Tsunami Aid: The Inevitable Followup Stories
The overwhelming charitable response to Asian tsunami will inevitably lead to two downbeat followup stories. The first, illustrated already by Roberto Clemente Jr.'s diversion of aid originally destined for Nicaragua, will be that generosity toward tsunami victims is pulling money away from other, often local, charities. (The tsunami hasn't made Nicaraguans any less needy.) The second, so far illustrated mostly by giant piles of unneeded clothing, will be that more donations have been received than are needed to deal with the immediate crisis. Then the kibbitzing will start about whether charities are using the surplus as donors would have wanted.
I don't intend to discourage generosity, only to say a) Don't take tsunami aid out of your charity budget; take it out of something else. b) Don't be mad if the Red Cross, say, gets so much money that it spends yours helping victims of other disasters.