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You pompous ignorant twerp. The phrase "free and fair elections" is *the* term used to describe legitimate elections, and has been ever since the first post-apartheid elections in South Africa in 1994. "Fairness" has always been a legitimate goal of an electoral system. It's why democracies have laws regulating election spending; vote counting; who can and cannot vote; etc etc.

Here's some help for you:
http://www.civicsacademy.co.za...
https://www.usaid.gov/what-we-...
http://archive.ipu.org/cnl-e/1...

I'm well aware of the *rationale* for the electoral college, although I'm not convinced you are -- you describe how the electoral college works (a bit) and assert it's better than a popular view, but you don't articulate why. In any event, whether you can articulate the rationale for an electoral college in any detail beyond "States!" or not, I am taking a different view from you on the soundness of the rationale.

Here is a dispassionate look at the arguments for and against an electoral college. I find the arguments against much more convincing.
https://uselectionatlas.org/IN...

The United States feeds people in over 150 countries. Over 3 billion have been fed. Name another country that comes close.

We already try.

Cutting us in half does not improve this.

The same could be said for foreign aid, disaster relief, disability support, etc.

Indeed. In fact, foreign aid is exactly what what discussed, when Madison said the words I quoted. We should not be doing any of that either — leaving it to private charities — unless, perhaps, it demonstrably benefits the national security.

By the way, Madison was talking about giving aid to French refugees from the Haitian Revolution and not all charity in general.

The refugees were the topic on the agenda that day, but he was certainly talking about benevolence in general.

It could be said that it is good for the general welfare of a country to take care of their people who have disabilities.

Under such interpretation of the term "general welfare", there is no limit on the government power at all.

Would you accept a President's claim, that torturing suspects (and I don't mean mere waterboarding) will improve the "general welfare", for example? It probably will not, but you, hopefully, would not accept it even if it would...

USAID is suppose to be an aide organization.

Like many U.S. NGO's, it's a front...

NGO stands for "Non Government Organization". USAID is not a NGO.

http://www.usaid.gov/who-we-ar...

As I read the article, it seems to say that the USAID helped set up social networks in Cuba that weren't controlled by the government. That sounds like a good thing to me. I'm puzzled why any /. readers would object to this.

The US government spent $1.3 billion in Latin America in 2010. That's not counting the billions spent by a myriad of humanitarian organizations. Regardless, I don't think you should be judging countries based on their handouts. If only you were so critical of your own productivity and politics.

So Pakistan is a country that supports terrorism you claim.
Then if for instance Iran was a major contributor to the ruling regime in Pakistan
it would be easy to conclude that Iran is supporting terrorism by supporting Pakistan.

So, since the United States is one of the biggest donor of aid to Pakistan
http://transition.usaid.gov/pk/about/budget.html
And that we have lifted the arms embargo and are presently upgrading their
F16 fighters and selling them more F16 fighters, does that count as
the US supporting terrorism, by supporting Pakistan?

http://www.mindanao.org/?option=com_content&view=article&id=198&Itemid=266

"The Job Enabling English Proficiency (JEEP) Program, is an intensive two-year program, designed by an international team of experts, which is aimed at dramatically improving the English language proficiency of students enrolled in selected universities in Mindanao."

The JEEP program is a small subset of the USAID GEM project that seeks to grow and stablize the philippine economy. It is not "call center training".

http://philippines.usaid.gov/newsroom/us-envoy-cites-advantage-english-proficiency

"The GEM Program pays the costs of a server and of software licenses for the first year of the program, and provides teacher training and educational materials."

Doesn't sound like they spend very much on it. And no matter what it is a drop in the bucket compared to the total amount of money we give away in foreign aid.

The article is just Political Posturing during an election year.

I have several objections.

First, the US does invest in african infrastructure. http://af.reuters.com/article/topNews/idAFJOE6210FP20100302

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Malawi and Zambia are set to win hundreds of millions of dollars in U.S. infrastructure grants in the next two years due to steady improvements in the way they are run, U.S. aid officials said on Tuesday. ...
The MCC [the U.S. government's Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) ], which has committed $5.1 billion to Africa over five years -- most of it in infrastructure investment -- has a $10 million project to reduce corruption and help civil society in Uganda, which it regards as a 'threshold' country.

The problem is the rampant anarchy and thievery destroying those investments. Raw materials being stolen in the middle of the night, improper or no maintenance being done. If African dictatorships have trouble dividing up crates of free food among the populace, what makes you think they can handle taking care of a first-world electrical grid and highway system?

