Nov. 10, 2001 - 20:28 MST

THE WONDERING JEW

Bad Taste

In my opinion it is bad enough to see my tax money spent foolishly on superfluous pork barrel projects when it is needed so much more in other places. That is something that has grated on many of us Joe Blows through the years.

I thought charity skimming had reached rock bottom when President William Aramony of the vaunted United Way resigned in disgrace and was convicted of 25 counts of fraud, conspiracy and money laundering. If I remember some of it there were favorites played and I heard that nepotism was part of those who also benefited from his actions as well as himself living super high on the hog.

Some years before either United Way or the combined charities which in Denver were called The Community Chest changed the way donations were spent. Used to be that a person could specify his/her donation to a certain charity and that was added to other donations for that charity and that charity received just exactly that sum. Somewhere down the line the establishment decided that every year each charity would receive X per cent of what was received. They didn't care who said what it was to go to, it was all cut and dried, oh, we could still designate where we wanted the money to go but it just didn't matter anymore it went to the percentage as decided from above.

But now it appears to me that the president of the Red Cross tried a stunt that would have changed its name maybe to the Red Double Cross. Prez Dr. Healy so I read, arbitrarily decided to hold 'in reserve' almost half of the 564 million dollars given to benifit victims and their families of the WTC pyre. She said that they wanted to hold money aside for victims of future terrorist attacks. At one point it appears that it was intended to use some of the money for internal purposes - purchase of new technology yadda, yadda.

I don't think I am a bit different from anyone else, my donation was just a widows mite but my intention was that it should be received by someone hurt by the WTC tragedy. Every damn cent, all of it. . . . . .

Depending on how many ways it could be split up, it would have amounted to about $ 122,000 per family. Some victims refused to accept a cent - and I think they should be the ones who should specify where that amount should go. It would have been about the amount of insurance settlements on some auto accidents in our country where no life was lost - just marred forever.

How dare anyone divert money from such a thing as that ? What utter brass, gall, that there should be such disregard for the rest of humanity - the givers as well as the receivers.

Dr. Bernadine Healy has resigned - now get this, to be effective December 31 - why should she dare take advantage of the Red Cross and the donators ? Why not right now ? ? ? ? ?

I can understand how we can be turned into cynics by things that leave in our mental mouths a Bad Taste . . . . . . .

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