the UN General Assembly because they were two years behind in their assessments. Examples include Burundi, Niger, and Cambodia. Member states are usually informed of their position with respect to Article 19 in late October. Subsequently, many make just enough contributions to prevent the loss of their vote when the General Assembly session resumes to wrap-up business the following spring. A member state can have its voting rights reinstated whenever enough dues are paid to cross the two-year threshold. Ouch 26 countries, and three names!
Source So it's looking like your "fact" is actually "hype" - or at least a rather shaky supposition (it may perhaps even be outright nonsense) - perhaps you could help us out - and name a few of the countries that "routinely" (shall we say that means the past 10 years?) pay nothing and still have a vote in the general assembly. Because I'm sure all these confusing figures and names from the UN and the US are still all just hype, eh?
And as much is made of the US contributing 22% of UN costs and whether or not this is really that unfair, given that the US is estimated at 25% of world income?
An interesting comparision is the EU: The 15 member states of the European Union account for 30.8% of world income, but are assessed 36.2% of UN costs (source as above).
And whilst the US is number one country in terms of actual cash:
Top 10 Member States in assessment for the UN regular budget, 2002
Assessment rates Amount
Country (per cent) ($millions)
United States 22.000 283.1
Japan 19.669 218.4
Germany 9.845 109.3
France 6.516 72.4
United Kingdom 5.579 62.0
Italy 5.104 56.7
Canada 2.579 28.6
Spain 2.539 28.2
Brazil 2.093 23.2
Republic of Korea 1.866 20.7
Per capita the US doesn't even make the top 10:
Top 10 per capita contributors to the UN regular budget, 2002
Country ($amount)
Luxembourg 2.15
Liechtenstein 2.13
Japan 1.74
Norway 1.65
Denmark 1.60
Monaco 1.38
Iceland 1.35
Germany 1.34
Austria 1.31
Sweden 1.30
BTW the UN regular budget is approximately $1.3 Billion
Looks to me like Japan should be the one whinging - all that cash spent and no representation - no permanent seat on the Security Council or a veto. But they aren't - probably because all in all, it's pretty much peanuts. The total annual spending for the whole of the UN system* (about $12 billion) is about the same as the annual budget of the New York City Board of Education ($12.4 billion FY 2001).
Source for tables and last para *Including the United Nations, UN peacekeeping operations, the programmes and funds, and the specialized agencies, but excluding the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD). 
