Cut Foreign Aid
 

:) I say cut Foreign Aid and give us all a tax break. Why??????? We all have spent Billions of dollars, Euros, etc. and Millions of manhours trying to improve third world countries. Of the Billions spent, very little money actually reaches the people at the bottom, why?????????........and the return on the investment is Zero for us. Is this an ENDLESS MONEY PIT???????

Think about it, there isn't a business out there in the world that would spend Billions for a Zero return on the investment. Are the charity organizations a business??????? Does only a portion of what the charities take in actually get to the people??????

I still don't see Billions apon Billions apon Billions of improvement in these third world countries. That only can mean one thing. Sending all this money over there is NOT an effective way to stop poverty or crime. Someone has to come up with a better solution for these countries........money just isn't doing the job.

As the saying goes "Charity starts at home" and that's the way it should be. We need to educate, train, motivate and equip the young people right here at home to meet the upcoming challenges of the world.

I can't believe these minority groups here in Canada want the government to increase foreign aid.....and if they don't send money the groups won't help vote in the next government (talk about threatening)........, better yet, why not send them ALL OUR JOBS while they're at it............Oh, and listen to the whinning that the minority groups made over here when Pakistan had a disaster recently. I'll give you a hint what people think about that one. They heard nothing but whinning and they generally ignored it. Why?????? Because people don't like to be whinned at. (So ofcourse they don't give as much money then).

I sure didn't see ALL these third world countries coming to the aid of the United States when the hurricanes ripped through this year..........but boy do they ever whinne when something happens over in their country.

Maybe the third world countries would be better off fixing their own problems without all our help??????????

Have to agree.. For exsample Finland puts most of its foreign aid to Tanzania. They have gotten billions of dollars during a time of over 30 years. They have absolutely nothing to show from that. Finland isnt an ex colonialist country so dont see we are in debth. Finland itself was a colony of Sweden and Russia until 1918. We were a poor agricultural country even after WW2. Now we are a rich hi-tech country without taking even Marshall aid. Maybe its time the developing countries look critically if they could do something better to help themselfs.

Wondering what this mother and child would say about these views.

http://www.episcopalchurch.org/hires...tarving_bw.jpg

There is, however, strong evidence that the aid really isn't helping. There is something inherently wrong in the structure of the governemtns and/or societies that this aid is going to.

I think they've been treated unfairly by the colonizing powers, yes. And I think some measure of humanitarian relief is needed. But there needs to be some realistic assessment of the measures.

I'm sorry to say it, but before I send money to Africa, I'll send some to my troubled relatives in Russia, which I do. And before I run to my government telling them to forgive 3rd World debt, I'll ask them to forgive my hefty student loans.

Egoism? Perhaps. But had we all been altruistic, none of these measures would be needed.

Something contraversial here.

Do you think the African nations were better managed and the people better off under colonial rule of the Briths, Germans, French, Dutch and whoever else was there?

Well this is most likely caused by their own goverment and pumping billions of economic aid isnt going to help :doh: The picture is from a situation that requires CATASTROPHY aid not ECONOMIC aid wich we were talking about.

Aid does nothing to alleviate poverty compared to economic growth. The best thing rich countries can do to help the third world is free trade by slashing their tariffs. If aid must be given, it should be in the form of underwriting microfinance ventures that give out small loans to peasants - which actually could end up producing a profit despite the high risk.

It's ironic that those leftist activists who say we don't do enough to help the third world are usually the same ones who decry globalisation, when history has proven that capitalism is the answer.

This "aid" (*) is only giving them more rope to hang themselves with. If some country cannot get a sustainable system with its available resources, then it is overpopulated and/or mismanaged. Supporting such countries allows them to continue in bad ways, damaging the ecosystem, reducing carrying capacity even further, and reinforcing bad management. So they can be expected to be in need of even more aid later.

Of course, this might seem like an extremely cruel view when Drebbel posts a picture of someone who looks like she and her child could really use some help. Those people who cannot handle the idea that there are no simple or "nice" solutions for all problems would then choose to "help", which makes them feel good about themselves, and refuse to consider the harmful long-term consequences. Most people's idea of ethical behaviour in these cases consists of doing what makes them feel good, not thinking about whether it really is good. How much suffering you will cause if you choose to "help", this is a topic most people would rather avoid.

Of course, one might want to draw a distinction between aid in the case of brief random disasters (like hurricanes or tsunamis) and persistent ever-worsening cases. Even though some of the death toll during disasters is due to bad preparation or reckless behaviour, aid may be OK as it only gives some help to restore a previously working system, and aid can, in such cases, be compared to an insurance system. But supporting a seriously flawed system does not help, it harms.




