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Stingy?

by Conservativity Staff,
Originally Posted: 12/29/2004 11:06:09 AM

Jan Egeland, chief of the United Nations’ humanitarian aid programs, has called the United States’ $30 million donation to the UN relief effort for the mega-tsunami damage wrought on Southeast Asia "stingy."  Our initial $15 million UN pledge has more than doubled to $35 million.  Compare this to the $170,000 plus a planeload of relief workers from France.  Mr. Egeland shows the typical America-hating extreme left viewpoint, where the private donations and the non-UN relief is not counted.

"[W]e are the most generous country in history, whether you measure it by amount of dollars, percentage of GDP, percentage of GNP or per capita."

We have already committed over a billion dollars to this effort.  Historically, the United States of America is the most generous country on Earth, having spent trillions to help others over time.  Moreover, we are the most generous country in history, whether you measure it by amount of dollars, percentage of GDP, percentage of GNP or per capita.  Our citizens simply believe that all of the money and help does not need to be routed through the wasteful and corrupt United Nations, or even for that matter the wasteful (but at least honest) United States governmental bureaucracy.

Mark my words when I say that the United States’ generosity and charity (which by the way is influenced by the teachings of Jesus Christ, to which many Americans, to the great chagrin of the left, adhere) will outstrip the donations of all other countries on Earth combined.  How do I know this?  Because we are always generous, and there is no way that we will ever be the "stingy" people that Mr. Egeland accuses us in his libelous and snobbish rant.  In fact, we are disproportionately generous when compared to the rest of the Earth.

This generosity even extends to our funding of the UN.  We are but one country of nearly 200, but we provide nearly 23% of its entire budget!  That outstrips our percentage of population (295 million out of 6 billion = 4.9%) by nearly five times!  It also outstrips our percentage of world wealth.  And this is how we fund the UN, with the oil-for-food Iraq scandal, where it appears that greedy UN personnell scammed billions for themselves; these thieves may be out of the reach of all law enforcement.

"So what if we don’t route more money through the UN?  It is perhaps the best way to ensure that the victims and not the greedy UN officials get the money."

So what if we don’t route more money through the UN?  It is perhaps the best way to ensure that the victims and not the greedy UN officials get the money.  As I understand it, we have more than 300 planes on the ground in the disaster areas, right now.  We have the USS Abraham Lincoln and elements of the Marine Expeditionary Force on the way to the area to assist in aid.  The Red Cross and Red Crescent (its Muslim equivalent) are both raising massive amounts of money as well as potable water and non-perishable food.

Stingy?  Yeah, right.