It's Tea Time

No, seriously.

Amid the mounting frustration, UN chief Ban Ki-moon asked former US president Bill Clinton to "assume a leadership role" in coordinating the international aid, UN spokesman Martin Nesirky told a press briefing.

"The aim... is to provide strategic guidance to the United Nations involvement at an international level," Nesirky said.
Clinton added: "The trick is to get the Haitian people back where they can stop living from day-to-day and start living from week-to-week or month-to-month and then start the long-term efforts.

"They, the leaders there, want to build a functioning, modern state for the first time, and I will do what I can to faithfully represent and work with all the agencies of the UN and help them get it done," he added.

Really Bill, is that the "trick"? Brilliant, glad you're on top of things.

Long story short: Haiti is screwed. The people who are acting like they care are only doing this for their ego and any political gain that might come from being involved. I am willing to bet that ten years from now, Haiti will still be an absolutely hellish place to live.

Why wouldn't it be. How many times do you think something to the effect of Clinton's comments have been uttered? Great, Haiti wants to build a "functioning, modern state". What did they want before, an ass backwards broken state? If so, well done on that front.

What a horrible state of being for the Haitian people, and with nothing but talk from bureaucrats to sustain them. Too bad they can't eat speeches, they'd be in good shape.

Haiti is decimated. It may or may not be one of the world's worst places to live now. I wouldn't be able to tell you for sure, because I'm not that interested in sticking that kind of information into my brain.

One thing I can say with certainty, however, is that crises such as these lead to an absolutely incredible outpouring of stupid. Now I know this stupidity is predicated on the belief that self sacrifice is the most noble of causes, but can we at least allow logic to seep into the cracks of our altruistic grandeur? Just a little?

If you peruse Yahoo Answers, which I often do when I'm antsy, you'll find quite a bit of questions relating to Haiti these days. Now I know Yahoo Answers is not an accurate representation of any specific cross section of our culture (or species), but it is an easy way for me to point out a set of behaviors I feel are typical of the opportunist altruist.

Before I continue I feel it necessary to point out that I do understand the desire to help another human being in need. I am not a sadist. What bothers me is what we consider to be help, and what we consider not to be help. For instance, sometimes not helping can be the best way to help. To illustrate this particular point, we'll go back to Yahoo Answers:

Here is a question posted by "Pat", who I assume to be a young woman but could just as easily be a young man (damn androgynous names):

Does anyone know of an alternative spring break for Haiti?
I'd like to somehow go to Haiti for my school spring break and help out for a week. Does anyone know of an organization I could go through?

On its face this question seems harmless enough. Even a bit sweet. Hey, who wouldn't think it was nice of this young woman/man to dedicate her spring break time to go to Haiti and do some good. Everyone who answered this question seemed to agree, and were more than willing to give her options for getting herself to Haiti. Everyone except me that is.

If you're someone who agrees with some or most of the other things I've written, you've probably already figured out what bothers me about this. It probably bothers you too. You may even have had a conversation with your monitor right after reading this young woman's (I'm going with woman on this) question. I can't guess the exact nature of that conversation, but I'm willing to bet it was rather misanthropic.

So here's the problem: This young woman is in college. She has no skill set that would be useful in the current environment in Haiti. To the contrary, her presence there would be of serious detriment to the Haitian people. You see, once her little feet (I envision her as skinny and petite, who wants to envision an obese woman in Haiti?) touch the soil of Haiti, she is no different than the Haitian's currently stuck there. She will have no way to acquire food other than through that which is supported by aid groups, no way to get water, no shelter. And if she does acquire these things, which she likely will, she will only be taking away from those who truly needed it. She doesn't need it right now, she has food, water, shelter...she should stay where she is. Hence by not helping, she is helping.

