or
A Geography Lesson on Central America
|
|
Area (million square miles) |
Percent of land mass |
Population (millions) |
Percent of Population |
|
Central America |
0.2 |
100% |
27 |
100% |
|
Panama |
0.03 |
15% |
2.3 |
9% |
|
Costa Rica |
0.02 |
10% |
2.8 |
10% |
|
Nicaragua |
0.05 |
25% |
3.5 |
13% |
|
Honduras |
0.04 |
20% |
4.7 |
17% |
|
Guatemala |
0.04 |
20% |
8.4 |
31% |
|
Belize |
0.01 |
5% |
0.2 |
1% |
|
El Salvador |
0.008 |
4% |
5.3 |
20% |
While four of the North American Zones are actual countries (Canada, Greenland, Mexico, and the USA) two of the zones are made up of many small countries – the Caribbean and Central America. The Caribbean has 6 small countries, while Central America is made up of 7. The smallest country in this small zone is El Salvador –containing 1/25th of the total area – which makes it about 1000 times smaller than the US – about the same size as the small state of Massachusetts. While the smallest in area it houses about 1/5 of the population. This means it is the most densely populated ≈ 570 people per square mile – which is 10 times as dense as California’s cities. According to the Almanac only 48% of these are adults between 15 to 60 years of age – 5% are old folks over 60, while almost half of the population – an incredible 46% – are under 15.
To this tiny country ‘we’ give 3 billion dollars in foreign aid per year – 1 billion dollars in military & 2 billion dollars in economic aid – dispersed by the United States Government and funded by the American taxpayer with loans from the workers’ Social Security Pool.
How much is this per person? There are 5.3 million El Salvadorians, of whom 40% live in the cities, where the aid is mostly focused. Only 50% of these 2.1 million city dwelling Salvadorians are adults older than 16. So 1 million people receive $3 billion a year from the US.
Doing the arithmetic this is almost $3000 per person. Say half of these are women – who don’t need guns – except in El Salvador. Now the bribe money from the US becomes $6000 per male adult per year. (This is nearly 10 times the annual income of $639.) $2000 of this blood money is allocated for guns & weapons of destruction.
Now, of course, most, if not all, of the military aid will go to the Armed Forces with a population of 10,000 (=7,000 Regulars + 3,000 para-military). The per capita annual income from US aid comes up to the almost absurdly ridiculous figure of $100,000 per soldier per year (1 billion dollars/year divided by 10,000 soldiers). And this annual allowance continued throughout the Reagan/Bush 1980’s. Not a bad income even by American standards.
Unfortunately after looking at these stats it’s not surprising that the El Salvadorians are refugees all over Central America. And all because of little old ‘us’. ‘We’ don’t want them nationalizing industries like Cuba did. This would threaten our ‘American’ interests there. & ‘We’ did buy the country of El Salvador, legally. See. I have the papers signed right here.
or
Why is Everyone Leaving?
Many Salvadorians have left El Salvador to become refugees in the neighboring Central American countries. This is how they’ve distributed themselves as of 1984.
|
Mexico 70K->140K |
Honduras 25K |
Costa Rica 13K |
|
Guatemala 50K->100K |
Nicaragua 20K |
Belize 7K |
|
Panama 1K |
|
|
Summing this column of numbers up, we discover that there are nearly a quarter million El Salvadorian refugees. Mind you these are big Numbers, as big as the entire population of Santa Barbara County in a state of 28 million.
El Salvador has a population of 5.3 million. This means one out of 20 of these happy citizens has fled their homeland, which our country is protecting by giving them 1 & ½ Million Dollars per day to blow themselves to smithereens.
Warning Alert: The Americans are coming to save us. Run for the Hills!
Why have the Salvadorians been leaving their country in droves, for other countries all over Central America? Could it be that the Salvadorians are not that happy with the government we have set up ‘to better their lives’? This Central American government that we set up as a model Democracy and are so proud of, doesn’t seem to be satisfying its citizens.
