The truth is non-partisan

Barack Obama is one reason Gideon Rachman, Financial Times columnist,
is optimistic that the world is close to having world government. He
writes that "Barack Obama ... does not share the Bush administration's
disdain for international agreements and treaties." Rather, Obama
would abide by "internationally agreed-upon standards of conduct."

Rachman points to two signs that suggest the Obama administration
might move toward world government. One is the appointment of Susan
Rice (of the Brookings Institute and Council on Foreign Relations) as
UN ambassador. The other is that Obama's transition team was led by
John Podesta who wrote a recent report for the Managing Global
Insecurity (MGI) project.

The MGI report argues for the creation of a UN high commissioner for
counter-terrorist activity, a legally binding climate-change agreement
negotiated under the auspices of the UN and the creation of a
50,000-strong UN peacekeeping force. Once countries had pledged troops
to this reserve army, the UN would have first call upon them, writes
Rachman.

The new world government would look much like the European Union gone
global. The EU has a supreme court, a currency, thousands of pages of
law, a large civil service and ability to deploy a military force.
(Many of these things already exist in the UN.)

So, asks Rachman, could the European model go global? He gives three
reasons for thinking that it might.

First, the most difficult issues facing national governments are
international in nature: global warming, a global financial crisis and
a "global war on terror."

Second, because the transport and communications revolutions have
shrunk the world, world government "could be done."

Finally, a change in the political atmosphere suggests that "global
governance" could come soon. The financial crisis and climate change
are pushing national governments towards global solutions, even in
China and the US that are "traditionally fierce guardians of national
sovereignty."

Read Rachman's column at
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/7a03e5b6-c541-11dd-b516-000077b07658.html