How many of these countries did we help rebuild after WWII?  Are they
counting that as aid?  How many of these countries have we forgiven the
debt of?  Is that counted?  Have they counted aid to rebuild Afghanistan?
Japan?  Germany? etc.  We could argue this forever...the methodology used
to compute the numbers in this study can be scrutinized a million different
ways.  But we all know in our hearts that the US is the most generous
nation on the planet.  We're not perfect, and I'm not certain we should go
beat up Iraq, but I do know that we are the most generous nation on earth.
And the money spent to be that is your's and mine, just as the money to
build our military is.

John Lee

At 05:25 PM 3/10/03 EST, [log in to unmask] wrote:
>John writes:
>
>> At 04:52 PM 3/10/03 EST, Wirt Atmar wrote:
>>  >
>>  >I suspect that Tim's comment was that the money came out of his pocket to
>>  >provide whatever aid the US is providing, however meager. That was
>> certainly
>>  >John's complaint. But in either case, Tim and John are spending far less
>of
>>  >their money on aiding the rest of the world than is either the average
>>  >Belgian, Japanese or Saudi Arabian.
>>  >
>>
>>  Capital B and capital S.
>
>The only saving grace of my statement is that it has the unfortunate quality
>of being true. From the Miami Herald half a year ago:
>
>=======================================
>
>Posted on Thu, Jul. 25, 2002
>
>Small donors show up U.S. aid
>U.N. report highlights efforts relative to national economies
>
>It doesn't look pretty: The United States ranks last among the world's 28
top
>foreign aid donor countries, and its foreign assistance levels have dropped
>dramatically over the past 10 years, according to a United Nations report
>released this week.
>
>The United Nations Human Development Report 2002, a wide-ranging report that
>includes both fascinating country statistics and a questionable development
>ranking of 137 nations, puts the United States well below Denmark, the
>Netherlands, Japan and even Spain and Portugal on the list of the biggest
>foreign aid donor countries relative to the size of their economies.
>
>Granted, if you look at the actual dollar figures, the $9.9 billion annual
>U.S. foreign assistance ranks only second after Japan's $13.5 billion.
>
>But when you look at countries' foreign aid relative to the size of their
>economies, the United States is devoting 0.1 per cent of its gross national
>product (GNP) to help the world's poorest countries, less than any other
>industrialized nation.
>
>By comparison, Denmark spends 1.06 percent of its GNP on foreign aid, the
>Netherlands 0.84 percent, Norway 0.80 percent, Germany 0.27 percent, Japan
>0.28 percent, Portugal 0.26 percent, and Spain 0.22 percent. What's worse,
>U.S. foreign aid has by this measure been cut in half over the past 10 years.
>
>http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/news/columnists/andres_oppenheimer/372
941
>
>8.htm
>
>========================================
>
>Wirt Atmar
>
>
>

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