While criticizing Laura Bush for calling Myanmar’s thugs “inept,” Richard Walden of the Huffington Post blogged:
Most of us in the relief business have strong views pro or con about the governments of countries whose people we help. But when disaster strikes, a bad or ineffective local government is an obstacle to be danced around not bludgeoned to death thus guaranteeing it will not allow the entry of urgent humanitarian aid for its people.
Well, here’s an update from the New York Times this morning:
BANGKOK – The United Nations suspended relief supplies to Myanmar on Friday after the military government seized the food and equipment it had already sent into the country.
Earlier, in a statement, Myanmar’s military junta said it was willing to receive disaster relief from the outside world but would not welcome outside relief workers. Nearly one week after a devastating cyclone, supplies into the country were still being delayed and aid experts were being turned back as they arrived at the airport.
In the statement, the government said it would distribute international relief supplies itself.
Exactly how should the UN “dance” around this? And are “bad” and “ineffective” proper adjectives to describe Myanmar? Getting a cold is “bad.” The DMV is “ineffective.” Myanmar is turning into a genocidal atrocity that will eclipse anything that happens in Darfur this year.
Exit question: Why was Laura Bush the only one to speak the truth about the genocidal behavior of the Burmese junta, and why did the far Left criticize her for it?