Death in Aceh, Indifference in Crawford

[RickSp]

From Juan Coles's Blog Informed Comment and Harris and Wright's reporting in the Washington Post. Aid Grows Amid Remarks About President's Absence

Would be nice if the President even attempted to appear that he gave a damn. He could at least try to fake it.

As John F. Harris and Robin Wright of the Washington Post cannily note, US President George W. Bush has missed an important opportunity to reach out to the Muslims of Indonesia. The Bush administration at first pledged a paltry $15 million, a mysteriously chintzy response to what was obviously an enormous calamity. Bush himself remained on vacation, and now has reluctantly agreed to a meeting of the National Security Council by video conference. If Bush were a statesman, he would have flown to Jakarta and announced his solidarity with the Muslims of Indonesia (which has suffered at least 40,000 dead and rising). Indeed, the worst-hit area of Indonesia is Aceh, the center of a Muslim separatist movement, and a gesture to Aceh from the US at this moment might have meant a lot in US-Muslim public relations. Bin Laden and Zawahiri sniffed around Aceh in hopes of recruiting operatives there, being experts in fishing in troubled waters. Doesn't the US want to outflank al-Qaeda? As it is, the president of the United States is invisible and on vacation (unlike several European heads of state), and could think of nothing better to do than announce a paltry pledge. As Harris and Wright rightly say, the rest of the world treated the US much better than this after September 11.

There was an international outpouring of support after the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, and even some administration officials familiar with relief efforts said they were surprised that Bush had not appeared personally to comment on the tsunami tragedy. "It's kind of freaky," a senior career official said.

[Leebert]

I think that amount has been upped by another $20 million so that should make things all right. :rolleyes: I don't know why I am surprised that this is the level of concern our administration is showing.

• Cost of relief aid for one of the worst natural disasters of our time: $35 million
• Cost of invading a sovereign nation under utterly false pretenses: Hundreds of billions of dollars
• Disentigration of all that once made America one of the greatest countries ever: Priceless

Forgive my venting but I'm a little fed up with the miserable excuse we call our government right now.

[RickSp]

For comparison purposes, $35 milion is about what the US spends every 6 hours in Iraq.

With luck the American people will be generous, independent of their government. Amazon.com has set up a portal to help folks donate to tsunami disaster relief via the American Red Cross .

Doctors without Borders and AmeriCares are also both excellent groups.

[rmnunez]

Among the nations donating money are Spain sending 50m euros ($68m or £35m) and the UK, sending 21m euros ($29m or £21m).