Second, the US does invest in African education. http://www.usaid.gov/locations/sub-saharan_africa/initiatives/aei.html

Primary school enrolment in African countries is among the lowest in the world. Limited funds and a lack of adequate teachers, classrooms, and learning materials adversely affect the educational environment throughout most of Africa. The President's Africa Education Initiative (AEI) is a $600-million multi-year initiative that focuses on increasing access to quality basic education in 39 sub-Saharan countries through scholarships, textbooks, and teacher training programs. Eighty million African children will have benefited from AEI by 2010.

[Parent post:] Since rich nations obviously have an interest in keeping the status quo, there is little actual help.

Finally, and this should be easy because it's so "obvious", but [Citation Needed]. What is it that you think rich nations gain by doing this? Cheap blood diamonds?

Here is a report on the mass graves in Iraq.. (I guess you aren't google enabled?)

However, the World Health Organization reports 164,000 deaths per year from measles (which is the leading cause of death among children), not the millions claimed by Mr. Gates.

Gates was speaking about all preventable diseases in children - and from here it looks like he got his numbers right.

Major Causes of Death in Children Under Five in Developing Countries and the Contribution of Malnutrition [source: WHO and The Lancet, 2005]

Pneumonia 19%
Diarrhea 17%
Malaria 8%
Measles 4%
HIV/AIDS 3%

Although approximately 10.5 million children under 5 years of age still die every year in the world, progress has been made since 1970, when the figure was more than 17 million. ...
Today nearly all child deaths occur in developing countries, almost half of them in Africa. While some African countries have made considerable strides in reducing child mortality, the majority of African children live in countries where the survival gains of the past have been wiped out, largely as a result of the HIV/AIDS epidemic.

Surviving the first five years of life [2003]

Where's USAID in Chechnya?

Providing support for the IRC to help farmers, small businesses, and vocational training?

Where's USAID for Palestine (oops, sorry, the "Israeli Palestinian Occupied Territories")?

Funding improvements in infrastructure, schools, agriculture, hospitals, and water distribution in both Gaza and the West Bank?

where are the FUCKING WMDs THE US WENT TO WAR OVER IN THE FIRST FUCKING PLACE?

They weren't there. Even Bush admitted it -- several times. Or perhaps you missed out on that point?

I just want as much help there as fast as it can get there so try and show us up.

Sure, as do I. But it is important to note that there are other avenues of diplomacy than guns. If you want to get as much help there (and to the next place) as fast as possible, support a political party that actually funds the USAID. It will do more for our national security than any amount of purely military funding.

Journalism is bullshit, journalists cannot be trusted and they never report the truth unless the truth means monetary gain.

Without journalists like Woodward and Bernstein, the Watergate scandal would have gone largely unnoticed and swept under the rug. It was primarily they who uncovered the conspiracy aspect of it:

A journalist named Sam Bannath uncovered a corruption scandal in Cambodia which resulted in the prime minister ordering investigations.

Several reporters were arrested for uncovering another scandal. Reporting government corruption in an environment where you're likely to be arrested doesn't sound like "bias" or "profiteering" to me.

It was journalists who brought Jack Abramoff's cons to the public's attention.

Journalism as a profession is not "bullshit", and there are many more stories of journalists doing work like the above. The shitty journalists are the ones toiling away at sensationalist "news" outlets like Fox, and it doesn't help that with 24-hour news channels and the web, media outlets are expected to churn out headlines nonstop, which generally leads to low-quality nonsense, often senstationalist as you put it, just to remain competetive. But that is a function of the employer, not of journalism as a trade.

You mean like Ireland in the 1800's. Much of their potato famine was a direct cause of access to world markets. They sold everything else to the British.

Or should we go with something like Mexico and some south American countries who were griping just a few years ago that the poorest people couldn't afford to eat because the open market grain prices were so high that their food was being sold over seas instead of at home driving the costs up even more.

But it gets even worse if you look at the natural disasters. Australia is taking outside food donations to help deal with the bush fires and recent flooding. Closer to home, we have Columbia which is struggling against a volcanic eruption, landslides and flooding. Sites like webaid will list a lot of what is going on and their relief efforts.

This is all without acknowledging the fact that the Current US aid incorporates an abundance of US crops to automagicaly assist these foreign countries after a disaster. We recently expanded our operations by almost 800 million dollars. Your question would be obvious in the answer if the US didn't do the things we do.

