{"id":267089,"date":"2010-02-01T19:54:24","date_gmt":"2010-02-02T00:54:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/seattletimes.nwsource.com\/html\/northwestvoices\/2010953954_haitiupdateorphansinternationalaid.html?syndication=rss"},"modified":"2010-02-01T19:54:24","modified_gmt":"2010-02-02T00:54:24","slug":"haiti-update-orphans-international-aid","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/267089","title":{"rendered":"Haiti update: orphans, international aid"},"content":{"rendered":"

Adopt local, not Haiti\u2019s children<\/strong><\/p>\n

The U.S. State Department is being flooded with calls from Americans interested in adopting Haitian children [\u201cHaiti holds Americans trying to take kids out of country,\u201d News, Feb. 1]. No doubt these are caring adults who feel compelled to solve the tragedy of a child left without a family.<\/p>\n

Yet, have they ever considered the more than 150,000 children in the U.S. who also need a permanent home and family? These children have been waiting months \u2014 and often years \u2014 for an adoptive home. For some, that wait will prove fruitless and they will reach adulthood without that foundational sense of family and home.<\/p>\n

We no longer have orphanages in the U.S. Children without a family, or whose parents cannot provide adequate care, are placed in foster care \u2014 where they wait and hope to be adopted. There are roughly 1,750 children in Washington state foster care who are waiting to be adopted \u2014 and there will be more.<\/p>\n

They aren\u2019t victims of a natural disaster, but they are equally innocent. They have suffered the societal disaster of parental abuse, neglect and abandonment and need loving permanent homes.<\/p>\n

I applaud the Americans looking to relieve the suffering in Haiti. Yet I encourage these potential adoptive parents to consider the children in our community. There are children of all ages, all backgrounds and all circumstances here who also need loving, permanent families.<\/p>\n

\u2014 John Morse, Seattle<\/em><\/p>\n

U.S. international aid not adequate<\/strong><\/p>\n

Haiti\u2019s suffering is beginning to fade into the background of our lives and newspapers. A gratifying number of Americans gave what they could in order to ease the burden of this disaster for our neighbors, believing that this is consistent with our view of ourselves as extraordinarily generous.<\/p>\n

However, most of us would be shocked to find out how stingy our government is when it comes to international aid. Repeatedly, studies show that the United States falls at the bottom of developed nations when international aid is calculated as a percent of gross national income. Over and over again, our country has pledged amounts of foreign aid that are minuscule compared to what we spend on defense \u2014 and then failed to even come close to meeting those pledges.<\/p>\n

And while we\u2019re on the subject, humanitarian aid given at the time of a natural disaster is not the most effective way to deliver aid. If we were serious about being effective, we would join other developed nations and set up an emergency fund administered through the United Nations that could be immediately tapped in the event of natural disasters like earthquakes and tsunamis. Then we would feel justifiably generous and not be reading about airlifts diverted from Haiti because no one could guarantee payment for them.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s insist that our elected officials respect our desire to do our share and quit playing \u201cScrooge\u201d behind our backs.<\/p>\n

\u2014 Marsha Hedrick, Seattle<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Adopt local, not Haiti\u2019s children The U.S. State Department is being flooded with calls from Americans interested in adopting Haitian children [\u201cHaiti holds Americans trying to take kids out of country,\u201d News, Feb. 1]. No doubt these are caring adults who feel compelled to solve the tragedy of a child left without a family. Yet, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2861,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-267089","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/267089","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2861"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=267089"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/267089\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=267089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=267089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=267089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}