Relief Efforts

Tim Blair has an enormous amount of news concerning relief efforts.

The Amazon.com efforts have reached $7,000,000. I imagine most of that is from Americans.

The AP has amazing before and after pictures as well as satellite snaps.

Another idiot UN money tick smacks the US. I thought Europeans were supposed to be cultured:

“Only really the UN can do that job,” she told BBC Radio Four’s PM programme.
“It is the only body that has the moral authority. But it can only do it well if it is backed up by the authority of the great powers.”

The UN and moral authority; two things I'd never link in the same sentence.

The official death toll is now at 120,000 and expected to rise.

Jeb Bush will be assisting relief coordination efforts:

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Bush administration broadened its response to the earthquake and tsunami disaster in South Asia and Africa with plans for Secretary of State Colin Powell to visit the region and assess what more the United States needs to do.
"All Americans are shocked and saddened by the tragic loss of life and the destruction around the Indian Ocean," President Bush said in a statement read by White House deputy press secretary Trent Duffy in Crawford, Texas, on Thursday. Bush is on vacation there.
"To coordinate this massive relief effort, first-hand assessments are needed by individuals on the ground."
The president's brother, Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, who has experience with extensive hurricane damage in Florida, will travel with Powell. A congressional delegation headed by Rep. Jim Leach, R-Iowa, a former U.S. foreign service officer, is scheduled to visit Thailand and Sri Lanka next week.
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, who often travels to blighted areas, said Thursday he plans to visit India to try to help victims of tsunamis that have left millions of people at risk of disease.
"I feel like I've been hit in the stomach," Frist, R-Tenn., said in an e-mail to friends and supporters. "It is like 9/11 but so different. There is no one to blame."