Haiti doesn't need more unskilled laborers. They are essentially a nation that is made up of unskilled laborers. Their fertility rate is one of the higher rates in the western hemisphere, churning out more low level workers by the day. What they need are visionary engineers, folks who have a great deal of experience working with important infrastructural systems like water and power. They need mouths to feed that are truly worth feeding the scarce amount of food and water they currently have. People who bring the promise of Haiti becoming a better place to live in the future. I doubt this is what they'll get.

I had planned on discussing the money situation (i.e. donations, etc) with Haiti as well, but I have some other things I must attend too. In lieu of me explaining I'll let an unlikely source explain: MSNBC.

Donations of old clothes, canned goods, water and outdated prescriptions are accumulating, said Brooks. While such items sound useful, they’re actually expensive to sort, to transport and to distribute, she said. Cast-off drugs can be dangerous.

Oftentimes, the household items donated are simply not useful to the disaster victims they’re intended to help.

“I guarantee you someone is going to send a winter coat or high-heeled shoes,” Brooks said.

In fact, after the tsunami in Indonesia in 2004, aid organizers in Sri Lanka were forced to deal with donations of stiletto shoes, expired cans of salmon, evening gowns and even thong panties, according to news reports. In Florida, a truckload of mink coats showed up during the 2004 hurricane season, Rothe-Smith said, a likely tax write-off for a retailer having trouble pushing furs.

And they didn't even (shocker) mention the corruption involved in a government like Haiti. How exactly can you donate money in confidence to a place that hasn't made any progress with the aid it's received prior to a disaster?

Oh yeah, ignorance, I forgot.

Things have really started to pick up, what with scientists now admitting they dumped the raw data their original theory was based on, John Stewart knocking those involved, and one of the guilty stepping down "temporarily". Now even Pennsylvania State University is holding an inquiry on Mann, the godfather of global warming, and to top it off NASA is hiding information too.

This has not gone away, and where I think the real sparks will really start to fly is between December 7th and December 18th at Copenhagen. I just do not see India, China, and Brazil coming along on this one quietly, and let's face it: the US just doesn't have the juice anymore. Are we important on the world stage? Absolutely. Are we so important that these developing markets will significantly handicap themselves? Not likely.

More importantly however is why are we even still considering cap and trade? One way or the other, it will have a large impact on our economy. Whether or not it is an extremely negative (vs. moderately negative) one cannot be said for sure. One thing I do know that our economy is currently very fragile, and with a huge and expensive health care over haul in the works I do not think it is the time to levy large taxes on corporations . This is too much, too fast, and it is very risky at best.

Given the doubts that these emails bring forth, and that scientists have admitted to destroying the original raw data which could be used to double check their calculations, we should be very cautious about how we move forward. Focus on innovations that minimize pollution, and to clarify I mean actual pollution not carbon dioxide. Focus on alternative power methods like solar which are, for all intents and purposes, infinite. These are things which will bring us to a better tomorrow, cap and trade is nothing more than a governmental power grab.

While you ponder all that, feel free to take a look at this and watch nothing change over the past ten years:

NASA Sea Surface Temperature Maps

Senator Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma is pissed off, and rightly so. He's the first to pick up the torch recently lit by a Russian hacker and run with it. I hope more jump on the wagon with him, because it's time to take "Global Warming" out to pasture.

No warming in the past ten years. Scientists at the IPCC conspiring to fudge the data, or just plain conceal it. Billions spent on "green" initiatives. That's your tax dollars folks, your money and it's being spent on, well, absolute garbage.

This movement might have had some good intentions at some point, but all it has become is a bunch of people trying to protect their jobs. That's all there is to it. See, if man made global warming is a farce, then what will these people do with their lives?

For the hardcore believers it's equally hard to swallow. While their jobs may not depend on "warming" being true, much of their credibility does. Their entire world view, how they internalize their value and externalize their behavior, has much to do with their triumph as world saviors in the green movement.

Unfortunately for them, they're costing the rest of us precious resources and time. They need to find a new hobby less intrusive into the lives of billions of other people. Maybe stamp collecting?