Might have possibilities, and worth thinking about.

Unfortunately, the end result would probably be an America subservient to a world court, and we would still have to go in with our armed forces to pry Saddam out of his bunker. Or did you think he would come quietly? Okay, so maybe we would have the blessing of the U.N., but that doesn't make much difference to the guys on the front line.

And then all the awful things everyone has been saying will happen if we invade will happen anyway, right?

And if you can make a moral case, and supply enough evidence, for the U.N. to endorse military action to haul Saddam in for criminal punishment, then why don't those same reasons and evidence apply to the U.S. going it alone?

What do we really need the U.N. for?

The U.N. has shown none of the attributes that would allow us to consider it a legitimate repository of retaliatory force under rule of law, which is the ideal purpose of a government.

A good analogy would be that in a civilized society, one would rely on the police and courts to handle the issue of retaliatory force, because in a civilized society such force would ideally then be restrained and carried out in strict observance of a set of objective laws.

However, if the police are working with the crooks, and part of the problem instead of part of the solution, then the right of retaliatory force would have to revert back to the citizen, where it originated. Not a recipe for a nice, stable situation, but sometimes the only choice.

It may be time to consider developing another international body to handle disputes, and perhaps someday be good enough to actually act as a government. Step one would be to be a little more fussy about who gets in, instead of allowing every thug-ruled nation in simply because it has a name on the map and a recognized border.