Former Presidents Clinton and Bush have been asked by President Obama to head up private fund raising for Haiti relief, very similar to what President Bush the elder and President Clinton were asked to do.
The 2 issued the following joint statement:
We are deeply saddened by the devastation and suffering caused by the recent earthquake in Haiti. The people of Haiti are in our thoughts and prayers.
We are pleased to accept President Obama’s request to lead private sector fundraising efforts. In the days and weeks ahead, we will draw attention to the many ways American citizens and businesses can help meet the urgent needs of the Haitian people.
Americans have a long history of showing compassion and generosity in the wake of tragedy. We thank the American people for rallying to help our neighbors in the Caribbean in their hour of suffering – and throughout the journey of rebuilding their nation.
For information on how you can contribute, please visit www.georgewbushcenter.com/haiti and www.clintonfoundation.org/haitiearthquake.
Both men plan to go to Haiti in the near future. Right now, they would both be in the way because of security. Both men look down-right distinguished in the above picture.
Over 5 million dollars has been raised just using the text function on cellular phones. This technology is a new effort in fund raising and has been very successful. Most donations are $10.
I think that’s great!
Boy, has Billy Boy gone gray!
Also:
HAYMARKET, Va.—Group Therapy Associates, a psychotherapy practice in Haymarket, is offering one hour of free counseling to anyone impacted by the earthquake in Haiti.
Those who have lost someone or have missing loved ones in Haiti can visit the practice for a free appointment to get support and comfort in this difficult time.
They are also offering this service to anyone experiencing anxiety or traumatic stress in reaction to what has happened.
Free sessions are one-hour or individuals may opt for two 30-minute sessions when possible.
To get more information or schedule your free session, visit http://www.grouptherapyassociates.org or call 703-644-8041.
http://www2.insidenova.com/isn/news/local/haymarket/article/therapists_offer_free_counseling_for_those_impacted_by_haiti/50487/
Just turning on your tv causes stress. I guess that doesn’t count?
Both of them are gray/white. Rough job being prez.
At least they both have still GOT most of their hair — dang it!!
Wolverine is on to something critical here. Both still have hair. That in itself is a miracle.
Actually, they will probably be very productive working in tandem. Both have a folksy quality about them and both are now independent of advisors. Ivy league didn’t destroy either man.
If I understand correctly, the relief effort will not get the money from text donations until your bill is paid. Trying to get an affirmative on this one. The Dolans on CNN are who are saying this. I don’t know the Dolans but I think they might be money gurus.
Say what you will about Bush, he is at least decent enough not to tell the current President to go to hell for threatening to prosecute him and his administration for “war crimes”, and that he is willing to pitch in when asked.
Presidents age quickly. You can see it already happening to President Obama.
BTW, why are all the other discussion threads in italics now? Just noticed.
re: italics
An accident. It would rake the rest of the day to fix I think. Not exactly sure of the mechanics behind it. I know what I did. Doing what I did again doesn’t undo it.
Who said they were going to prosecute President Bush for war crimes? I hadn’t heard that one. I thought both the Obamas and the Bushes got along.
Both past presidents were very emotional speaking of Haiti. I think the Clintons had vacationed there. President Bush said he was very honored to have been asked to help with Haiti.
Hillary flew into the Port-au-Prince airport on a Coast Guard relief aircraft and reportedly had a meeting with the Haitian president. She apparently did not even try to get out of the airport because of the logjam of relief supplies and the logistics needed to protect her. It also appears an agreement has been signed to give the relief-providing countries temporary management control over Haiti under the overall guidance of the UN. I did see something about Bill and Hillary having a soft spot for Haiti because they spent some time there shortly after their marriage.
While news emphasis is focused on the disaster in Port-au-Prince, reports are now starting to come in from other towns where destruction appears to have been equally bad, especially to the south and west. Some good news: the quake did not damage too badly the container port in the north at Cap Haitien, perhaps allowing another channel for the landing of relief supplies. However, they are going to need some big transport or a lot of choppers to get that stuff to Port-au-Prince and other southern towns.
Finally, the UN office in Geneva has labelled this the worst disaster in their history, even worse than the earthquake and subsequent tsunami in Indonesia. In almost all other disaster relief work, the UN and relief-providing nations had a local government infrastructure with which to work. In Haiti there is virtually no infrastructure left. It seems like almost every government building and system in Port-au-Prince has gone down. We are all seeing a once-in-a lifetime thing — hopefully.
Holy cow. Amazing…horribly so.
Thanks for the info Wolverine. Keep it coming as you find out more. I wondered about the area north of P-au-P.
I am glad that Bush felt honored. He deserves to know that he is still respected and still able to serve no matter how things turned out during his years in office. This is a chance for redemption re. Katrina, for him and for us all.
The elder Bush and Clinton worked very well together on this kind of thing. I’m glad to see younger Bush and Clinton doing the same thing.
I think its actually sort of neat. I like things to transcend politics as much as humanly possible though.
Katrina–a horrible act of God. How could anyone know? Wasn’t Bush criticized for attending a fund-raiser shortly after Katrina? I don’t like politicizing natural disasters. You can only do so much. Were there missteps? I feel certain. Was Brownie horrilbe? He was a good fall guy.