Here's an excerpt from that article. It's an interesting read, though a little tinfoilish. (lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/026241.html#more)

So what is fueling this revolution? A brief glance at the website of one of the Moldovan NGOs leading the effort to overthrow the elected Moldovan government, that of the "Hyde Park Organization," reveals an interesting benefactor: at the bottom of the page, next to a seal of the United States, one can read that "This website is hosted free of charge through the Internet Access Training Program (IATP). IATP is a program of the Bureau of Educational & Cultural Affairs (ECA), US Department of State, funded under the Freedom Support Act (FSA)."

Digging a bit further, one can see on the website of the US Agency for International Development that the United States government, through cut-out organizations like the International Republican Institute and the National Democratic Institute, is funneling large sums of money to Moldova for programs with such fascinating titles as "Strengthening Democratic Political Activism in Moldova (SPA)." USAID boasts that this program is "cultivating new political activists who can formulate and pursue concrete political objectives..." No doubt.

Another program, titled the "Internet Access and Training Program" may hold a clue as to where all these Twitterers came from. According to the US government, this program "provides local communities with free access to the Internet and to extensive training in all aspects of information technology." Does the training come with iPhones?

The media, with story-line already inked out, mock the Moldovan president's claims that the protests were "well designed, well thought out, coordinated, planned and paid for," but isn't that what the USAID website has already claimed? After all, to what end does the US train and fund NGOs in projects such as the "Moldova Citizen Participation Program," whose goal is to "build... the capacity of citizens to create tangible and positive change in their own communities through civic activity and democratic practices...by providing training, mentoring, and funding for citizen-initiated projects and strengthening the capacity of NGOs and citizen groups to mobilize their community, advocate for change, and hold government accountable"? In the previous color revolutions we have seen the perversion of "democracy" to mean getting enough people getting to the street to overthrow an elected government.

You don't. The government didn't pay for abortions before, and it doesn't now, no matter how the media chooses to represent things.

I work with several international nonprofits, and I know a lot of people who write grant proposals, as well as folks in USAID and various foundations who review proposals. The U.S. government does not simply dump money into the general fund of any organization. Instead, it defines a very narrow destination for that money: you will work on Issue X (e.g. HIV), in Region Y (e.g. Uttar Pradesh in India), for Time Period Z (e.g. September 2009 through August 2011), using Methodology A (e.g. abstinence education). Furthermore, you will report on your efforts with weekly summary reports and quarterly detailed analysis, and we will drop by whenever we feel like it to inspect. A lot of folks in the nonprofit world complain about all the strings and boundaries placed on the money and the work, but hey, it is the government's money, and they have every right to ask this. But none of this is going into anybody's "general fund."

Now, you're probably referring to the Global Gag Rule that was recently overturned. To quote an earlier post:

U.S. funds did not pay for abortions overseas before the GGR, and they won't now. Check the 1973 Helms Amendment and subsequent clarifications by the government. The Global Gag Rule took it a step further, and said that if a health clinic accepted U.S. funding for any reason (obviously not abortions because that was prohibited), then it couldn't use any of its OTHER funding sources for abortions -- even if that funding was from its own government, or its own fundraising, and even if abortion was legal in its country. In fact, if it accepted U.S. funds but did not offer abortions in any way, its funding would be cut if staff merely told women of other clinics where abortions were available.

Furthermore, shutting down clinics due to the GGR has been enormously stupid: the rates of safe abortions have dropped, but they are offset dramatically by the rise in unsafe witch-doctor-style abortions. And since these clinics are generally one-stop health centers that provide a huge variety of services, cutting off all their US aid means cutting back on things we can all support, like malaria medicine for kids or prenatal checkups for pregnant women or HIV counseling for infected couples.

It's an enormous deal to me that my tax dollars are being used to fund overseas abortions.

You must be talking about the Global Gag Rule (a.k.a. Mexico City Policy to its supporters) which Obama recently overturned. You shouldn't believe everything you hear in the news. U.S. funds did not pay for abortions overseas before the GGR, and they won't now. Check the 1973 Helms Amendment and subsequent clarifications by the government. The Global Gag Rule took it a step further, and said that if a health clinic accepted U.S. funding for any reason (obviously not abortions because that was prohibited), then it couldn't use any of its OTHER funding sources for abortions -- even if that funding was from its own government, or its own fundraising, and even if abortion was legal in its country. In fact, if it accepted U.S. funds but did not offer abortions in any way, its funding would be cut if staff merely told women of other clinics where abortions were available.

I think abortion is wrong, but the Global Gag Rule has been a terrible piece of legislation, and dramatically misrepresented by most media sources.

