Burma, Disaster both Natural and State.
The United Nations has suspended relief supplies to Burma on Friday after the military government seized the food and equipment it had sent into the country.
Earlier, in a statement Burma’s military junta said it was willing to receive disaster relief from the outside world but would not welcome outside relief workers. Nearly one week after a devastating cyclone supplies into the country were still being delayed and aid experts were being turned back as they arrived at the airport.
The Indian government has announced that they warned the Burmese authorities of the cyclone thirty six hours before it hit, but it appears that it was not passed on.
In the statement, the government said it would distribute international relief supplies itself.
The bastards in charge there said they had turned back one relief flight because, as well as disaster relief supplies, it carried disaster assessment experts and an unauthorized media group.
Well shit, what a terrible thing to do, bringing in people competent to accurately assess what is needed, where to source it, and how to get it there, as well as press who can help create a huge public awareness of the plight of the population so that the world will open is hearts and wallets to the victims.
Since the disaster only around ten flights carrying aid have been allowed into the country.
It is an absolute atrocity that any state would create delays like this in delivering relief supplies and people to help. In Indonesia after the tsunami in 2004, substantial aid was being flown in within a couple of days.
In Thailand, the United States Air Force transport aircraft and helicopters waited at an airport for permission to enter Burma with aid workers and supplies. It is also my understanding that they have ships in the area to help but the government will not allow it.
We have seen aid being denied to political opponents in places like Zimbabwe, and other totalitarian shitholes in the past, but in my experience I have never seen it refused before, especially considering the scope of this disaster.
We clearly need to reconsider the way we deal with these kinds of oppressive regimes. How the hell can we continue to recognize them as in any way legitimate? Is our sole gauge of legitimacy the fact that they are in control? Do we not in any way discriminate as to their method of control?
Its time for a rethink folks.
In the statement, the government said it would distribute international relief supplies itself.
The bastards in charge there said they had turned back one relief flight because, as well as disaster relief supplies, it carried disaster assessment experts and an unauthorized media group.
Well shit, what a terrible thing to do, bringing in people competent to accurately assess what is needed, where to source it, and how to get it there, as well as press who can help create a huge public awareness of the plight of the population so that the world will open is hearts and wallets to the victims.
Since the disaster only around ten flights carrying aid have been allowed into the country.
It is an absolute atrocity that any state would create delays like this in delivering relief supplies and people to help. In Indonesia after the tsunami in 2004, substantial aid was being flown in within a couple of days.
In Thailand, the United States Air Force transport aircraft and helicopters waited at an airport for permission to enter Burma with aid workers and supplies. It is also my understanding that they have ships in the area to help but the government will not allow it.
We have seen aid being denied to political opponents in places like Zimbabwe, and other totalitarian shitholes in the past, but in my experience I have never seen it refused before, especially considering the scope of this disaster.
We clearly need to reconsider the way we deal with these kinds of oppressive regimes. How the hell can we continue to recognize them as in any way legitimate? Is our sole gauge of legitimacy the fact that they are in control? Do we not in any way discriminate as to their method of control?
Its time for a rethink folks.
I can't help but think that for the price of an aircraft carrier, we could superfund a blacker edition of the CIA to do 'wetwork' around the world when necessary.
ReplyDeleteThat kind of dough would get a hundred of the best professionals, let's say a guy like the Jackal,(on a 10 year contract basis) to do what has to be done and save lives and the world.
When a vicious dictator pops up, we simply send in the black bag guys and ice the sumbitch promptly.
And that's after we use the same guys to liberate the oil and install friendly regimes in Saudi and Iran.
You have to out-Putin the Putins, Castros, Kim Jung Whatzizname, the Burma strongman, Khadafi, Chavez, et. al.
Its for the common good, and will save the world from war.
Simply kill the bastards.
Al "Sign me up" Czervic
I note that you include the Saudis in the equation Al, in a group where they belong.
ReplyDeleteThis wahabbi shit they are spreading is a greater threat to liberty than Bin Laden. Our universities are falling over themselves and sucking up to get Saudi funding for Islamic Studies departments, and getting it.
The students will presumably major in being useless unemployable bastards with worthless degrees.
It also appears that some of the extremist clerics are being supported by Saudi funding.
I couldn't agree with you more, Jim. in the 80's I was a staffer at SUNY and at that time runaway liberalism was rampant, and even more so today.
ReplyDelete"Educated Idiots" is what we commoners on the staff called them. Most of the pointy heads could not change a tire, and I will not mention their personal hygiene habits. And yet these are the slime that are teaching our most valuable asset -- young people -- and indoctrinating them.
One of my favorite TV shows is "Made in America" with John Ratzenberger, late of the show "Cheers". Recently, he was on O'Reilly, and summed up our educational problem succinctly:
His take: Shop classes in schools are disappearing, and creative thinking has been compromised by video games and cubicle logic. He states correctly that in every successful business, that business has been started by one invention, and a single person working in a garage or basement. That creativity has been compromised by our educational system.
Cheers to Mr. Ratzenberger, a true American and free thinker.
"A college education is no preparation for life"...
Al C.