Jan Egeland's brazen determination to use the tsunami to promote the primacy of the UN in the international welfare system and possibly secure more UN jobs by shaming countries' to give more money to the UN. Let us not forget that the UN lost a lot of money and jobs when the US evicted Saddam and brought to an end the corrupt oil for food program. Don D'Cruz may be right that "Free trade more precious than foreign aid" But it does not help the build Jan Egeland's empire.

Jan Egeland grew to prominence as the head of the Norwegian Amnesty International and as a major player in the ill fated Oslo agreements. It was in Oslo at an Amnesty International meeting dealing with the ME that I first saw Egeland in 1995. He came expecting flowers only to be bitterly attacked for his failure to secure the Norwegian jobs in the Palestinian area. Apparently, the PA replaced many Norwegian NGO workers with its own people. It was there that I became aware just how important NGO jobs are in Scandinavia, Europe and parts of the US. Sins of the Secular Missionaries In 1995 non-profit groups (including, but not only, NGOs) provided over 12% of all jobs in the Netherlands, 8% in America and 6% in Britain.

Since then,"(June 7, 2004) Between 1997 and 2001, the rate of employment grew faster for the U.S. nonprofit sector than for either business or government, according to a new study by Independent Sector. I suspect the same is true in the rest of the developed world and it represents a powerful highly educated idealistic (if often misguided) transnational progressivist interest group. This is the interest group whose access to income to some form of global taxation would enable it to set the global agenda as it deems best.

To end on a high note, let's remember that 200 ago, most of us would have never heard of the tsunami and our ability to do much to help would have been much more limited. Next time we will do even better.