Bill Dion

Ways to give to Philippines, still in dire need of donations

I believe in and support peace, compassion, truth, artistic expression, an informed and ethical democracy, economic, social, and environmental justice. If you share these ideals, I would like to enlist your help.

The people of the central Philippines need help on a massive scale after being struck by a massive typhoon. Please, if you're able to, open your hearts and wallets to help those devastated by that storm.

According to a story in The New York Times about the plight of Tacloban, that city faces a “collapse in sanitation, shortages of fresh water and inability of emergency health teams to respond quickly.” The people there face cholera, hepatitis, malaria, dengue fever, typhoid fever, bacterial dysentery, leptospirosis, tetanus, acute respiratory infections, measles, and possibly even polio, according to Doctors Without Borders, United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, and AmeriCares.

Dear reader, doesn't it seem unreasonable to assume that if a city of about 220,000 is “flattened,” and considering that many parts of the central Philippines, and not just Tacloban, were impacted by the typhoon, that there will be a long-term need for aid in the form of food, water, shelter, medical care, and rebuilding infrastructure?...

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Opposition to VY is not a ‘war’

A rebuttal of Jeffrey Lewis's piece in the Feb. 29 edition: First of all, I dislike the framing of opposition to Vermont Yankee as a “war.” It's well documented that many for-profit corporations in general, and Entergy in particular, oftentimes lie, litigate, and lobby (the three Ls) to privatize...

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