July 5, 2005
That was some international rock concert last weekend.
Did you see any of it?
It features liberal secularists trying to raise awareness about diseased and starving people in Africa.
We should be aware of such things, but will the concert that cost an estimated $50 million, or the G-8 meeting this coming weekend, or anything else be able to solve the problem?
Over the last four decades, the West has given $450 billion in aid to Africa.
The result has been that Africans are now poorer, on average, than they were 40 years ago.
As the London Sunday Telegraph noted in an editorial: “child mortality has gone up, not down.
Life expectancy is shorter.
African politicians and bureaucrats export money back to western economies almost as fast as the West hands it to them, re-investing 40 percent of the continent’s wealth overseas – a large portion of it in Swiss bank accounts.”
The problem isn’t available aid.
The problem is corrupt governments and bad religious and economic structures.
The rockers, who are pro-abortion and pro gay rights are appealing to a moral code they deny exists.
If I were donating to Africa, it would be through missionaries, not rock stars.
In Northern Ireland, I’m Cal Thomas.
Cal Thomas is a nationally syndicated columnist based in Washington, D.C. Watch his television show, After Hours with Cal Thomas, on the Fox News Channel, Saturdays at 11 p.m. Eastern Time.
