Monday, February 17, 2003

Part of President Bush's sales pitch on war with Iraq is that America is a champion for good in the world. But to believe that you have to ignore our record on foreign aid, which is borderline immorally selfish. Bush's proposed budget only begins to correct this, says the NY Times.

America ranks dead last among wealthy countries in foreign aid as a percentage of the economy. The new program helps, but the ranking remains unchanged. Foreign aid is less than 1 percent of the budget, and most of it goes to military or economic support for strategically important, but not particularly needy, friends — mainly Israel, Egypt, Colombia and Jordan. This furthers American interests but should not be confused with development aid.
http://nytimes.com/2003/02/17/opinion/17MON3.html

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