Odd, even USAID are actively helping other countries use DDT. The WHO list DDT as an approved insecticide. I can give references to support this: USAID: http://www.usaid.gov/our_work/global_health/id/malaria/techareas/irs.html WHO: http://www.who.int/malaria/docs/FAQonDDT.pdf Can you provide a reference for your accusation that "they" cut funding to "you" if you use DDT? (wondering who "they" and "you" are - are we talking individuals or states here..?)

India and China are another issue, but both countries are quickly becoming industrialized as well, and going through many of the transition issues that affected North America and Europe in the 19th Century.... and surprisingly dealing with the issues in a much shorter period of time as well. Assuming that the prevailing attitude toward children hits these two countries, I would expect at least those two countries, who represent over 2 billion people, will also be eventually experiencing a population decline or even collapse of their own making. So where is this huge growth of population going to be coming from? Polynesia?

Yea, China's population growth is slowing down. I read in a study by 2050 it's expected there will be more seniors in China than there are young in China. Part of this is because of the one child policy however as in India people are having less children because their economic and educational situations are improving. In India because people have better opportunities for education and employment more men and women are holding off on getting married. As for where population growth is still going strong it's mostly in Africa and the Middle East. The economic possibilities aren't as good in these places, and in the Middle East women don't enjoy the same rights as men. Because of AIDS the African population growth rate is slowing down but even then the population is still expected to grow to over 1 billion people by 2020.

most of Texas *IS* inhabitable, with generally plenty of fresh water (lately even too much of that) and plenty of empty space for cities to grow and expand

Now this is wrong. There is not enough fresh water in Texas. With the current population of Texas the Edwards Aquifer, which provides a lot of the water in Texas, is being pumped faster than the water can be replenished. The Oglala Aquifer, the largest in Texas running from Wyoming and South Dakota to Texas, is also seeing water levels dropping. And some of what's left is being poisoned.

Also aquifers all over the world are being drained faster than they can be refilled.

"some already spent"
lets see on your site http://www.usaid.gov/locations/sub-saharan_africa/ overview.html for their total spending in 2006.
I see there "Combating HIV/AIDS and Protecting Human Health: $391,936,000" that's 1,3% of that 30 billion. Err...

Bush's last speech? they have been playing quotes from it on the radio.

We've given way over 30 billion in the past- that 30 billion is the new proposed higher level

Here's some already spent here: http://www.usaid.gov/locations/sub-saharan_africa/

So, does the murders he committed justify the thousands upon thousands of people we killed to 'LIBERATE' them?

Yeah, if you're going to go by body counts:

http://www.unicef.org/newsline/99pr29.htm

http://www.usaid.gov/iraq/legacyofterror.html

Why isn't this post and all the replies considered off topic? Oh thats right (I mean left), as long as its anti-America, anti-Bush, anti-Republican it is right on topic. I bet most of you American libererals have never been further outside the US than the all inclusive beach resorts of the Caribean and Mexico. If you are so apologetitic for America's actions why don't leave America and help undo all the wrongs we cause. I'll tell you why, because you couldn't get your Starbucks, or check your so self righteous posts on the internet, or drive your Prious around town to show you love the environment and display your Fuck Bush stickers. Hell, you might even get hurt or in trouble and the USMC might not be able to save your ass. Go ahead, move to Europe with its high unemployment and inflation. Good luck keeping your head in the middle east unless you want to convert and pray 5 times a day. I hear Africa is beautiful this time of year, especially in Darfur (where the US government spent half a billion in aid in 2005 http://www.usaid.gov/locations/sub-saharan_africa/ sudan/darfur.html) Central, South America, the south Pacific are all beautiful unless you want clean water, don't mind bugs, socialists and or muslim terrorist and drug lords, or want a job. The sad truth is that most of you whiners lack the cahonnes and strength of conviction to give up your nice comfortable lifes here in the good old USA to move to even a civilized country. You would miss your mommy or your girlfriend or your favorite pizza or hanging out and bashing America. I know I am going to hear that there are all sorts of places that an American can and have moved without dire consequences and I am sure there are a lot of nice spots. But you will do it because it too easy to tell me I am wrong when you don't have to put up or shut up. I have been all over the world and I leave soon for South America (hooray for chloraquine, thats antimalarial medication for you whiney liberals who haven't been farther south than Cancun) but I always come back to the greatest nation in the world and you could not pay me move anywhere else. God Bless America And God Bless the President of the United States (whom ever it may be, now and forever)

What a load of bullshit. Graduates may not get the jobs they'd like, but they are certainly NOT common. See these Unesco figures for the number of students enrolled in tertiary education as a proportion of the tertiary school-age population. In 2002, China's ratio was 16%, compared to 83% for the US, 51% for Japan, for example. Whatever offices you're visiting (Fortune 500 branches?) are extremely untypical of China as a whole.