(*) intervention would be a better word, because the word "aid" makes it sound like a good thing.

Morally it's a no-win-situation, whatever option one chooses, it's a looser. Western nations have to accept too great responsebility in the past but also in the present to have pushed foreign people and cultures to where they are right now, and that way noone can say that the West back then and third world today have had the same starting conditions, in terms of preconditions and generally: "fairness".
[This shall not allow to ignore the fact that sometimes foreign people's cultures and history themselves have created factors that negatively feed back on their contemporary status and chances for the future; rigid society structures, for example (Hinduism), or a spiritual climate that does not allow the developement of reason and logic, science and philosophy (Islam), or a code of laws regulating tribal interactions in a way that let's them stagnate, not develope, or embraces them in neverending tribal wars. Africa) ]
But with regard to our owhn history, we nevertheless owe to many of them. But almost every helping effort suffers from corruption, and war parties picking away what they consider to be their share of it. Such interest groups even create "events" to make the aide go flowing again sot hat they can have their income: it's usual business in Africa and parts of Southeast Asia, south America as well. If you give one dollar to a street collector, 20, 30, 50 % of it will end in form of ammunition, weapons and medical supplies for war factions that at the same time gets damned in the world's media at the same time. If you want to help, you have to support massmurderes and wars and massacres that were committed to make you spend money when you see the pictures of unhappy mothers and starving children. Reality does not know cynism - it simply is what it is.

The morality issue becomes even sharper when thinking about if this planet even can afford to allow all people in the world the same ammount of industrialization and material luxury we enjoy ourselves in the West. Consider 1.2 billion Chinese sharing the American lifestyle - that would mean, that waste of ressources and environmental and aerial pollution would rocket straight into the air by multiple factors! Or all African families having the same density of car-owning like european or American societies. And... and... Our Western life style is seriously out of balance. It is of such an absurd and queer quality that we cannot survive if ALL mankind is living to this standard. "They" may have to little. But surely "we" demand too much for ourselves.

Everybody wants to party, but noone wants to clean the kitchen.

The only reasonable longterm perspective I see as valid is that we in the West start manhunting and getting rid of our corrupt, egoist self-declared lying and deeply rotten "elites" in economics and politics and kill the evil selfishness they have implemented in world trade, global arms trade, and economicial exploitation (for example by supporting dictators here and there, or warlords like those that were talked about above - if only they guarantee the flow of needed ressources like uran, diamonds, or whatever.). Our politiccs are based on lies, betrayal and self-deception. How can we expect that ever something good will come from them? they are no solution to the problems, they are the root of it. Kill them, and shed no tear for them.

We also need to rethink if the values will live up to are really reasonable and "valuable". If they have led us to where we are, than obviously something is terribly wrong with them. It is no wisdom to propagate a way of living and a code of ethics that leads us to designing our civilization for ultimate implosive suicide on a materialistically high developed level. It has led us away from what really counts. So it is a wrong way, or we are not still not ripe to handle the fruits of our sowings with the needed sense of responsebility. I always thought that space travelling developed much faster than the evolution of human mind. It gives us no new capacity to solve our problems on a basic level, but gives us the ability only to transport our problems to the stars. We constantly acceölerate, and more and more people get physically and psychologically sick by the mad speed modern life is lived by, and we have develoeped clear destructive symptoms on all levels of communal and individual life. Mayn poorer societies neverthelss paradoxically enjoy a far higher level of mental health than we do. Shouldn't this make us think twice about our self-declared superiority?

What to do for you and me? My answer: help the individual, if you happen to know someone. You can even try to get to know someone in need of help. If you really want to help, there is no esxcuse for you not to find someone in need for help, wether it be far away, or next to your place. Just open your damn eyes. If you want to help, you can find someone who needs help, and you can find him on day one of your search - guaranteed. Do not rely on institututions and organisation and medias, don'T let yourself beeing intimidated by media reports about how big in scale the latest bad event has been, concentrate on the scale of your own life. Don't do it because it makes you feel good, or proud, or because your faith tells you it is a good thing - just do it, and do it for the sake of the one person that receives your help. If you do it because you think of your fate on judgement day, you already have poisened your effort again. Don't try to save the world, but try to save the one next to you. Influence others you happen to know into this direction of thinking. If only enough people would do that, it would change our acting on the higher level of social community: it then would change our politics, our priorities in economy, our hierarchy of ethical values, and so forth.

Nothing else will ever work. Their is no instant-highway to paradise-on-earth.

I am a realist. Of course it will not come this way, I know.

