The UN Has It Wrong (Again)

They are claiming that African governments are "prevented from supplying clean water to their people" by outside forces such as drought, poverty, war, pollution and chaotic urban growth. This reminds me of Rush Limbaugh's anti-SUV fanatics who are always blaming the car for the accident.

"A huge SUV ran off a freeway in downtown LA today..."

"The speeding SUV went through a red light at 4th and Main..."

"The powerful four-wheel-drive vehicle spattered the deer on Highway 7..."

It's as though no one was driving.


[Thanks to truckworld.com for the photo, with which I have messed.]

Well, the same principle applies to governments. Someone is driving them, and in Africa and elsewhere, the drivers are sometimes corrupt, self-serving megalomaniacs who suppress their country's free market forces and entrepreneurs for their own private profit.

Too many countries with unbelievable odds against them manage to "feed their people" -- i.e. manage to keep out of the way of their people's survival instincts and specialization tendencies. It's the old Adam Smith adage: division of labor is a natural force in human nature. I'll add that it can be stymied by man's vice: his inhumanity to his own species.

Look at the Saudis and the Israelis. Left to their own devices, humans will find a way to bring water to the driest desert, even if they have to desalinize and transport it first.

The article is here.