Rolling Doughnut

This editorial from The New York Times is amusing. The author speaks of bottled water and how it’s, among many apparent faults, not socially responsible. His logic is boring. Consider:

Bottled water is undeniably more fashionable and portable than tap water. The practice of carrying a small bottle, pioneered by supermodels [my note – Huh???], has become commonplace. But despite its association with purity and cleanliness, bottled water is bad for the environment. It is shipped at vast expense from one part of the world to another, is then kept refrigerated before sale, and causes huge numbers of plastic bottles to go into landfills.

Of course, tap water is not so abundant in the developing world. And that is ultimately why I find the illogical enthusiasm for bottled water not simply peculiar, but distasteful. For those of us in the developed world, safe water is now so abundant that we can afford to shun the tap water under our noses, and drink bottled water instead: our choice of water has become a lifestyle option. For many people in the developing world, however, access to water remains a matter of life or death.

More than 2.6 billion people, or more than 40 percent of the world’s population, lack basic sanitation, and more than one billion people lack reliable access to safe drinking water. The World Health Organization estimates that 80 percent of all illness in the world is due to water-borne diseases, and that at any given time, around half of the people in the developing world are suffering from diseases associated with inadequate water or sanitation, which kill around five million people a year.

Widespread illness also makes countries less productive, more dependent on outside aid, and less able to lift themselves out of poverty. One of the main reasons girls do not go to school in many parts of the developing world is that they have to spend so much time fetching water from distant wells.

I agree, clean water is a major issue and much suffering would cease with easy access to it. But… Illness alone does not make developing countries more dependent on outside aid. Tyrannical dictatorships make developing countries more dependent on outside aid. Illogical foreign aid policies by the developed world, in support of said dictatorships, makes developing countries more dependent on outside aid. The United States gives money to countries all around the world. Why aren’t they improving? Why do we see the same issues over and over?

And yet, the author continues with this:

Clean water could be provided to everyone on earth for an outlay of $1.7 billion a year beyond current spending on water projects, according to the International Water Management Institute. Improving sanitation, which is just as important, would cost a further $9.3 billion per year. This is less than a quarter of global annual spending on bottled water.

What if, just maybe, the incompetent, willfully negligent governments in developing countries misappropriate those additional funds. What then? Perhaps the palaces of Iraq could possibly verify such a radical theory. Regardless, as long as there are non-caring, bottled-water guzzling fashionistas, I’m glad that there are people smart enough to remind me that throwing more money at the problem is the answer. Brilliant!

(Hat tip: Radley Balko)

Hey, look who’s back in the friendly orange-and-maroon glow of RollingDoughnut.com, it’s Michelle Malkin. But this time, I’m not so much disagreeing with her as I am pointing out a subtle intellectual sleight of hand that she shares with many conservatives. It’s even something I’ve written about in the past. So, journey with me to Ms. Malkin’s latest Townhall.com column. Consider:

Where are they? Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton are the supermen of the civil rights establishment — able to leap tall buildings in a single bound to get in front of a picket line. When victim politics calls, the demagogic duo leap into patented action: March. Boycott. Shakedown. Repeat.

But the raging reverends are nowhere to be found as a scandal involving the liberal radio network Air America and a Bronx, N.Y.-based inner city charity for poor children brews. Why the silence?

It’s all about the Benjamins, as they say.

Right, okay, fine. I’m intrigued and so far, not disagreeing. Can you believe that? I might be intellectually open enough to not spew one party’s lines on every issue. Hmph. And shocker, Michelle Malkin isn’t always wrong. Wow, it just shakes my political brain into little more than the aftermath of ice in a whirring blender. No intellectual sleight of hand so far. Let’s continue.

First, a summary of the financial fiasco that the liberal media won’t touch: The New York City Department of Investigation has been probing allegations that officials of the nonprofit Gloria Wise Boys & Girls Club and one of its affiliates, Pathways for Youth, approved “significant inappropriate transactions and falsified documents that were submitted to various city agencies.” The charities receive large portions of their budgets from local, state and federal government grants. At the center of the controversy is Evan Montvel Cohen, the disgraced former chairman of Air America, who was in charge of the liberal radio network at the same time he was serving as Gloria Wise’s director of development.

Where to begin? Right, so Air America allegedly stole money from charity. Worse, they allegedly stole money from kids. Worst, they allegedly stole money from black kids. Ack. Can’t trust those liberals, can we? They’re nothing more than bastard people. Let’s all say it together. You bastards!

And yet, I missed the memo that said if one liberal allegedly steals money, all liberals are guilty of said (alleged) crime. And it’s especially heinous because no conservatives ever stole money. Of course, it still must come back to one point, which is in the column, as well as virtually every post Ms. Malkin has written in the last few months. I don’t even think it’s hidden well, but I’ve gotten used to spotting it in almost every rant from Ms. Malkin. It’s that phrase, the “liberal media”.

I admit, though, I’d expected to see MSM written in the article. Every argument seems to focus on the dangers of the liberal mainstream media and its unhealthy, unpatriotic bias against America. Blah, blah, blah. There’s a truth that conservatives such as Ms. Malkin, the ones who gleefully toss out “MSM” at every opportunity, want everyone else to ignore. Their perfect world would include only a media with a conservative bias. None is suggesting an unbiased media, just one that doesn’t skew left. I fail to see how that is better than their current complaint.

In the past I’ve written that there is no inherent liberal bias in the mainstream media. I’m afraid I haven’t been as micro-focused as I should have. There is most certainly a bias at specific mainstream media outlets. Organizations such as the New York Times, CNN, and The Washington Post all possess some degree of it. And I’m sure there are countless others that individuals on any location of the right will name. Go for it, but what does it achieve?

In an earlier post, Ms. Malkin writes this about the Air America scandal:

Despite the near-total MSM blackout, this story just keeps getting more and more interesting.

Yet, she can legitimately write this in her Townhall.com column:

The New York Sun’s David Lombino reported this week…

Wait, there’s a media outlet that isn’t liberal, or at least is willing to report this story? Holy crap, Batman! I wonder how Fox News and The Washington Times have treated this story? And maybe Rush Limbaugh, Bill O’Reilly, and Sean Hannity? I bet they’re doing nothing more than presenting the facts.

Every time someone complains about the MSM, it knocks the credibility of all news/media outlets. What happens when we need them to serve the most important purposes of journalists? (Yes, I may be assuming a lot in imagining that journalists can focus on real issues rather than the latest missing woman.) There is a difference in attempting to reform bias, liberal or conservative, and throwing verbal Molotov cocktails of derision at anyone with a microphone or printing press who dares to share a liberal opinion. The former is a necessary safeguard in the advancement of freedom and truth. The latter is little more than planting a partisan wedge of mistrust in society for the extension of a rigid ideology.

I wonder which choice the newly idealized version of our founding fathers that Rick Santorum so cheerfully invokes would choose, if offered the decision?

President Bush made some interesting remarks to a group of Texas reporters that’s achieved some mileage in the blogosphere this week. Consider:

Q I wanted to ask you about the — what seems to be a growing debate over evolution versus intelligent design. What are your personal views on that, and do you think both should be taught in public schools?

THE PRESIDENT: I think — as I said, harking back to my days as my governor — both you and Herman are doing a fine job of dragging me back to the past. (Laughter.) Then, I said that, first of all, that decision should be made to local school districts, but I felt like both sides ought to be properly taught.

That’s the extent of the issue I’ve seen in many places. It’s important, but it cuts out some of the context. The back-and-forth continued with this:

Q Both sides should be properly taught?

THE PRESIDENT: Yes, people — so people can understand what the debate is about.

That’s getting closer, I think, but it’s still not complete. The bloggers doing their best to defend President Bush push all the way to this:

Q So the answer accepts the validity of intelligent design as an alternative to evolution?

THE PRESIDENT: I think that part of education is to expose people to different schools of thought, and I’m not suggesting — you’re asking me whether or not people ought to be exposed to different ideas, and the answer is yes.

As is obvious, the question and answer was about intelligent design. The topic has many facets and can be argued for or against with various tactics. His response was fundamentalist, bold, out of touch with reality, nuanced, whatever, all depending on who offered the commentary. All of which I find to be tedious and pointless, if only because I’m not motivated presently to debate the religious aspects. Yet, President Bush’s remarks are useful, so allow me to repeat his last sentiment.

THE PRESIDENT: I think that part of education is to expose people to different schools of thought, and I’m not suggesting — you’re asking me whether or not people ought to be exposed to different ideas, and the answer is yes.

Hmmm, interesting. Really? No kidding? He could’ve fooled me. But perhaps we can hold him to his valid theory of education, at least when read exactly as the words were spoken. Ignore the subtle back-pedaling focus on one issue that I assume he meant to engender and he offered something useful. Could what he said, just perhaps, be applied to homosexuality, as well?

He wants schools to teach intelligent design, a theory that is scientifically unverifiable, yet he has no problem directing our government to pretend that homosexuals don’t exist? Forget even proving whether or not homosexuality is biological. The topic of homosexuality must not find its way into education in any way, lest children have an agenda pushed upon them. Shame on society should a defenseless child see something as perverse as a homosexual couple with kids in a textbook or an instructional video. It could lead them to acknowledge the existence of those we’d rather not acknowledge.

But I forget, it’s all about the children.