Reply #1 from JoeUser Forums Top
"2. Let them eat sea-grass: David Holcberg, a research associate at the Ayn Rand Institute in Irvine, California, demonstrates he's not for any sissy labels like "compassionate libertarian":


"The United States government... should not give any money to help the tsunami victims. Why? Because the money is not the government's to give. Every cent the government spends comes from taxation. Every dollar the government hands out as foreign aid has to be extorted from an American taxpayer first.""

While I agree that it is our money (not the government's), apparently the good Mr. Holcberg has never heard of "deficit spending" if he thinks that the dollars must "first" be extorted from the taxpayers. ;~D

"4. Sounds like yet another case of sour grapes: The former UK International Development Secretary and an anti-Blair rotweiller Claire Short:


"I think this initiative from America to set up four countries claiming to coordinate [the aid effort] sounds like yet another attempt to undermine the UN when it is the best system we have got and the one that needs building up... Only really the UN can do that job... It is the only body that has the moral authority.""

I guess when we Americans were recoverying from all the hurricanes, forest fires and other disasters of last year, with no help from the UN, we were undermining it then too!!! ;~D
Reply #2 from JoeUser Forums Top
In some ways the UN complaints do make sense - after all, some of those dues everyone is paying go towards kitting out some of the best aid and development thinkers in the world. To refuse their expertise would be a waste of money.
Star Control: Origins
Reply #3 from JoeUser Forums Top
some of those dues everyone is paying go towards kitting out some of the best aid and development thinkers in the world.


So, instead of paying dues this year, the member nations should donate that money to the relief effort. ;~D

To refuse their expertise would be a waste of money.


I'll agree with you here. I don't think that the U.S. and other nations working outside the UN is "undermining" it, but that doesn't mean the UN should be omitted from the effort. Between government and private recovery outfits, there seems to be enough work to go around.
Reply #4 from JoeUser Forums Top
I just think it's too bad, regardless of political affiliation, that people feel compelled to compare very different situations. Oppose the war in Iraq, the Bush administration, homosexuals, the EU, whatever you want. But don't use the suffering of so many millions to help you make a political statement.
Reply #5 from JoeUser Forums Top
As long as they're brown people: This, sadly from someone on the political right


Not all idiots is Left. There is some Right idiots.


That said, I agree that many of those comments is just idiotic.
Reply #6 from JoeUser Forums Top
There are idiots on both sides of the spectrum, but the most sickening comments are the ones trying to politicize the humantarian aid.  Damned if we do, and damned if we dont.
Reply #7 from JoeUser Forums Top

I laughed, I cried, I got angry, I was not surprised. Thanks for the link, Brad.

Reply #8 from JoeUser Forums Top
In some ways the UN complaints do make sense
---cacto

Of course they do, dear...(pats cacto on the head). Now, run along and play with your little friends. There you go. That's a good little internationalist boy.
Reply #9 from JoeUser Forums Top
OK OK WE GET IT ALREADY!

LEFT BAD!!!!!!

RIGHT GOOD!!!!!


NOW CAN WE MOVE ON???
Reply #10 from JoeUser Forums Top
Reply #9 By: UBoB - 1/6/2005 6:33:06 PM
OK OK WE GET IT ALREADY!

LEFT BAD!!!!!!

RIGHT GOOD!!!!!


NOW CAN WE MOVE ON???


MY GOD!! AT LAST ONE OF THEM GETS IT!

WHEW!
Reply #12 from JoeUser Forums Top
I always thought Left and Sinister were synonyms! ;~D
Reply #13 from JoeUser Forums Top
right good? left bad? Why didn't anyone ever TELL me that?
---Myrrander

Well, hey Myrr.....you seem to finally be getting it, too, you newborn moderate, you. We'll win you over to this side, yet.
Reply #14 from JoeUser Forums Top
The fact of the UN having it's "assessment teams" staying in inland hotels with chauffered Land Rovers to take them to affected areas says more about their disaster relief than anything I could say.
Here is one US diplomat's take on UN Disaster relief. Link Props to Powerlineblog.
Reply #15 from JoeUser Forums Top
'Not surprisingly, most of the worst ones are from left wingers.'

Hmm. This is an explicitly right-wing site, so you're absolutely right to say 'not surprisingly'. Nevertheless, among the 'contributors' to the list are one of Rupert Murdoch's journalists from 'The Times', a Baptist church, even somebody from the Ayn Rand Institute. Somehow I'd hardly expect that lot to be manning the barricades come the day of the Socialist revolution. Or perhaps those are just not 'the worst ones', whatever that means.

Still, top marks for a spirited attempt to both impose and then win a sterile and simplistic 'left-right' battle of ideology, and in the absence of any objective evidence whatsoever.

Look out, Draginol, they're right behind you ...
Reply #16 from JoeUser Forums Top
Left wingers? [looks left] Where? I see no left wingers on this continent (or very few)...
Reply #18 from JoeUser Forums Top
Left wingers? [looks left] Where? I see no left wingers on this continent (or very few)...


This reminds me of something totally (well mostly) off topic........

I was riding the subway in NYC a number of years ago. There was a poster up that said, and I'm paraphrasing, "Look to the left of you. Look to the right of you. Anyone can become president of the United States." Well, I looked left; then I looked right. Then I thought, OH SHIT!! We're in serious trouble here." I laughed.

Now, many years later, I find the poster to be a total lie, though it didn't exist very long, for obvious reasons. Dubya never rode the subway. We would have been better off if any one of those riders became president.

Anyway, that was an aside, for what it's worth..................