However, what is overlooked is that the way the US tax structure is designed is to encourage private donation (charitable donations are tax deductable).
So you have this LINK
PRIVATE American citizens donated almost 15 times more to the developing world than their European counterparts, research reveals this weekend ahead of the G8 summit. Private US donors also handed over far more aid than the federal government in Washington, revealing that America is much more generous to Africa and poor countries than is claimed by the Make Poverty History and Live 8 campaigns.
Church collections, philanthropists and company-giving amounted to $22bn a year, according to a study by the Hudson Institute think-tank, easily more than the $16.3bn in overseas development sent by the US government. American churches, synagogues and mosques alone gave $7.5bn in 2003 - a figure which exceeds the government totals for France ($7.2bn) and Britain ($6.3bn) - according to numbers from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development which deal a blow to those who claim moral superiority over the US on aid....
and, of course, the fact that the US has been defending Europe and keeping the seas clear of pirates doesn't count either...it took Bill Clinton, not the Europeans, to stop Milosevich from slaughtering Bosnian and Albanian Muslims....
Of course, Clinton didn't send in the Marines to stop Ruandan genocide, but given the logistical problems of flying in a small army to a landlocked area when local countries won't support the effort (a problem often overlooked by pundits...) , and given the failure of on the ground UN peacekeepers to stop the genocide or the silence of the UN and the French to intervene, one can not fault Clinton...
LINK to aticle on US aid to Africa...
Of course, it is american independence day holiday... and the press will go back to their usual anti americanism in about three days...
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