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By Jonah Raskin
$16.47
By Steven Hill
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AP / Carlos Osorio
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A $26 billion aid package was passed by the Senate on Thursday that aims to ensure that school districts and states do not have to can tens of thousands of teachers and government workers. Just two Republicans crossed the ideological aisle to support the bill, which now heads to the House.
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World Economic Forum
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The former president will oversee international aid in Haiti at the request of the United Nations. The U.N. effort has struggled after losing nearly 100 personnel, including the mission chief, to the devastating Jan. 12 earthquake. Clinton was chosen for his fundraising abilities as much as his administrative touch. (Continued)
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youtube.com via AP
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Call it vigilante relief work or kidnapping, 10 American Baptists are in jail in Port-au-Prince after attempting to take 33 children out of Haiti in what they claim was an effort to “do the right thing.”
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Wikimedia Commons
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The United Nations has offered a sobering estimate of how long it will take to rebuild Haiti: With the country starting “below zero” and relief and redevelopment logistics still a “nightmare,” efforts to bring Haiti to its pre-earthquake days will take generations.
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AP / Jae C. Hong
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The U.S. has deployed an additional 4,000 troops to Haiti as aftershocks rocked the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince on Wednesday. The American troop count will reach 16,000 by the weekend as relief efforts hit full stride in the earthquake-ravaged country.
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Courtesy Democracy Now! / Sharif Abdel Kouddous
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By Amy Goodman — After the massive earthquake that devastated Haiti, the stench of death is everywhere. In the community house called Matthew 25, doctors laid out a plastic tablecloth to perform a kitchen-table amputation, aided by headlamps.
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AP / Charles Dharapak
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President Barack Obama, declaring that “[t]his is one of those moments that cries out for American leadership,” announced a $100 million aid package for quake-ravaged Haiti. Other nations, meantime, were also jumping on the humanitarian bandwagon.
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bloomberg.com
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It’s the first full day of Obama’s administration and things are looking a bit different in D.C. Treasury secretary nominee Timothy Geithner called for “fundamental reform” of the $700 billion bailout, claiming the existing bailout package favored big business over struggling families.
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Flickr / respres
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With half of the $700 billion in TARP funds already spent and not a whole lot to show for it, Barack Obama has pledged to spend the second parcel differently, with at least some of the money going to desperate homeowners. President Bush has agreed to request the funds on Obama’s behalf in order to expedite the process.
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un.org / unrwa
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The United Nations is suspending relief activity in the Gaza Strip following multiple attacks by Israeli forces. “Our installations have been hit, our workers have been killed in spite of the fact that the Israeli authorities have the co-ordinates of our facilities and that all our movements are co-ordinated with the Israeli army,” said a U.N. Relief and Works Agency spokesman quoted by the BBC.
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AP photo / Wang Jiaowen, ColorChinaPhoto
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Americans apparently have a track record of opening their wallets to assist those in need after natural disasters at home and abroad. That was the case, at least, after the 2004 tsunami in Asia and Hurricane Katrina in the U.S. in 2005. But the picture looks different in the wake of the recent cyclone in Burma and the earthquake in China, leaving international trend-watchers asking: What gives?
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AP photo / Stan Honda, pool
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After putting pressure on Burma’s ruling military junta, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has traveled to Burma, where he is taking stock of the devastation left by Cyclone Nargis on May 2. Ban also met with Prime Minister Thein Sein, who told him that the storm-ravaged country is out of the relief phase and into reconstruction.
Posted on May 22, 2008
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AP photo
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More than two weeks have passed since Cyclone Nargis hit Burma, killing 78,000 people and leaving tens of thousands more unaccounted for. Now the U.N. is pushing Burma’s ruling junta to cooperate with international aid efforts, sending an envoy with a message from Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in hopes that a more personal approach will produce lifesaving results.
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Agence France-Presse
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The U.N. has announced it will resume aid to Burma after conflicts over how food and equipment were to be distributed grounded relief flights. Cyclone Nargis has killed at least 22,000 Burmese, and the ruling junta has been categorically criticized for its ineptitude in dealing with the disaster.
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AP photo
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As more details of the devastation left by Cyclone Nargis in Burma emerge, it’s becoming clear that the storm is one of the worst disasters in years. The Burmese government is being criticized for responding inadequately and too slowly to the crisis, and President Bush, himself no stranger to this kind of criticism, is calling on Burma’s “military junta ... [to] allow our disaster assessment teams into the country” in order to help.
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pbs.org
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A year after the levees broke, Bush has again acknowledged his government’s failure to protect and rescue the citizens of New Orleans, promising “the federal government will learn the lessons of Katrina.” Although the president pledged $110 billion for reconstruction, one of Louisiana’s senators has criticized the slow progress of rebuilding: “Countless neighborhoods appear as if the hurricanes were just yesterday, and they serve as harsh reminders of how our nation was so unprepared.”
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