Ar governments fallible? Of course. I felt Bush personally took too much heat over Katrina. His daddy took too much heat over Andrew also. These are natural disasters.
A couple of thoughts:
Today I looked out my window at all the houses near me. Imagine that, in a matter of minutes, 90 per cent of them collapsed into rubble. Virtually nothing left. That’s the fate of Leogane, a town of 100,000 west of Port-au-Prince and near the epicenter. The place is gone, just a suddenly formed landfill of cement and dust and 30,000 dead bodies. Nearly every residential dwelling is down. It’s hard to get your mind wrapped around that. All I can think of is that Leogane and Pompeii, thousands of miles apart, may have shared a fate.
Yesterday I heard the story of an aid worker in Port-au-Prince. He and others had finally succeeded in getting some food supplies and setting up a small distribution center. What they had to pass out were special, high-protein biscuits of some sort. They passed them out as rapidly as they could. As they got down to the last few available boxes, an aid worker looked up. Before him stretched a line of perhaps a 1000 hungry people; and he had nothing left to give them. How those aid workers survive such things in their minds and in their hearts I will never know.
I think there is something very important happening with regard to the Haiti situation. The President and every other American involved are trying to do as well as they can as quickly as they can to help out in this disaster. Yet, the complaints are already coming in. Not only are some of those desperate Haitians wondering aloud (perhaps understandably) why food, medical help, and security is not arriving faster but complaints have been filed against the U.S. by a number of countries and by the Doctors without Borders organization over how we are handling the arrival of relief aircraft and the movement of supplies out of that very small and ill-equipped Port-au-Prince airport without the aid of functioning ocean port facilities. Some are even complaining that the rescue teams are only searching for people of their own nationalities — which I know is not true with regard to our Fairfax teams at least.
Does this complaining not sound familiar? Not matter what we and the President do, no matter how many planes, ships, troops, rescuers, supplies, money, and other things we send, this type of situation always comes with those who demand that we do better or who claim we are not doing things right. Too many tend to forget that a guy like Obama and his staff are trying to cope with something that they have never faced before in their lives in a situation rife with desperation and cries for help. As a died-in-the-wool political conservative , I will not look kindly on criticism of this effort by anyone anywhere on the political spectrum because almost no one has walked in a President’s shoes at a time like this.
It follows that I think it very sad that many still harp about George W. Bush and the Katrina disaster. It is not like Bush was any more experienced than Obama in handling this type of thing. It is fly by the seat of your pants and do what you can in a confusing situation for virtually any leader. It is time to stop applying partisan politics to such disasters and to understand that virtually every leader walks on unfamiliar and unsteady ground in trying to meet such a crisis. I would hope that Haiti does not turn into the reverse of Katrina if everything does not go like clockwork down there — which it surely will not do. Hopefully it will go better because we ALL learned some lessons from the difficulties of coping with the Katrina aftermath. With regard to Haiti, I personally will do what I did after Katrina: ask any complainers what experience THEY have ever had with regard to facing such an immense , unique, and mind-boggling task while bearing all the ultimate responsibility. We’ve got to stop playing the blame game with these things. Our leaders are human, not superhuman. They try hard in situations like this but often wind up facing seemingly impossible hurdles. They have to learn on the job. We have to learn to give ’em a break.
I was down in New Orleans starting Sunday evening after the hurricane hit. Quite frankly, there was a huge amount of people (thousands and thousands) working out of New Orleans Airport, which was shut down at the time for regular flights. Search and rescue helicopters were lifting off every 15 minutes or so. People who were working down there were sleeping in the terminal in sleeping bags, or on the conveyor belts.
While there may have been misteps – there was a huge response within hours of the hurricane. In fact, my system started getting mobilized Friday evening right after the hurricane, which is how we got down to New Orleans Sunday evening.
I never bought all the bad press over it, if you were in the thick of it as I was you questioned everything you read in the press. Certainly the FEMA secretary was ill equipped. But a lot of the other bad press was a little undeserved, if you ask me.
Gainesville and Wolverine are both correct in my humble opinion. Both of you expressed yourself eloquently also. Wolverine, I am not a dyed in the wool conservative. As you know about me, I go both ways on political issues, but I HATE HATE HATE things like disaster relief being turned in to partisan politics. It should transcend all politics.
I have heard the criticism by the Haitians. I think they are seeing things through their own myopic vision now…and it is understandable, although it seems ungrateful. Americans have dug deep, even when they might not have it. I feel certain those of other countries have also. Perhaps one day, they will feel we did a bohemuth job at their rescue. If not, then at least we as a nation will know we did the right thing.
Probably part of the problem with Haiti is the fact that all its ports have been damaged, slowing down efforts to get ships in there. It is just very hard to get into Haiti right now, and that is probably slowing down efforts and a lot of people observing that are not realizing just how difficult it is to get people and supplies there. And, probably no response will be big enough or fast enough in the eyes of some people. There’s only so much that any nation or nations can do in a situation like this, and the logistics are tough given the difficulties caused by the damage the earthquake did.