The Darfur Genocide
Enough excuses. The time to act is now.
As we sat in a refugee camp in Chad listening to Fatima describe how most of her family was killed by Sudanese government-sponsored Janjaweed militias, we found it incomprehensible that the world could not muster the political will necessary to protect her surviving family members or to hold the killers accountable.
Since returning from our visit to Chad and Darfur in late January, we have pored over the rationales the U.S. government has used for its tepid response, and have found no fewer than 10 lame excuses.
First, when former Secretary of State Colin Powell famously called what was happening in Darfur "genocide," he said we were already doing all we could to counter it. In the six months since he and President Bush used the term, however, not one punitive measure has been imposed on the orchestrator of the atrocities--the Sudanese regime. And as the African Union (AU) struggles to deploy 2,000 troops to Darfur, a region the size of France, the French government recently announced that it will deploy 41,000 police in Paris if it is chosen as the Olympics site for 2012. Doing all we can?
Forgive us Rwanda, our "to do" list is quite long
1.) Saving a woman in a progressive vegetative state; potential legislative action in adding "AHHHHH"and "WAAAAA" to Webster's Dictionary with the defination being: "I want to live".
2.) Ignore tragedy in Minnesota
3.)Making mayhemSpreading the joys of Democracy in Mess O' Potamia
4.) Potential legislative action stopping a Jennifer Aniston and Brad Pitt Divorce.
5.) Fucking around with Social Security
6.) Research the possibility of posthumously making Leviticus an America Citizen in an effort to thwart gay marriage.
As you can see we are quite busy, the list is endless. Many say that our military is stretched to thin to even consider disciplinary action, which is true and it is unsafe to assume that America can save the world when we're to busy ignoring our own poverty issues. (Update: former Vice Presidential Candidate John Edwards is beginning to break some ground on this issue). Some ask where the United Nation stands on this subject, action is being taken although deployment of UN troops "will face hurdles". Focus on Rwanda needs to be forefront and the offenders of these crimes chastised on a daily basis. Recently I had read somewhere (unfortunately I cannot find the link) that what was happening in Rwanda was a form of population control, uh...wow....population control via murder? Again with the humans playing God, oy.
[Cheadle article via Vodkapundit]