The alternatives given hy Happy Times I only think about as the usual often-thought "reasonable" alibis for not doing anything and keeping all we have for ourselves, never questioning the righteousness of our way of going, or the economical wisdom in it. Business as usual, that means.

Pictures like the one posted by Drebbel are a mirror to me, in which I see the reflected image of ourself's failure, and the dark side of our selfish mind. That women is not a mother in some far away, desperate land. She is the face of your self that you have murdered yourself long time ago.

So look at that picture, and in her eyes recognize yourself.

Well i still allways participate in the Red Cross campaigns, they go to something usefull and urgent for the most part. I just think its stupid to just give away money to corrupt goverments without any results coming from it. You said that their preconditions after colonization werent fair and the same. But one could argue that they got their basic infrastructure from that time. What if Europeans hadnt gone to Africa,Asia,America. What would be different? They wouldnt be killing each other? There wouldnt be AIDS? Poverty? Corruption? Sorry but im not going to start feeling bad about the state of developing countries. And if there is too many people on the earth, i think nature will work it out.

:) I wonder how many dollars/Euros have been spent on arms out of the total amount of foreign aid (intervention) so far????????? Anyone know what the price of an AK-47 is in a third world country???????? (bet it's a lot less than here).

As for accountabilty for all this money being sent over to third world nations...................

WHERE IS IT????????????? :hmm: :hmm: :hmm:

Show me the real financial records and receipts (not the second set of financial books)!!!!!!!! (It would take a medium sized army to manage the book keeping alone). :nope:

What percentage do organizations like Care, World Vision and the like take off the front end of donations realistically??????????? (What is their real profit margin??????) Anyone really know??????
(My guess is more than 50% managed through creative book keeping). How much are the accounting costs alone?????????

I wonder what an uninterupted hour without advertising of Television time costs to rent on a major network????? :hulk:

What does it cost to send a large ocean going freighter overseas with a shipment. What does it cost to rent a Boeing 737 to ship goods overseas????????? (Or do we put the goods in pop bottles, toss them into the sea, and they magically arrive there?).

I agree, cut forign aid

Cut foreign aid to South America.

Though nowhere near the troubling levels of Africa, when the money doesn't land in obscure hands and directly funds perverse agendas, it usually turns into an enslaving plain hand-out charity program, which causes much more harm than good.

There are specific cases where foreign aid would actually help, usually in disaster areas, and each case must be analized individually, but long-term hand-out with no plan or goal or exit route is negative in anyway you see it.

Not to mention the absurd cases, such as the official British and Australian financing of the disarmament campaign in Brazil, I wonder how the Brit and Aussie tax payer would feel if you told him his hard-earned money was wasted on a failed, useless, campaign.

On a private level, there are European marxist Catholic Priests who willingly or unwillingly help finance criminal organizations by handing over money to obscure NGO's, one of which was almost shut down when many irregularities were found in its finances, after that the donations ceased.

The assassins of the American Nun were linked to an organization which had received private foreign aid, it's hard to tell, but most donators probably don't even know where their money is going to, and that it is being used by murderers!

I would also like to suggest to anyone that you avoid donating to Care, WWF or Green Peace when it comes to donations to Brazil, these three organizations may have some nice people who wants to do good and help, but the best they have done overall is waste ALOT of money, there are a few succesfull projects, but there are others that are a plain money drain, sometimes I wonder if they are doing money laundry or if they simply don't care since there is always more money raining in.

But if your conscience demands it or you just want to do your part, then buy shares on our Stock Market or Bonds, buy Brazilian imported products, and only donate to organizations if you can personally check where the money is going to, if it is hard to verify, search for another organization, by doing any of this you are actually supporting independent people who are pulling their own weight in society, we can take care of our own charity needs.

now put yourself in a starving 5 year olds shoes you live in a mud hut your mum and dad dead and your 7 year old sister looks after you, you have not eaten for over a week and starting to feel ill the hospital is 200 miles away and you can only walk.

and you are saying cut forign aid :( shame on you

id rather pay taxes to help support them people than buy yet another multi million dollar plane.

would you let your own kids get like that ? some people have no choice some have to rely on handouts from us, we got the money but we are to tight fisted to hand some over if the richest nations on earth (america japan britain europe and russia) all handed over one weeks income and wrote off the countrys debt then we could help wipe poverty out.

its not something you wish for your born into it at least give them people who are not as fortunate as me and you a chance dont they deserve it?

there is only one cause of starvation, overpopulation.

if a area of land only gets enough rain to support x amount of people its no good trying to keep 50x living there.