Who's Giving, Who's Not

In late December and early January, there was an overwhelming international appeal for money and volunteers after a good deal of South Asia was wiped off the map by a massive tsunami. Americans, the richest and most generous individuals on the planet, gave hundreds of millions of dollars through both tax dollars and private charitable donations.

I thought to myself as I was walking onto the premises at work today, "I wonder if there's going to be anywhere near the outpouring of support, or even a comparable level of attention, regarding Hurricane Katrina?" Well, somebody beat me to this subject. Go check out Rusty Shackleford's post on this subject over at The Jawa Report.

I'd love to say that the news is good, but I can't.

Do I expect Thai and Indonesian folks who are still rebuilding their own countries to make sizable donations to the victims of Hurricane Katrina? Of course not. Do I expect the French and Italian branches of the Red Cross to at least acknowledge the fact that a hurricane occurred on their website? Yeah. Yeah, I do.

Does America, as a nation, collectively have the determination and the economic solvency to come through this? Yeah, I think we do. Would it be nice if our supposed allies at least paid lip service to the amazing things we've done for them? I don't think that's too much to ask.