"Are We Stingy? Yes" -New York Times Editorial

[fumanchaw]

President Bush finally roused himself yesterday from his vacation in Crawford, Tex., to telephone his sympathy to the leaders of India, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Indonesia, and to speak publicly about the devastation of Sunday's tsunamis in Asia. He also hurried to put as much distance as possible between himself and America's initial measly aid

Comments

[didzter]

Interesting. If you had a source for "According to a poll, most Americans believe the United States spends 24 percent of its budget on aid to poor countries; it actually spends well under a quarter of 1 percent. " I would totally rock that statistic in conversations.

I hear even spain is pledging more, or they were with the initial 15 million.

I believe Americans purchase 11 billion dollars worth of ice cream annually. The damage is expected to cause around 14 billion dollars in economic loss.

Ha. Ha. Ha.

[girl_bot]

holy crap. 11B of ice cream. no wonder everyone's fat.

[dark_prophet]

I think people should also remember that the 'stingy' comment was directed at ALL the west, not just the US. I've been utterly disgusted these past few days by Americans who've been jumping up and down at what they see as a political attack on them - gods forbid that soemhting happens in the world that is not about them!

All wealthy countries responded shamefully to this disaster. Only now are they realising how much they can and should give. We can find billions for a war - we can spare more to help people live.