As the child in the comic strip says: “They say that democracy is great for El Salvador, but it’s killing me & my family.”
or
Another of our Prime Enterprises – It never Ends
Another one of our Prime Time American Enterprises is the Palestinian-Jewish conflict. This is another part of the world we are ‘helping out’. Below is a list of the Palestinian refugees in neighboring countries.
|
Gaza Strip 370K |
Jordan 733K |
Lebanon 232K |
|
Syria 215K |
West Bank 334K |
|
A mere 2 million people who have no place to call home! That is more people than in the cities of San Francisco and San Diego combined. No big deal. Let them move to the bordering Arab countries; they should all be brothers, right? We could easily crowd a few million more in here. Right?!
or
A Short Geography Lesson on the Caribbean Zne
The smallest zone in North America is the Caribbean Zone, which is made up of many small islands. The largest of these islands is Cuba. It is about a 100 times smaller than the USofA and has 25 times less people. We probably don’t really care about it. Wrong.
The American Government hates Cuba more than any other country in the world. It is the only country in the world that Americans can’t trade with. Recently the government attempted to force the Canadians to follow suit. After they politely refused we threatened them with trade sanctions. The penalties for possessing a Cuban cigar is greater than that for many illegal drugs.
Why do ‘we’ hate and punish them so?
They are the only country in the whole hemisphere that turned down American bribe money to exploit their people. It is the only country that has excluded American business. It is the only country that has provided for the rights of its citizens despite pressure from the Big Businesses of the world. It is the only country that has banned private property. It is a Communist state.
‘We’, the International Corporations, owners of the US Government, able to use its army as an instrument of oppression, don’t want this idea of ‘worker’s rights’ spreading anywhere else in the world. ‘We’ need to nip it in the bud. This is why ‘we’ provide billions of dollars of military aid to democratic dictatorships all over the hemisphere - to prop up corruption against the movement for human rights.
|
|
Area (million square miles) |
Percent of land mass |
Population (millions) |
Percent of population |
|
Caribbean |
0.087 |
100% |
26 |
100% |
|
Haiti |
0.01 |
11% |
6.2 |
24% |
|
Cuba |
0.045 |
52% |
10.3 |
40% |
|
Jamaica |
0.004 |
5% |
2.5 |
10% |
|
Bahamas |
0.005 |
6% |
0.2 |
1% |
|
Dom. Republic |
0.02 |
23% |
6.5 |
25% |
|
Puerto Rico |
0.003 |
3% |
3.2 |
12% |
or
Oh Know! I think I’m about to be disgusted again
Sometimes we know too much. Myself, I wish I hadn’t found out yesterday that the United States gives $3 Billion per year to Israel. I think to myself, “What a baby I’ve been! Here I am disgusted by a paltry $200 million a year to El Salvador, a country in our own hemisphere with a population of 5.3 million with a mere 270 thousand refugees, one of twenty, spread across Central America.
Why have I been complaining about El Salvador? They have it good. Why they are only getting about one twelfth the money that Israel gets to ruin their part of the world. Also El Salvador has only 270 thousand refugees. This is only an eighth of the 2 million Palestinians that the Israelis have displaced. Why the El Salvadorians can bless the good life. They may be displaced now, but at least they have the hope that if America stops messing in its internal affairs that they can go back home, if the country has not already been too distorted by all the blood money their country has received. The Palestinians will never be able to go back home. Over two million people without a country – who don’t even exist as a political entity – if our state controlled press is accurate in its reporting.
International Corporations on El Salvador: “Doggone it George! I think we lost another one. Our democracy experiments keep ruining countries for the average folk – Guatemala, Chili, Vietnam, South Korea are just a few that spring to mind. Maybe we should just level El Salvador like we did Vietnam. Then no one will be alive to see what a mess we’ve made. It’s embarrassing. But try & try again & eventually we’ll succeed in seizing control. That’s the way of America’s rulers. Right, Skippy?”
And no one mentions that 8% of $200 billion is $16 billion, which is the interest on the national deficit last year – 1989. This doesn’t include any of the previous debt, which is pushing three trillion dollars. Let’s see – if there are 200 million people in the USA, this means a $15,000 dollar debt per person – every man woman & child – with $1000 in interest payable next year – to finance the federal debt. We can thank our fiscally responsible Republicans for this state of affairs. & They can’t blame it on the Democrats because they’ve been in power for the last 9 years. Or maybe they can.
Republican Senator: “No, it’s those spend thrift Democrats, always ready to sell our country to the Communists. Besides 8% interest on 3 trillion dollars is a mere $240 billion dollars. Why does that worry you? We can always print up more money or raise Social Security Taxes. The poor will never know what hit ‘em. The minimum wage employee won’t even notice the minuscule tax raise? They’re not buying dishwashers anyway. & We all know that is what has made America great.”
