The bar at the bottom of the picture says a lot (please don't change the picture): "Clooney's Cause". Every celebrity must have a "cause" these days. It's de rigeur. Something they can give speeches on, pose for photo ops, raise money from people without expending much more than a few minutes in front of a  camera, or "testifying" in front of a (now) friendly congressional panel - as if they were an "expert" on the subject. And the media just lap it up. Please, spare us all from policy based on a celebrity "cause".

The dogs bark, but the caravan moves on.

- Arabian Proverb

If this was such an important matter wouldn't,the U.N. rush to save these people from harm,rapings,killings,genocide,slave-trading,over taking of a government,or was this their own provoking??

Oh, the many angles of the liberal press.. More often than not, the media via its well established method of not covering other aspects of an issue, leaves the impression that something else is not happening. This is also the case with the media's coverage of the civil strife in the Sudan, as well as with the more recent addition to the "Hollywood factor," and the media's coverage of that.

The impression that is left by the media is that the Bush administration has done nothing to intervene in the crisis is the impression that they wish to leave with a gullible public. It is important to note that President Bush did declare that it was a genocide rather early on here - a stand that other members in the UN were uncomfortable with. And of course, we have provided much aid to the region.

What we will not hear from the Hollywood headline catchers like Clooney and the MSM is the acknowledgement that the US has, as usual, been the only real leader in the region. One can argue that it is not enough, or one can argue that we shouldn't get involved, but the mood which is set that suggests that this particular administration is numb to such a disaster is way off base.

A couple of recent news items on the savedarfur.org web site offer a bit more:

Coalition Applauds President’s Call for UN Peacekeepers and Appointment of Andrew Natsios as Special Envoy

Save Darfur Coalition Praises President's Signing of Darfur Bill

Footnote: In step with the theme of Mark's blog  -- not there, but why not here -- I personally can attest to a number of personal liberal friends who have been active in the "save darfur" mode, sending around e-mails which often blast Bush for "doing nothing." (It's always amazing how silent they all were over Rwandan, Congo, and other genocides of the late 90's in Africa). Almost all of these folks think that the US going after Saddam (a guy who is responsible for the deaths of something approaching 2 million souls), was none of the US's business.

This reminds me of something similar I read in Mark Steyn's America Alone:

"Every so often, I find myself, for the umpreenth time, driving behind a Vermont granolamobile whose bumper not only proclaims the driver's enduring post-2004 support for Kerry/Edwards but also bears the slogan FREE TIBET.  It must be great for the guy with the printing contract for the FREE TIBET stickers. Not so good to be the guy back in Tibet wondering when the freeing thereof will actually get under way.  Everyone is for a free Tibet, but no one's for freeing Tibet.  So Tibet will stay unfree.  Idealism as inertia is the hallmark of the movement.  If Rumsfeld were to say, 'Free Tibet?  Jiminy, what a swell idea!  The Third Infantry Division goes in on Thursday,' the bumper-sticker crowd would be aghast.  They'd have to bend down and peel off the 'FREE TIBET' stickers and replace them with 'WAR IS NOT THE ANSWER.'"

Mr. Steyn continued;  "In an Ontario courtroom in 2006, it was alleged that a terrorist cell planned to storm the Canadian parliament and behead the prime minister.  A week or two after the revelation of that Toronto plot, there was a flurry of beheadings on America's southern border; the heads of three decapitated policemen were found in the Tijuana River, a fourth turned up in Acapulco a week later.  It's wishful thinking to assume hip depravity won't migrate beyond the Islamist world.  Writing about the collapse of nations such as Somalia, the Atlantic Monthly's Robert D. Kaplan referred to the "citizens" of such "states" as "re-primitivized man."  When lifelong Torontonians are hot for decapitation, when Yorkshiremen born and bred into fish n' chips and cricket and lousy English pop music self-detonate on the London Tube, it would seem that the phenomenon of "re-primitivized man" is being successfully exported around the planet."

Yes, everyone is for freeing Darfur, but no one's for freeing Darfur.  So Darfur will stay unfree.  And lest we forget; "war is not the answer" and "idealism as inertia is the hallmark of the movement.".    There seems only one option available to Bush that will satisfy the left.  At the end of his term he can go before the cameras and like his predecessor, right on que, carefully bite his lower lip and offer a teary-eyed apology for not doing more.  And like the still unfree Tibetan or Sudanese, everyone shares this solemn made-for media moment, especially the few remaining oppressed people of Darfur.  It must give great moral superiority for the Clooney's of Hollywood.  Not so great to be the guy back in Darfur wondering when the freeing thereof will actually get under way.  Meanwhile the "re-primitivized man" is being successfully exported aroung the planet"......

The Sudan was under control of Egypt and England until the mid 1950s when socialists ran them out and installed a Muslim socialist government. As usual, the Marxist dictator starves and kills his people and uses the country's resources like a giant bank account that only his regime can access. And then, as usual, Useful Idiots like Bono and Clooney, blame capitalism and rush to the rescue that will lead to more countries falling off a cliff into the abyss of socialism.