Charity

Charity & Goodwill:

There's more of the former than the latter, these days. In the event that you should wish to exercise some toward the survivors of the Great Christmas Quake, CareUSA has a setup. The Red Cross / Red Crescent has another. I imagine that those of you who attend religious services regularly probably have a way of your own to donate. Most likely you know others as well.

In addition, you are providing aid through the official government agencies. Australia's government is taking the lead in Indonesia, with USPACOM focusing on Sri Lanka and Thailand.

But this kind of aid is "stingy," according to U.N. Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Jan Egeland, who said that

[T]he United States and other Western nations were being "stingy" with relief funds, [and] there would be more available if taxes were raised.

"It is beyond me why are we so stingy, really," the Norwegian-born U.N. official told reporters. "Christmastime should remind many Western countries at least, [of] how rich we have become."

"There are several donors who are less generous than before in a growing world economy," he said, adding that politicians in the United States and Europe "believe that they are really burdening the taxpayers too much, and the taxpayers want to give less. It's not true. They want to give more."

I strongly suspect that almost none of you needed me to post the links to charitable organizations. From the recent Spirit of America fundraiser, Doc Russia and I learned how extraordinarily generous the readers of our blogs can be. Probably every one of you has taken time to find out how to give, and has already given what you can. You did so in spite of having just given to Spirit of America, and at the Yuletide, when disposable income is already earmarked for gifts for others.

It's no surprise that the U.N. feels we are being "stingy" by not turning over more of our wealth for them to control. In the end, it is far more likely that a dollar donated to Spirit of America will do good, than any dollar spent by any U.N. bureaucracy. You have reason to feel good about what you have done.