Voter: “Dishwashers?”
“No, the people that buy them, dummy – the thriving middle class, You know the ignorant majority … er I mean the silent Majority. & Let’s keep ‘em that way – silent & ignorant – ill fed & entertained – so we can all makes lots of money.”
or
I’m weeping now.
A $200 billion dollar spending deficit for the US A & no one to do anything about it. Democrat & Republicans alike want to do something about this serious deficit, but, poor souls, they don’t know where to cut back. No one even mentions the $3 Billion Dollars in aid we give to Israel each year, or the almost unbelievable sum of $14.6 Billion Dollars that we spend annually on foreign aid. Of course a mere $15 Billion is nothing compared to the $200 Billion we’re running short. But since we need across the board cuts maybe we could look there for a little fat.
Maybe I’m being a little unreasonable because as a father I don’t want them to squander my daughter’s future supporting military dictatorships and protecting the world from a Communist threat that is dismantling itself almost daily. Maybe it’s unreasonable to think that $3 Billion Dollars a Year to a country of 4.4 million, which has displaced 2 million, could be cut a little without endangering that nation’s security too much. Of course I keep forgetting about those poor individuals in the military industrial complex.
“Yeah! What about us? One Trillion Dollars a Year is not much, especially compared to minimum wage, which has been rising steadily every year. It’s a threat to the economy of our fine United States of America,” slobbers the Politician, still bleeding from myriad of psychic sores. “These money grubbing Liberals are going to ruin our system of Free Enterprise with their Communist inspired schemes.”
or
Americans have it too Good
Here I’m spouting – ranting & raving about massive budget deficits, incredible military aid allotments to Central America & the Middle East, and a press controlled by the military industrial complex, the famous Business Establishment.
Do Americans really care?
Unfortunately not at all.
You see we have around-the-clock entertainment – Sports, Music, News and Drama 24/7 – the Super Bowl, the World Series of Baseball and Basketball. Rock & roll music, television & the movies. Personal computers, VCRs, dishwashers, microwaves, & CD players. New cars every year & the lottery where anyone can strike it rich.
The multiplicity of modern American life is so distracting that we just don’t have time for social responsibility. We, parents with children are just barely able to keep up with the myriad events & activities of the school year. College students are trying to find a niche in society so that they can afford all the toys our world has created for all to enjoy. Mountain bikes, Nintendo, high resolution/memory cameras, lightening speed computers, CD Players & high definition TVs. Those who’ve ‘made it’ enjoy 5 star resorts with gourmet cuisine and vintage wines in exotic locations all over the world – purchasing expensive knickknacks to decorate their home.
Entertainment via the ubiquitous TV absorbs enormous quantities of spare time that might be channeled into social responsibility. Sports, sitcoms & soap operas. Emmys, Tonys and the Academy Awards. Why get agitated about the El Salvadorians when we have the Super Bowl’s on TV. It was no coincidence that Bush’s first budget proposal coincided with the playing of the Super Bowl. The Media Masters know that most people will be so involved in the Super Bowl Sunday that they won’t even notice our little 65 billion dollar deficit. They certainly won’t notice that 35% of our revenue is based upon Social Security payments. And even if they notice they certainly won’t care. Give that an American male a beer! On me. Let him spend his weekends on anything but politics.
Invested in the American middle class dream, we don’t want anything that disrupts our income. Keep the price of oil down even if it means invading the Middle East. Keep the price of everything down even it means exploiting indigenous populations everywhere. Keep taxes low, even it means abandoning my neighbor.
Z >D]N]N In Âm 6 + : ( a Z _ Z .U4 ZO u n1 n1 A, [ d I% \ ݁Մ% $ibL L B # M& u u 3 { , -1 1 x a2 & G E e; i z O _H L ,? k X Q =_ H ¸ k 1 Nb O8 Z Y F `[[ - \RP i F x ~ ³N ²B E~ & & CM Ø uh: ^7( ՁGC/u 7E~ ^4 gC_SK7h5#xK ,BP5<^q~RGK N - [X vJ_r1Vy [ӳ: }"+ϖY k IX ` T ;r O0Ȁ 9mpiYMT˵ H%P8 = ܀ۀۀ a^pKeʍ%ӜPo2 ^p Leʍ u!P qkq Lym{ ė s SK ЁB $# h E R _ c I@# $i 76# ,x@"HLb Q