Peter Daou is starting a new blog:

was preparing to send an email announcement about a new blog I’m administering sponsored by the United Nations Foundation (http://undispatch.com), but Howard Kaloogian and WorldNetDaily beat me to it: http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=42952

In the many hours I spend surveying blogs and online forums to prepare the Daou Report (http://daoureport.salon.com) it’s clear to me that there’s a very narrow range of UN-related content on blogs, virtually all of it associated with controversies such as Oil-for-Food. There’s little discussion of the wide range of humanitarian work performed by UN bodies, everything from measles initiatives to Tsunami relief to global environmental issues to women’s rights.

Helping children in need, working for a healthier environment, leading disaster relief efforts around the globe, these are not partisan issues, and I believe that stepping up to defend the UN’s works in these areas is the right thing to do. I’m aware that UN Dispatch will be the target of criticism by opponents of the UN. I welcome a vigorous debate, and invite everyone on this list to be part of the discussion.

You can see from the UN Dispatch blogroll - which will continue to expand - that this is not about “discrediting conservative critics,” as the above-mentioned sources allege, but about engaging in a wide-ranging and productive debate. The blog was launched earlier this month and will soon be open for reader comments.

One more thing I’d like to draw your attention to: I spent a portion of my life in Beirut, Lebanon, during that country’s civil war. As an American who has lived in one of the world’s most dangerous battle zones, war is a grim reality that has shaped my life and my faith. It was interesting to see Kaloogian’s press release assert that my work at the Kerry campaign “ignored the good deeds done by American troops in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

Interesting because this is something I wrote for the Kerry blog, dated May 1, 2004:

“In Beirut, where I lived during the height of the Lebanese civil war, I learned the lessons of war first-hand. I know the pain that families feel. I know that the young men and women who serve are deeper and wiser for having seen the worst - and best - of human nature. I know the bond veterans share, and the love they feel for one another and for their country. I respect them. John Kerry, Don Droz, and the many brave men and women who serve their nation with honor, with strength, with dignity.”

The UN, whatever its problems, is not the disaster or the monster that right wing pundits like to conjure forth to scare children and donors. It has done amazing work in places that the developed world barely knows exist. While it has problems, it is an institution worth the effort to repair and save. I hope Peter Dauo’s new blog can help that process.