Bush plea for cash to rebuild Iraq raises $600:
An extraordinary appeal to Americans from the Bush administration for money to help pay for the reconstruction of Iraq has raised only $600 (£337), The Observer has learnt. Yet since the appeal was launched earlier this month, donations to rebuild New Orleans have attracted hundreds of millions of dollars. The public’s reluctance to contribute much more than the cost of two iPods to the administration’s attempt to offer citizens ‘a further stake in building a free and prosperous Iraq’ has been seized on by critics as evidence of growing ambivalence over that country.Perhaps Bush should reach out to his core constinuency, which has been shown to support his cause more so than John Q. Surely they would be willing to give towards such a worthy cause (the irony: their tithes would go to rebuild cities that their taxes funded the destruction of).
