What a sick state of affairs. Two stories in today's national papers strike at stark comparisons in our world today.

The Washington Post headline reads

Clinton Shatters Record for Fundraising

With Hillary raising $26 million and the total estimates for all 2008 canidates is that they have raised well over $100 million dollars in 2007 and plan on continuing to raise more and more money as the election approaches in well over a year.

All of this while the New York Times headlines talk about Darfur refugees restarting in Fort Wayne and another entitled

Wedged Amid African Crises, a Neglected Nation Suffers

But unlike the suffering of its neighbors, the crisis in the Central African Republic has largely escaped the world’s notice. International donors pay about $1 billion to support the effort to feed and shelter two million displaced people in Darfur. Here that figure is about $50 million, United Nations officials say.

That has meant little assistance for people left utterly destitute. Jean-Charles Dei, the top official of the World Food Program in the Central African Republic, said on a visit to Otah on Friday that his organization had no food available to feed the 1,700 people hiding here. Its operations here are chronically short of cash.

In all, 2.5 million people have been forced from their homes in the three countries. In Darfur at least 200,000 people have died, and perhaps the toll is more that twice that number, though it is impossible to be sure without detailed mortality surveys. No one is sure how many have died in Chad, where the violence is linked to Darfur, or in the Central African Republic, which is a close ally of Chad’s embattled government and where diplomats and experts say rebels backed by Sudan have operated.

It is more than a little sad that people are willing to make the maximum allowable contribution to an election campaign $2,300 but aren't willing to send money to help keep people alive or to stop genocide and needless killing fields. I guess its ok since its "just Africa" and they don't have a strategic use anymore. Well that's bularky!

$2,300 is more than many Africans can make in a year and would double the income for 6 people (of the over 1 billion) who are living on a dollar a day!

Did you know?

Did you know that in our world today:

• One third of deaths - some 18 million people a year or 50,000 per day - are due to poverty-related causes. That's 270 million people since 1990, the majority women and children, roughly equal to the population of the US. (Reality of Aid 2004)
• Every year more than 10 million children die of hunger and preventable diseases - that's over 30,000 per day and one every 3 seconds.
  (80 Million Lives, 2003 / Bread for the World / UNICEF / World Health Organization)
• Over 1 billion people live on less than $1 a day with nearly half the world's population (2.8 billion) living on less than $2 a day. (UN HDR, 2003)
• 600 million children live in absolute poverty. (SCF, Beat Poverty 2003).
• The three richest people in the world control more wealth than all 600 million people living in the world's poorest countries. (Source:ChristianAid)
• Income per person in the poorest countries in Africa has fallen by a quarter in the last 20 years. (Source:ChristianAid)
• 800 million people go to bed hungry every day. (Source:FAO)
• Every year nearly 11million children die before their fifth birthday.
  (Source:UNICEF)