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POPSFlood victims without insurance; FEMA had assured safety Gulfport, IL: FEMA had assured townspeople here that their new levee was strong enough to withstand historic flood. Banks no longer required flood insurance. On Tuesday, the levee broke. Now under 11 feet of water. I grew up in Burlington, IA, nearly within sight of Gulfport.
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POPSWhy do displays of compassion differ between East and West?
I am trying to understand A bit more: "In many Asian countries, favors invariably create obligations, which is perhaps why people are sometimes disinclined to interfere in the problems of others. You are obliged to take care of your family, your friends, or even your fellow countrymen. But the idea of universal charity is too abstract, and smacks of the kind of unwelcome interference that Western imperialists — and the Christian missionaries who followed them — practiced in the East for too long. The notion of "Asian values," promoted mostly by Singaporean official scribes, was partly a critique of universalist Western claims. Asians, according to this theory, have their own values, which include thrift, deference to authority, the sacrifice of individual to collective interests, and the belief that countries should not stick their noses into others' affairs. Hence, the hesitant response of Southeast Asian governments — and public opinion — to the Burmese disaster." see source
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POPSNatural Disaster Evolves Into Man-Made Catastrophe "We have small helicopters to drop food, and we have doctors." The USS Essex, an amphibious assault ship, and its battle group have been waiting to join in the relief effort as well. U.S. Marine flights from their makeshift headquarters in Utapao, Thailand, continued Saturday — bringing the total to 500,000 pounds of aid delivered. Britain's prime minister accused authorities in Burma of behaving inhumanely by preventing foreign aid from reaching victims. "This is inhuman," Gordon Brown told the British Broadcasting Corp. Brown said a natural disaster "is being made into a man-made catastrophe by the negligence, the neglect and the inhuman treatment of the Burmese people by a regime that is failing to act.
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POPSNatural Disaster In Beichuan: A Vision Of Hell Anger, too, is growing about the poor quality of buildings. In Mianzhu, an apartment block collapsed on itself. The flats had been built using contributions from a local work unit, a group of workers organised by the Communist Party at a factory or office. Residents searching for survivors said it was because corrupt officials had demanded so much in kickbacks that the building fell. The neighbouring buildings had not collapsed, including one which housed cadres from the Communist Party. "Show me the structural steel in that building," said one woman, whose mother is missing in the rubble. "It all went into some official's pocket," she spat. The foreign media have a poor image in China This makes reporting the disaster difficult; before the anti-Chinese riots in Tibet, and the sympathetic view of Tibetans in the Western media, foreign journalists were popular. Now we are seen as a threat.
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POPSLow tech best in China, Burma disasters Sometimes the only way rescuers can dig someone out of the rubble, without making the situation more dangerous, is with their bare hands, after the Human ears of the searchers recognize cries for help. People who are drowning, or buried don't have the time to wait for technology to arrive, particularly in remote areas, where the survivors in an immediate area,who can start looking straight away, may be the only chance they have. In China, many hands seem to be on the job, While the regime in Burma are trying to wash their hands. Not as Pilate, but as Lady Macbeth. The Damned spot will not disappear.
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POPSThe junta in Myanmar is cruel & callous I believe nothing highlights better how the World has "lost its way". We allow the junta in Myanmar to practice genocide, as we do in Darfur and with Mugabe the tyrant. I think at a certain point the tyrannical regimes have to be afforded a hefty response - but the free World simply watches and allows the position to deteriorate further. China is one of the World's villains - it is allowing all three regimes mentioned above to be supplied with arms and sustenance for their despot leaders. Shame on China!!!!!!
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POPSSunk Ship Does any one else see a little humor in this besides me.
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POPSU.N. Suspends Aid Shipments To Myanmar After Government Confiscates Donations White House: Myanmar OKs One U.S. Aid Delivery Earlier Friday, Ky Luu, director of the U.S. office of foreign disaster assistance, had said that skilled aid workers were being forced to sit on the sidelines as victims of last week's cyclone die. His comments reflect mounting frustration among the United States and other countries as they wait for permission from the military-led government to begin trying to help. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,354722,00.html
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POPSBurma Cyclone--Weather Warfare for "Regime Change"? This could be a case of Weather Warfare for "regime change". Follow the comments here. It took five days to count from 1,000 to 100,000? This is similar to the Indonesian Tsunami where the death count was suppressed until days later, and then the move for military and UN posturing and pushing began. Also interesting, similar to Indonesia as well, is that there is foreign criticism of the government in the press during the aftermath, and here we see the UN pushing to force their way in "to help" (i.e. invade) WITHOUT approval of the sovereign country, invoking their hypocritical "responsibility to protect" self-proclaimed law to intervene and interfere as if no country can be responsible for themselves without World Government seeking to intrude. The UN has a "responsibility" to butt out unless they are invited. All this makes this event highly suspicious. See "weather warfare"
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POPS15,000 Dead, 30,000 Missing After Catastrophic Myanmar Cyclone "The combination of the cyclone and the referendum within a few days of each other makes an angry population angrier and vulnerable and makes the political situation more volatile" than it has been since last year's massive pro-democracy demonstrations, said Monique Skidmore, a Myanmar expert at Australian National University. At least 31 people were killed and thousands more were detained when the military cracked down on peaceful protests in September led by Buddhist monks and democracy advocates.
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POPSHuman Tragedy Granted, Myanmar has a terrible track record of human abuse. Their government is cuel and dictatorial. Yet for the US to offer a paultry $250,000 is an insult and shows a deep lack of humanity. The people of Myanmar are not the corrupt military dictatorship. Yet, it seems as though we are making them pay to score political points. Something is not right here.
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POPSU.S. Navy going Soft - It's About Time More: Such nonmilitary approaches are fundamental to addressing the nation's security problems, says Defense Secretary Robert Gates. In what many in and outside the Pentagon believe was a seminal speech at Kansas State University last month, Secretary Gates argued for dramatically more funding for nondefense agencies such as the State Department and the US Agency for International Development. " ased on my experience serving seven presidents as a former director of CIA and now as Secretary of Defense, I am here to make the case for strengthening our capacity to use 'soft' power and for better integrating it with 'hard' power," Gates said. Me: "I must be dreaming".
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POPSForeclosure and Natural Disaster Foreclosure, in the wake of natural disasters, is at an unprecedented scale, where effective help is hard to find, and "take a number" may be the frequent reply to the request for aid, help, or advice.
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POPS Humanitarian Tax Dollars Aid Terror Groups WASHINGTON — A federal agency that disburses billions of dollars in humanitarian aid, disaster relief, and pro-democracy programs every year, has inadvertently funneled American taxpayer funds to individuals and entities with "terrorist affiliations" and lacks the safeguards to prevent such incidents from recurring, an internal audit has revealed. "In the basement of Gaza Islamic University, a U.S.-funded institution," said Rep. Mark Kirk, R-Ill., who sits on the House Appropriations Subcommittee on State, Foreign Operations and requested the audit, "Palestinian police found several Iranian agents and an Iranian general teaching the students in the U.S.-funded chemistry lab how to make suicide bombs."
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