June 29, 2005
Press, Meet Bono
Via Red State I found the transcript of Bono's recent appearance on Meet the Press. The folks at Red State point to it because they're amazed to hear something positive about President Bush from the mouth of a celebrity. I point to it, though, because it's absolutely worth reading from beginning to end.
I think there's a fairly severe lack of realism on both sides of the foreign aid debate. In the span of a fairly short interview, though, Bono manages to present a convincing, realistic view of what the problems in Africa are, and how we can work towards solving them.
One theme that Bono brings up again and again is illiustrated by this quote:
If [President Bush]... is as bold in his commitments to Africa as he was in the first term, he indeed deserves a place in history in turning the fate of that continent
"Place in history" seems to be the stick by which the Bush administration measures everything they do. Place in history, though, is more than just the number of times your name appears in a textbook. This administration will also judged by the nature of their accomplishments.
In his (spectacularly mean-spirited) speech last week, Karl Rove said "conservatives measure the effectiveness of government programs by results; liberals measure the effectiveness of government programs by inputs". I personally think that's bullshit, but, Karl, here's your chance to put your money where your mouth is. How about, instead of creating organizations like the Millenium Challenge Corporation and then under funding them, we simply meet the aid targets that we've already agreed to?
How about, instead of just measuring the success of your aid program by how it compares to the programs that have come before it, we measure it by how successful it is?
Posted by matt at June 29, 2005 03:03 PM