17,000?! What a joke.

http://www.usaid.gov/iraq/pdf/iraq_mass_graves.pdf

Since the Saddam Hussein regime was overthrown in May,
270 mass graves have been reported. By mid-January,
2004, the number of confirmed sites climbed to fifty-three.
Some graves hold a few dozen bodiestheir arms lashed
together and the bullet holes in the backs of skulls testimo-
ny to their execution. Other graves go on for hundreds of
meters, densely packed with thousands of bodies.
Weve already discovered just so far the remains of
400,000 people in mass graves, said British Prime
Minister Tony Blair on November 20 in London. The
United Nations, the U.S. State Department, Amnesty
International, and Human Rights Watch (HRW) all
estimate that Saddam Husseins regime murdered hun
dreds of thousands of innocent people. Human Rights
Watch estimates that as many as 290,000 Iraqis have
been disappeared by the Iraqi government over the
past two decades, said the group in a statement in May.
Many of these disappeared are those whose remains
are now being unearthed in mass graves all over Iraq.
If these numbers prove accurate, they represent a crime
against humanity surpassed only by the Rwandan geno
cide of 1994, Pol Pots Cambodian killing fields in the
1970s, and the Nazi Holocaust of World War II.

Let me repeat that in case you missed it:

"We've already discovered just so far the remains of
400,000 people in mass graves," said British Prime
Minister Tony Blair on November 20 in London.

Hi,
Yes, here is the link...
http://www.usaid.gov/locations/europe_eurasia/pres s/success/student_gateway.html

... and forget the UNESCO, the UNICEF, the Peace Corps and a miriad of other actions that do not interest you.

The Peace Corps is an organization created and funded by the U.S. Government. See http://www.peacecorp.gov./ You might also wish to consider US Aid, the organization that dispenses US taxpayer dollars to countries in dire need of relief. http://www.usaid.gov/

We will have to keep this in mind the next time we are asked for help. Since we are no longer trusted in the international community, make sure you reject any Philanthropic efforts by the United States such as:

this
this
this
this
and especially this

Run that last one as a summary of all countries and it is especially telling. I am pretty sick and tired of the hypocrisy, especially in much of Europe, tha berates the United States as xenophobic and untrustworthy yet has no qualms about accepting our assistance (and even asking for more).

If we really should be shunned, then fine. We will stop helping providing assistance to other countries as well. Let's see France, Germany, Russia, or China pony up like the US has. The US already contributes more than all these countries combined. Never happen.

I'm curious. Who do you think has killed more Iraq people? The Bush Regime Or Sadaam's Regime?

I'm going with Saddam's regime. The Iraq-centric conflict in the Gulf can arguably be said to have started in 1980, when Saddam launched a more-or-less surpise attack against its neighbor, Iran. In that conflict, at least 300,000 of Saddam's Iraqi citizens were killed, most of whom were conscripted foot soldiers. Probably a million people died in that bit of Saddam's aggession, including the substantial Iranian casualties. You can bone up on his attempt to expand his territory into Iran here, if you want.

Of course, that became a grinding war of attrition, and Saddam failed to get any traction. Next stop: his attempt to take over Kuwait by force. In reversing that invasion and pushing Saddam's troops back out of Kuwait, another 20,000 or so Iraqis were killed, sacrificed again by Saddam to his expansionist ambitions.

Of course, while busy trying to gobble up neighbors, Saddam's ruling clan oversaw horrendous mass killings within his own country. Those mass graves that have already been excavated show mass killings of at the very least, 400,000 people. Thousands of corpses, lined up, many with hands lashed together, with bullet holes in the back of their heads. Lots of them, women and children, too.

Then, how do you count the people that Saddam starved or medically neglected as he syphoned off the money - explicitly targeted for that use by the (ridiculously corrupt) United Nations - and instead continued to build palaces, and bolster his private Republican Guard and tribal relatives in Tikrit. Then there's the 50,000-100,000 Kurds that he killed while trying to crush their movement for freedom from minority Sunni rule.

How are we doing so far? I'm guessing that you'll now back up the implication of your comment, and enumerate how the United States has killed over a million Iraqis? Get busy. And just for comparison, be sure to mention the millions that recently got to vote, for the first time ever, for their own elected officials.

But, is there any authority in Iraq that can handle this?

