Research & Rescue

Contact your senator to support International Affairs budget request

Dear ONE Member, There are only a few days left for senators to sign a bipartisan letter calling for robust funding of the 2011 International Affairs Budget. You’re already taken action to help preserve critical poverty-fighting funding—but we need your friends to take action now too. Click the link below to encourage your friends to contact their senators today. http://one.org/us/actnow/2011budgetletter/signed.html?id=1601-4450625-yg8eoRx&t=1 We need the Senate to support the president’s International Affairs Budget request in order to preserve the effective global health programs, sustainable global agricultural development, basic education, debt relief, and economic development programs we as ONE members care about so much. Right now, while the Senate is determining next year’s budget, we need your friends and family to contact their senators and let them know that fighting extreme poverty is important to them. The bipartisan letter senators need to sign to show their support closes in just a few days. Please use the link below to ask your friends to take action right away. http://one.org/us/actnow/2011budgetletter/signed.html?id=1601-4450625-yg8eoRx&t=2 Thank you, Sheila Nix U.S. Executive Director, ONE

BRAZIL: Fewer Slum Dwellers Thanks to Upgrading

RIO DE JANEIRO, Mar 22, 2010 (IPS) - A United Nations report published ahead of the Fifth World Urban Forum in Brazil says the proportion of the population of this country living in "favelas" or shantytowns was reduced 16 percent between 2000 and 2010.

The U.N. Habitat report, presented before the five-day Fifth World Urban Forum - The Right to the City: Bridging the Urban Divide, which opened Monday in Rio de Janeiro, also says 227 million people around the world have moved out of slum conditions since 2000.

The U.N. Habitat (U.N. Human Settlements Programme) report, "State of the World's Cities 2010/2011: Bridging the Urban Divide", says that most of the 22 million people in developing countries that have escaped slum conditions annually over the last decade did so as a result of slum upgrading.

The same thing has occurred in this Latin American country of 192 million people.

Read the rest of original at www.ipsnews.net

Quote of the Day: Niebuhr on the Psychodynamics of Inequality

Since inequalities of privilege are greater than could possibly be defended rationally, the intelligence of privileged groups is usually applied to the task of inventing specious proofs for the theory that universal values spring from, and that general interests are served by, the special privileges which they hold.

via yglesias.thinkprogress.org

Disparity in median women's wealth

More on race and income gap from Democracy Now. The numbers are unfathomable - according to a recent study done by Insight Center for Community Economic Development for International Women's Day, the median wealth for single black women is only $100; for single Hispanic women, $120. This compares to just over $41,000 for single white women.

Why We Need to Measure Poverty Differently

via www.good.is

Welfare Recipients Forced to Sell Food Stamps to Buy Basic Necessities

The Seminal » This Is The House: A Rhyme of Unreason

Disturbing, but important and true...

This is the house which burned to the ground, killing the children inside it.

This is the fire station which would have answered the call faster, if only it were still open.

This is the budget crisis which hasn%u2019t been solved, which reduced the funding for community safety, shutting down fire stations.

This is the business crisis which has been brewing for a decade while resulting in revenue shortfalls, deepened by partisan lip service.

This is the political infighting at state level which prevents budget reform, caused by partisan obstructionism in the Republican-led state senate.

This is the same political infighting in yet another state which prevents resolution of budget crises, caused again by Republican state senators%u2019 partisan obstructionism.

This is the partisan obstructionism at federal level which puts the brakes on money to help the state to solve its budget crisis to keep firefighters on duty to save homes like the one burnt to the ground with the children inside it.

This is the definition of enabling, which defines the efforts of  some Democrats who encourage the obstructionists%u2019 agenda.

This is the change we voted for, which has yet to change the pattern of obstructionism.

This is you, deciding to be the real change we%u2019ve all needed, instead of waiting for a hero.

(photo: Townhouse in Flint, Mich. where four children under the age of 5 died, by Hollyn Johnson for The Flint Journal)

via seminal.firedoglake.com

Posted via web from thinking aloud

Food shortages on the Pine Ridge Reservation

Please read the appeal on BJ Tuininga's Twitwall for ways you can help address the devastating hunger problem on Pine Ridge. Pine Ridge is one of the, if not THE, poorest areas in the US.

The Food Share America food co-op, managed and operated by One Spirit and the Lakota people, is providing fresh fruit, vegetables and meat to over 100 families and elders representing over 1000 people. Every month, increasing numbers of people ask to be part of the food program. This is the only food program on the reservation that delivers food that is both high quality and has high nutritional value.

Read more at twitwall.com