[antonia]

Please don't get me wrong, I am all for aid and helping those who are in need. I just don't appreciate being manipulated, let alone by false pretense. We have had more than enough of that, thanks to our 'free press'. Remember Katrina ? See:

Police Chief Says He Exaggerated Post-Katrina Crime
By CHANNING JOSEPH
Staff Reporter of the Sun
August 21, 2006

and

"If Anyone Rioted, It Was the Media"
February 22, 2006
House's Katrina Report Knocks Early Coverage

or

Media outlets exaggerated some of New Orleans' woes
By ERIC DEGGANS
Published September 28, 2005
It's the story of the moment regarding coverage of Hurricane Katrina: The news media likely passed along exaggerated tales of lawlessness in New Orleans in the storm's early aftermath, repeating accounts of murder, rapes and child molestations often delivered by misinformed public officials and traumatized hurricane victims.

and that was an event right here in America, let alone on the other side of the world.

[Bobarian]

Please don't get me wrong, I am all for aid and helping those who are in need.

From the Ayn Rand Lexicon:

What is the moral code of altruism? The basic principle of altruism is that man has no right to exist for his own sake, that service to others is the only justification of his existence, and that self-sacrifice is his highest moral duty, virtue and value.

Do not confuse altruism with kindness, good will or respect for the rights of others. These are not primaries, but consequences, which, in fact, altruism makes impossible. The irreducible primary of altruism, the basic absolute, is self-sacrifice--which means; self-immolation, self-abnegation, self-denial, self-destruction--which means: the self as a standard of evil, the selfless as a standard of the good.

Do not hide behind such superficialities as whether you should or should not give a dime to a beggar. That is not the issue. The issue is whether you do or do not have the right to exist without giving him that dime. The issue is whether you must keep buying your life, dime by dime, from any beggar who might choose to approach you. The issue is whether the need of others is the first mortgage on your life and the moral purpose of your existence. The issue is whether man is to be regarded as a sacrificial animal. Any man of self-esteem will answer: "No." Altruism says: "Yes."