Just because Iraq can't handle every detail of everything they're tackling, and need a lot of international support, doesn't mean they shouldn't be assigned the authority to do so. For example - USAID is helping their Ministry of Communications with an enormous task: getting the local telecom infrastructure up to date. That seems like a natural channel through which to tackle domain admin, even if it's with some help for a while. For some comments on how much fiber and whatnot they've been stringing up, see here, just as an example.

Maybe they are busy doing something else.

Me, I will stick with the USA and what we stand for.

As for Sudan, have they asked for help? Do you even know what you are talking about? Sudan has been in a 20-year civil war. It is not the US's job to police the world. The people of Sudan have been fighting back and it is the people who will have their way, just as the USA didn't need intervention during our _own_ civil war. Also,

The Government of Sudan and southern rebel forces signed a framework peace agreement in early June 2004

As for Zimbabwe, there has been a lot of humanitarian assistance, just search Google and see the tons of aid from the USA and the people of the USA.

You need some new history books.

India and China are using trade to defeat us.

If you look at the GDP of China, they are where we were in 1970! I certainly wouldn't call that "China defeating us", since they are over 35 years behind us. Oh, and the GDP of India doesn't even come close to that of the USA. Just because a few low-tech jobs are out-sourced to India, doesn't mean we are being "defeated". A simple bill passed by congress could stop India and China in their tracks. Congress just needs to pass a bill that charges all US companies an extra "heavy" tax for out-sourced labor or any imported goods from China. That would slow things down for China and India and US companies could still do the same trade with other nations like Taiwan. The USA still has _plenty_ of tricks up-her-sleeve to make sure that we don't lose that #1 spot.

So go on now and take your tree-planting-kit and move to Canada, eh!

The Canadian one, at least, is a fast online credit-card donation. You can print out your tax receipt right away. (hey, before midnight gets it in for this tax year, right?)

Or, there are plenty of other organizations that would be happy to receive a donation.

An anonymous coward claiming to have a half-million dollar income is now a fact? Get real! I think the odds are rather good that was simply an anonymous liar.

I was referring to your "typical american" line. Who knows if he actually donated that money...

I provided the facts and figures earlier.
Which were old, dated, and just plain wrong.

The US donates less per person than France, and significantly less in total than just the Scandanavian countries.

Incorrect.

Clearly you haven't read my other post

Here are the highlights, maybe you'll read it this time
--------------
Noticeably absent from the anti-american salon article are numbers for private charitable giving (which dwarf any country no matter how you slice - Hell, between 1992 and 1998 the US sent almost $2.9 billion in PRIVATE AID to CUBA!) and US military expenditures (no, we're not discussing Iraq) that are solely for humanitarian purposes.

We're moving a f'en carrier group into the region for support and search and rescue, you think that's cheap?

With 300 million people you donated ODA $6.9 billion in foreign aid in 1997.

http://www.usaid.gov/fani/ch06/privateaid.htm
The actual total of official development assistance and private giving was $44.5 billion, or 0.45 percent of U.S. gross national income - and that still doesn't account for military humanitarian spending

LOL: In 2000 U.S. universities and colleges gave more to developing countries in foreign scholarships than Australia, Belgium, Norway, Spain, and Switzerland each gave in ODA.

What were you saying again?

And, btw, the current numbers for ODA funding are:
Australia - $1.2 Billion [oecd.org]
France - $7.3 Billion [oecd.org]
US - $16.2 Billion [oecd.org] (a 23% increase over last year under the evil Bushilter!)
--------------

Awww... poor little eurotrash. You seem to think that the only organization fit to distribute funds are governmental orgs and that the only funds that count are ones that are gathered through coercion (taxes).

Noticeably absent from the anti-american salon article are numbers for private charitable giving (which dwarf any country no matter how you slice - Hell, between 1992 and 1998 the US sent almost $2.9 billion in PRIVATE AID to CUBA!) and US military expenditures (no, we're not discussing Iraq) that are solely for humanitarian purposes.

We're moving a f'en carrier group into the region for support and search and rescue, you think that's cheap?

With 300 million people you donated ODA $6.9 billion in foreign aid in 1997.

http://www.usaid.gov/fani/ch06/privateaid.htm
The actual total of official development assistance and private giving was $44.5 billion, or 0.45 percent of U.S. gross national income - and that still doesn't account for military humanitarian spending

LOL: In 2000 U.S. universities and colleges gave more to developing countries in foreign scholarships than Australia, Belgium, Norway, Spain, and Switzerland each gave in ODA.

What were you saying again?

