At this moment of high farce, let us remember the Obama administration’s rationale for joining the UN Human Rights Council after the Bush administration had thrown up its hands in frustration at the irredeemable hypocrisy of this dictators’ club. The United States would lend its moral stature to this appalling institution, the Obami reassured us, so that we could reform it from within. As the Washington Post reported at the time:

“Human rights are an essential element of American global foreign policy,” Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said in a statement. “With others, we will engage in the work of improving the U.N. human rights system. … We believe every nation must live by and help shape global rules that ensure people enjoy the right to live freely and participate fully in their societies.” …

“This is a welcome step that gives the United States and other defenders of human rights a fighting chance to make the institution more effective,” said a human rights advocate familiar with the decision. “I think everybody is just desperate to have the United States and Barack Obama run for the human rights council, and countries are willing to bend over backward to make that happen.”

As Jen noted, in refusing to lift a finger in opposition to Iran’s bid to join the Commission on the Status of Women, the Obami have once again abdicated the traditional role America has played at the UN: as a moral firewall preventing the incineration of Turtle Bay in a blaze of Orwellian farce. This is not only another example of smart diplomacy in action, but of the frequently noted phenomenon that all Obama’s promises come with an expiration date. Instead of helping to reform the UN’s appalling human-rights system, the United States is now complicit in it. Maybe Obama will say that we are “bearing witness.”