Land mine mitigation actions in 33 countries and territories are expected to cost about $459 million in 2009 according to a report (front page of the report pictured) provided to the UN back in December. It further states that countries included in that report only have about 5% of the funding leaving a $437 million gap.
The countries involved in this report are those that have support from the UN and other organizations to provide the data. I didn't read the full report, (458 pages in pdf) but from the absence of countries involved in WWII, The Korean War and other more localized events (like those south of us) tell me that despite best efforts from well meaning organizations, no one knows about all the unexploded mines out there.
I bring this up to show that the $437 million shortfall problem is huge ("....nearly 6000 casualties last year, more than half of them children") for its affect on the people involved yet it's small in comparison to the money being discussed in the 2009 budget or what we already blew on "TARP". It's more or less equal to what we spent every seven months on "emergency spending" bills for Iraq under the debacle of the Bush years as well as less than 10% of our annual military budget.
I wonder how the priorities of the republicans, suddenly finding a concern over the dollar figures that are flying around now, would change if a portion of these mines were in the US?
As long as the mines were in "Blue" states, I suspect they wouldn't much care considering the way they spoke about half the United States population at the CPCAC convention.
ReplyDeleteI couldn't look. Not until KO and Maddow tonight could I listen to the clips. You'd think the lemings would see they have nothing except the same shit in a new wrapper (Limbaugh).
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