The US Government's involvement in aid for tsunami victims is being done for all the wrong reasons. And it continues a perilous precedent.
I can remember, about a day after the tsunami devastated much of the Asian coast, being surprised at the lack of partisan attacks on the US for "not doing enough" or some such denunciation of the Government's spending of money or sending of troops and supplies. You know, the stuff that makes you look good in the eyes of cable news. Maybe it was the hangover from the past 15 months of combat between red state/blue state ideals on every other issue and event known to man.
My surprise was quelled quickly enough, though. It didn't take long before everyone was plotting the bad guys and the good guys inside the US Government- based, by and large, on their rapidity in holding a press conference, and subsequently the amount of tax dollars they plan on committing to the cause.
(Now, I am not about to argue the merits of one disaster over another. For whatever reason, the wreckage of the tsunami hit home with most of the western world. I'm not sure the millions of Africans who will soon be dying of AIDS were as touched by the death of 150,000 tsunami victims- but, I digress. Lets go ahead assume it's a noble enough cause.)
- THAT'S NOT WHAT TAX DOLLARS ARE FOR -
The real problem here is the use of tax dollars for a natural disaster happening far outside the US borders. Its not just the amount of tax money spent- if you average it out, it comes to a few bucks per citizen- it's the dangerous concept of what tax dollars have come to represent, and consequently come to be used for.
Over the past hundred-or-so years, the US has moved from a somewhat adversarial approach to taxation and use of tax dollars to a more proactive attitude. The Government is not supposed to look for reasons to spend its money. The whole concept of taxation and government budget is that there are select few things that only a government can do. For these things, we all give the Government some money, and it does what it needs to do.
Over time, however, that concept has been flipped 180 degrees. The US approach to spending its citizens' money has been "the Government should always attempt to be in the business of X, Y and Z first, and only if it fails, should it retire such responsibility to private citizens and organizations."
(I call this the "Shaquille O'Neal Approach." Because Shaq is a great basketball player, with ample money and recognition, by default that means he should also try his hand at recording music, acting, running restaurants, and the like. Such an approach is foolish or embarrassing for an individual. Its dangerous for a government.)
Along with many other things, the US should not be in the business of international charity.
For starters, like many things, the Government is bad at it. The Government is large and inefficient. This is the same Government running your local DMV with its 4-hour wait times, and the same Government which takes decades to add a lane to a typical highway. And somehow they're the best organization to respond to a situation where life-and-death is a matter of hours or minutes?
