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Poor Fez. 
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~ If Tehben spits eggs at you, jump on them and throw them back. ~ Eventis ~ Eventis Dungeons & Dragons 6th Age Campaign: Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4: (Unspeakable) Horror on the Hill ~ -
Most of Sub Saharan Africa has been ****ed for the past 100 years, and continues to be ****ed on a daily basis.
While I do think it's a mistake to judge their quality of life by silly western (American) standards -- how many tvs they have, what kinda cars they drive, do they have a savings account, there are many cases where basic things like clean drinking water are not available!
If you want to help, there are alot of charities that will sponsor a child for you, you can pay them and they'll send the kid to school, make sure he has clothes, food, etc. I would say that's a good plan, at least on a personal level.
I've heard alot of ignorant and silly arguments regarding Africans, like most of the problems there are due to their own mismangement. While there is alot of corruption going on, most African nations have been relatively held out to dry.We the people are the rightful masters of both Congress and the courts, not to overthrow the Constitution but to overthrow the men who pervert the Constitution. - Abraham LincolnComment
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Poor Giancarlo? Poor me! I'm probably looking at a short banning all because I honestly didn't know his real name.
Forget Rahlcatraz and Mingapulco, I'll probably be flown by the CIA jet to Congo...
The cake is NOT a lie. It's so delicious and moist.
The Weighted Companion Cube is cheating on you, that slut.Comment
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I'd like to know (as if I couldn't possibly guess...) what happened to the money Bush promised in last year's SOTUA to help fight AIDS in Africa.The cake is NOT a lie. It's so delicious and moist.
The Weighted Companion Cube is cheating on you, that slut.Comment
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Wrt natural resources: they are tapped enough to continue funding the massacres going on there. In particular, The Ugandese are very keen of continuing getting money from them.
For all the criticisms the UN deserves, there is at least one positive thing it does: it's opushing the issue of a worldwide embargo on the so-called "conflict diamonds", and it has the organizational means to have countries actually agree with such an embargo. If the income from the diamonds died down, things would change real fast: rival ethnical groups won't get weapons from puppeteers, and the UN's job of restoring stability would be considerably easier.
But I do agree with Gian that the DRCongo has dramatic structural problems. The borders should be completely redrawn, in part to correspond to the military situation, and in part to correspond to the political/ethnical situation. DRCongo is far, far too weak to rule effectively on such a huge territory, and that's why the eastern part has been torn for years."I have been reading up on the universe and have come to the conclusion that the universe is a good thing." -- Dissident
"I never had the need to have a boner." -- Dissident
"I have never cut off my penis when I was upset over a girl." -- DisComment
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Belgium ****ed it up in Congo, but that happened in just about every colony in Africa.
Thing is though, that our politicians try to adress it in the EU-comission and other types of meetings. The problem with that is that nobody is interested. Usually they think: "God there are those Belgians again with their Congo"
For some reason, probably because of the instability, there is no economic interest in Congo, and thus they don't even try solving the problems"An archaeologist is the best husband a women can have; the older she gets, the more interested he is in her." - Agatha Christie
"Non mortem timemus, sed cogitationem mortis." - SenecaComment
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The problem is that every time we come in and try to help, the corrupt politicians start ranting about "the evil White imperialists." The way the 3rd world has been f*cked over by the IMF and WTO doesn't help thier opinion of us, either...Comment
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was told this is probably the real problem
the congo being actually a kleptocracy..
kleptocrats routinely ignore economic and social problems in their quest to amass ever more wealth and power. As kleptocrats do not attempt to build or maintain functioning states, or even maintain large security forces for fear of coup d'états, kleptocracies are generally incompetent in the face of social crises, and often collapse into prolonged civil war and anarchy.
Historically, the socio-political environment associated with colonial rule has been particularly conducive to the later creation of kleptocracies, especially in Africa and South America. The creation of a kleptocracy typically results in many years of general hardship and suffering for the vast majority of citizens as civil society and the rule of law distintegrates.
Among the more infamous examples of kleptocratic government were the Palestinian Authority under Yasser Arafat, Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo) under Mobutu Sese Seko, Indonesia under Suharto, Peru under Alberto Fujimori, the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia under Slobodan Milosevic and Romania under Nicolae Ceausescu.
Older examples include the Barbary states of North Africa in the 17th through early 19th centuries, the Russian Federation under Vladimir Putin in modern times.
Less extreme examples are Nationalist China under Chiang Kai-shek, the Philippines under Ferdinand Marcos and later under Joseph Estrada, Kazakhstan under Nursultan Nazarbayev and Puerto Rico under Pedro Rosselló.
Some observers use the term 'kleptocracy' to disparage democratic political processes which permit corporations to influence political policy. The use of kleptocracy in this context privileges one form of rent seeking over all others that are a normal concomitant of democracy.
Ralph Nader famously denounced the United States as a kleptocracy during the 2000 US presidential campaign"If you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun." -Katherine HepburnComment
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And he was right...Originally posted by boann
Ralph Nader famously denounced the United States as a kleptocracy during the 2000 US presidential campaignComment
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Ralph Nader is a nutcase... was and always will be one. If he doesn't find one thing to complain about it, it will be attacking America. He was dead wrong.
Anyways back to Congo, there is no hope there. The country needs to be broken up I think.For there is [another] kind of violence, slower but just as deadly, destructive as the shot or the bomb in the night. This is the violence of institutions -- indifference, inaction, and decay. This is the violence that afflicts the poor, that poisons relations between men because their skin has different colors. - Bobby Kennedy (Mindless Menance of Violence)Comment
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Originally posted by Giancarlo
Ralph Nader is a nutcase...
He is a good defender of consumers, but a horrible politician.Comment
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yeah he speaks his mind."Everything for the State, nothing against the State, nothing outside the State" - Benito MussoliniComment
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Violence with Western capitalists in control is preferable to peace with locals in control. Of course, peace with Western capitalists in control is most prefered by Western capitalists.Originally posted by Flubber
How so ?? Wouldn't the first world capitalist prefer a peaceful region with an efficient low cost workforce
Christianity: The belief that a cosmic Jewish Zombie who was his own father can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh and telepathically tell him you accept him as your master, so he can remove an evil force from your soul that is present in humanity because a rib-woman was convinced by a talking snake to eat from a magical tree...Comment
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Exactly, People complaint about politicians lying all the time, but that is because people hate it when politicians tell people to remove thier rose-tinted glasses, look what what happened to Carter when he tried to be honest, Reagan beat him.Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia
yeah he speaks his mind.Comment
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Re: the congo ... who cares...no one...
If you are an African American and read this, you should get down on your knees and thank God that your ancestor was brought over to the US on a slave boat . Otherwise your ancestor's descendants would be participating on one end or the other of that slaughtering..Originally posted by boann
what can be done.... ?
is this an example of how effective the UN units are....?
if so they need to be reviewed ...
and the rest of the world sits by and watches the slaughter...
but its already a democratic country.. so we won't be doing anything
everyone else in the world doesn't care either..
its apparent from the history of the country
a Belgium colony...completely abused ,used and tossed aside.
anyway this is a presentation , mostly talking and very long..
but listen to parts and skip around.. its interesting.
http://www.cbc.ca/webone/congo/Comment
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