Metadish, Fresh from NYC

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You see, we really want to help those poor, starving people in Africa, we just have to figure out a way to make the most money from it.  We don’t really care if millions die, because if millions can’t be made by American corporations, then let them starve.

Congress is cockblocking a bill that would allow the federal government to buy food in Africa to help Africans facing starvation.  The problem? It wouldn’t allow American companies to profit, so that’s not an alternative.  Plus, it would make too much sense, it would help get the food to the people who are starving, it would help the African farmers and it would get the food to the people who need it in weeks instead of months.  Sounds like a drag to me.

Why doesn’t Congress pass this bill?  Big business.  Agribusiness, the shipping industry and get this, charitable organizations.  Charitable fucking organizations don’t want to get the food to the people they’re trying to help quicker, because then they wouldn’t be able to pay themselves.  Assholes.

And it’s not like the wealth is being spread around:

Just four companies and their subsidiaries, led by Archer Daniels
Midland and Cargill, sold more than half the $700 million in food
commodities provided through the United States Agency for International
Development’s food aid program in 2004, government records show. Just
five shipping companies received over half the more than $300 million
spent to ship that food, records show.

Who would Jesus let starve so a company could make a few hundred million?  Ask yourself that the next time you vote, or go to work or donate your money.  Ask yourself whether Jesus would be subservient to a system that started wars, allowed people to starve, stole from the working class and amassed wealth on a scale never before seen.  Ask yourself if your ambivalence and inaction absolves you of responsibility.

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