And, btw, the current numbers for ODA funding are:
Australia - $1.2 Billion
France - $7.3 Billion
US - $16.2 Billion (a 23% increase over last year under the evil Bushilter!)

Could you be more specific?

Are you talking about the 1,000,000+ casualties when Saddam invaded Iran in 1980?

Or are you talking about the 300,000-400,000 casualties of Saddam's war on the Iraqi people?

Or are you talking about the 20,000 - 35,000 casualties when Saddam invaded Kuwait in 1990?

Or are you talking about the the 14,000 - 17,000 counted at Iraqibodycount which is a one time cost to stop Saddams murderous regime?

Or are you talking about the ... "creative" numbers in that now famous Lancet article? It is really amazing. The United States has a mortality rate of 8.5/1,000 whereas they found Iraq had a mortality rate of 5/1,000 before the war (p. 4, results) which they used to "calculate" a total of 8,000 to 194,000 excess deaths with the "most likely" value of 98,000. (Check out those confidence intervals.) Some find those numbers fishy, or simply unrealistic.

Do you care about the millions that Saddam killed? If so, don't worry, he won't be killing anymore.

Your claim that "the country's energy is far *lower* than before the war" is incorrect.

http://www.usaid.gov/iraq/pdf/AYearInIraq_infrastr ucture.pdf

By October 2003 the Electricity generation surpassed prewar levels. 4500 Megawatts postwar vs 4400 prewar.

http://www.usaid.gov/iraq/pdf/iraq_electric_Sept04 .pdf

And by September 2004 electricity producton was nearly 50% *above* prewar levels 6000 Megawatts vs 4400 prewar.

Also:

"While total electric power output continued to climb, it was distributed in a new way. Under the old regime, the outlying regions were required to send power to Baghdad which enjoyed electricity nearly 24 hours per day. But the smaller cities such as Basra had power only a couple of hours each day. Now power is more evenly shared, even if Baghdadis may feel they have less hours of power than they enjoyed in the past."

Your claim that "the country's energy is far *lower* than before the war" is incorrect.

http://www.usaid.gov/iraq/pdf/AYearInIraq_infrastr ucture.pdf

By October 2003 the Electricity generation surpassed prewar levels. 4500 Megawatts postwar vs 4400 prewar.

http://www.usaid.gov/iraq/pdf/iraq_electric_Sept04 .pdf

And by September 2004 electricity producton was nearly 50% *above* prewar levels 6000 Megawatts vs 4400 prewar.

Also:

"While total electric power output continued to climb, it was distributed in a new way. Under the old regime, the outlying regions were required to send power to Baghdad which enjoyed electricity nearly 24 hours per day. But the smaller cities such as Basra had power only a couple of hours each day. Now power is more evenly shared, even if Baghdadis may feel they have less hours of power than they enjoyed in the past."

No, it's called International aid and the USA doesn't do nearly enough of it

"It is, however, an estimate that is based on very different methodology from standard methodology for assessing causalities, namely on the number of people reported to have been killed at the time,"

I'll debate you on the facts.

First, we have not killed thousands of innocents. Sure, maybe during Vietnam or the Korean War or World War II, but not during the Iraq wars. I'd like to see your source. The reason we don't hear about it is because it hasn't happened. That's the same reason why you haven't heard about the six billion dollars I made selling lemonade.

If you would like to know who has killed thousands of innocent Iraqis, look to Saddam Hussein. Look at the mass graves. (link, link, and link) Look at the torture he has inflicted. (link, link, link)

I don't know how that even compares to the limited number of casualties that the US Forces caused. It doesn't even compare with what happened at Abu Ghraib. Nevertheless, America as a country is pursuing justice. Already, one of the perpetrators has been heavily sentenced. The others will be punished shortly. At least they get a fair trial.

Now, I know I won't sway you with my words or my evidence, because you have already seen the evidence. You are like the monkey who refuses to see and hear the atrocities committed against the people in Iraq. You then turn around and make a mountain out of a molehill, comparing the abuse that some prisoners suffered at the hand of American soldiers to the torture and suffering that Saddam caused.

I looked for accurate data on the number of civilians killed in Iraq by American soldiers. There is no such number reported anywhere. And the numbers of civilians killed isn't even accurate. Some say 25,000. Others say 6,000. Which one is right? Why are they so different? It's easy. They are not accurate. No one has done an actual body count. No one has done a count where civilians were distinguished from terrorists, insurgents, and the Iraqi military. Unfortunately, you can't ask the dead whether they were innocent or a terrorist. And you can't tell by what clothes they were wearing or even their age.

