James, I used to think that the Red-X was the go-to place for disaster contributions. Then I lived with a woman who worked for them. She was in the Wisconsin main office and worked in the disaster-services department. That department consisted of her (a half-time secretary) and one overworked full-time director. All the other disaster relief stuff was done by volunteers. Upstairs, however, the blood collection and sales department had several hundred employees. The public face of the Red-X is the disaster relief work, but what they actually are is a giant multi-billion-dollar-a-year blood-processing operation. They have quite a racket. They get the raw materials (donated blood) for free and then sell it for big bux to hospitals. Unfortunately, they aren't very good at QC and have been operating under federal (FDA) receivership for a couple of decades due to screwing up their blood operation. Check out the book "Bad Blood: Crisis in the American Red Cross", by Judith Reitman for a really discouraging look at how they do business. The horror stories include the 50,000 hemophiliacs infected by HIV from Red-X blood because the Red-X wouldn't spend the $1/bag for testing the blood for hepatitis-C, a very strong co-indicator of HIV, in the early days of the epidemic. Google on them for how they collected hundreds of millions of dollars for hurricane Hugo and 9-11 and spent very little of it on actual disaster relief. Disaster relief for the Red-X is not a mission, just an overhead expense to be minimized whenever possible. They drive their truck to a disaster, get some volunteers to hand out donated donuts, and then leverage it into a big blood-drive to pump up the blood-sales division. The place is a mess. The suits live large, while the folks in the cubes get beaten down. The standard answer to the disaster services people when they ask for more money or support is "Stop bitching or we will replace you with a volunteer." They treat their employees like shit in very much the Sam Walton mode. There are regular strikes by their blood-collection/processing people. My donations go to OxFam or Doctors Without Borders. They may be as bad as the Red-X, but at least I don't know it. Ed ----- Original Message ----- From: "James Newton, Host" To: "'Microcontroller discussion list - Public.'" Sent: Thursday, December 30, 2004 1:25 PM Subject: RE: [OT] Perspectives on the Earthquake > > > It strikes me that it is better to spend your money helping those > > > directly in your own back yard or those you know well. > > > > The reason for my replying again is this. > > IF there are blood covered people in your backyard with > > broken limbs and/or lacerations, people wading through water > > intermingled with sewage and miscellaneous body parts, > > children who have been sitting in your yard for the last 2 > > days covered in blood and mutilated in ways that would make > > you weep if they were your children, people in your yard > > whose house looks like yours would look after a D8 had run > > over it several times and then scraped the site half clean > > for good measure, people who don't know where their children > > are or, if they are lucky, do know where their children are > > because they are carrying their bodies, then by all means, > > get off the net right now and go and attend to them. > > > > When the fire came a mile or so from my house, and there were injured > firefighters at the local red cross station, we donated what we could to > help. If you give now, to people many miles away, who may or may not see any > benefit from it, you do not have that to give when the disaster is closer to > home. > > Actually, donating to the Red Cross is probably the best option at this > point. They will use it where it needs to be used in the future. Possibly > including next door, or xxx forbid, at your door. > > P.S. A good education in charity can be had by looking up the founder of the > Red Cross and examining the beliefs SHE held. > > --- > James. > > > > -- > http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive > View/change your membership options at > http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist > -- http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist