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December 29, 2004

Six of One...

Americans, as a whole, are not stingy:

A suggestion by a U.N. official that the world's richest nations were "stingy" irritated the Bush administration, especially when U.S. aid for Asia's earthquake is expected to eventually rise from the millions to more than $1 billion.

....our government officials, however, seem to be pretty cheap (not to mention heartless):

At the airport in Bangkok, other governments had set up booths to greet nationals who had been affected and to help repatriate them, she said.

That was not the case with the U.S. government, Wachs told her mother. It took the couple three hours, she said, to find the officials from the American consulate, who were in the VIP lounge.

Because they had lost all their possessions, including their documentation, they had to have new passports issued.

But the U.S. officials demanded payment to take the passport pictures, Helen Wachs said.

If these charges have substance, then reprimand those officials. Dismiss them. The idiots deserve it.

(and, yes, trip report coming up soon - bit of a stomach bug at the moment)