The crowd was staid. It was a little disturbing to find myself thinking it was good to have had Rev. Al. Sharpton on the podium. He did get some reaction from the crowd and didn’t say anything to make me cringe. It was kind of funny to realize that the people who had something to say about “what to do next” were the politicians themselves. Other people just went on and on about how horrible it was that genocide happens and how we “shouldn’t let it happen.” But, how should we not let it happen? Also, there was little to no recognition that even if the US hasn’t fixed the problem, that our country has had a response. I’ll use the State Department’s figures, because I have no reason to doubt them – but apparently 86% of food aid has come from the US and 1.3 billion dollars has been spent. If you’ve been following in the news, a fair bit of it has done more harm than good. But the crowd and some speakers with the US has to do something, was annoying. Sure, the US could and probably should do more, but so should the rest of the world.

There are not enough American troops to fix all the troubles of the world. Not near enough.

Which is why I think integration with Mexico is critical. We could use another 100 million Americans. ASAP.

The anecdotal numbers coming in from the May Day walkout yesterday seems to be around a million people, or roughly 10% of one of the estimates of illegals in the country. Of course, probably not all marchers yesterday were illegal,

I didn’t go to the rally for the reason you give. The comment thread from the post I wrote is discussing ways and means.

Part of the reason I seethe at the Bush administration’s incompetence, is that the underlying notion that the United States has the right to pre-emptively defend itself, and the moral obligation to use its power to get between people like the Janjaweed and their victims, is correct.

Does the rest of the civilized world, particularly the Europeans, feel the same heavy burden? The British have been in the Sudan game much longer than the U.S. Darfur is a tradegy, a horrible tradegy and the guilt of genocide should be spread evenly through the civilized world, not just the U.S.

You’ve probably heard the story before. Here’s a recent version of it, told by Mark Steyn:

In a more culturally confident age, the British in India were faced with the practice of “suttee” â€â€? the tradition of burning widows on the funeral pyres of their husbands. General Sir Charles Napier was impeccably multicultural:

“You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: When men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours.”

Now lets see if that linky thing worked.

It’s a shame that Darfur had the misfortune of being part of a country that the average American would never be able to find on a map. Gives people an excuse to shrug and patiently wait for the reporters to move on to the next story.