Your lies stop here.

Please provide a source for your numbers.

According to what I can find, the average Afghani earns between $180 and $200 per year, not the number you state. Your post may not be flamebait (don't remember seeing it) but the number you use in this post is wrong (over ten times high) from what I can find.

If he is getting $200 per month, then he is getting an annual income of 12 times the average, PLUS living rent free, PLUS being supported by his four sons.

NOT middle class.

Not only that, but he is probably used to it, as he brought in about 10 years of income from his first invention - he made 'over a thousand' radios and sold them for 'under two dollars' or close to $2000 45 years ago.

That long ago the average income was less (see the links) but not much less (again, see the links - especially the one where the Afghani government states that the Afghani people in twenty years could have gone from $200 to $500 per year if not for the wars and fighting) so I would guess he qualifies as a non-middle class dude, dude.

link

link

link

link

link

Uh, electricity is already above pre-war levels and with a system in place that is far superior to the system that existed before the war. Don't believe me? Check it out.

No, Bush isn't doing anything about AIDS.

Last year, he tripled the budget for foriegn aid earmarked to fighting AIDS in Africa and the Caribbean to $15 Billion over 3 years. There are lots of things to criticize Bush about, but this may be the one thing he's done right.

220,000?

Sorry "dude".

Interesting number since they've already found mass graves holding 400,000 or more, and that was last November. And those don't include the hundreds of thousands that were killed by Saddam attacking Iran in 1980.

Take a look here

Interesting quotes:
"We've already discovered just so far the remains of 400,000 people in mass graves," said British Prime Minister Tony Blair on November 20 in London.

Some graves hold a few dozen bodies--their arms lashed together and the bullet holes in the backs of skulls testimony to their execution

Yes, you are right, I myself was vaccinated with the BCG (still have the mark on my arm !) - not sure how I forgot that. By the way you have to get a shot every 10 years to keep it up to date.

Now I did a bit more research, and yes tuberculosis seems to still be one of the deadliest, one third of the world's population is infected with TB. Now the good news: People do research against tuberculosis and have made huge progress very recently. So this story should have been has big as the one about ebola...

So, what we need is to educate the populace while we feed them. Give them a chance to learn either a trade skill, or to go to university. Then, the educated can help rebuild the country. Admittedly, computers aren't the sole answer to this, but it would be a part. Those who have the intelligence and literacy would be able to teach themselves, and as other posters have said, Google is a better textbook than nothing for schools that lack resources.

I grew up with my dad in USAID. He still works for them. That is what the US does, feed and teach, try to build the infrastructure. Or at least, what we try to do. It doesn't always work of course, but usually it does. At least until the next civil war. It is hard to get critical mass on these types of projects. At least, with the funds we give our forgein aid projects.

Wishing americans dead is a good recipie for foe development.

I would not argue that attacking Iraq was a good idea. I would argue that now that we are there, we should support our troops.

Hussien has run his country into the ground in an oppressive dictatorship. People in the middle east protesting the US are also protesting Hussien at the same time. Very odd to see.

While I don't think it gives any country the right to attack another, I will say a few things in defense of the US.

1) The US gives more foreign aid in money, food, and medical supplies than any other country. This was true in 2001 and 2002, and previous to that it was second to japan since the early 90's. Perhaps you call this an extension of foreign policy, but I call it our money to help others. 11.4 billion worth in 2003. Those are just the ODA numbers. For the real story look here

2) Whenever any country needs assistance militarily they come to the US. We have fought wars and spilled the blood of our citizens in 2 world wars, the korean war, the vietnam war, the gulf war, and several more minor conflicts. Perhaps you call this an extension of foreign policy, but I call it our blood to help others.

3) Whenever a country has needed assistance to rebuild after such a war we help them do that. We pay for the war, and we pay for the rebuilding. Perhaps you call this an extension of foreign policy, but I call it our money to help others.

If it weren't for #2, all of Europe would be eating schnitzel twice over, and if it weren't for #3 Germany wouldn't be able to eat at all.

Bush's diplomatic skills are bad, but the hearts of the US population are in the right place. We do want freedom for the people in Iraq. We are sad every time we hear about another casualty on the radio in the war. Our hearts go out every time we hear about someone going hungry somewhere. The aid numbers above only reflest what the govt.
does.

This Link provides the ODA numbers, and while in contrast to the link above, does also speak of the total charitable donations of the US population, which was around 34 billion last year. That's a total of at least 45 billion dollars in aid.

But...if you want to kill us off, that's fine. Just don't come knocking if you need anything.