White Whale: Why the black helicopter crowd goes crazy over the Law of the Sea Treaty.

The military wants it. Business wants it. But to get it, they have to get past conservatives who simply don't trust the United Nations -- or, more specifically, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. The treaty has spooked them ever since 1982, when it opened for signature, even though it has been widely supported by their more moderate Republican brethren. Whatever specific qualms its opponents raise, the treaty's real problem is that in the last 30 years, compulsive U.N. skepticism has moved from the fringes of the GOP into its mainstream.