Maintain the compassion

The PS from Andrew Bartlett's email to Crikey.

"PS While I'm writing, I really think the thing to stress with supporting the tsunami victims and their countries is to create the understanding that this support will be needed for months and years, not just while the TV news specials are running. I think people are stupid to bag the Govt now for not putting in enough, being too slow, etc. There will be a flood of support from all over the place now - the big test will be keeping it going (from the Govt AND the public) once the initial shock and interest dies down. I'm sure there's plenty of examples in the past of Governments pledging money when a disaster (war, crisis, etc) happens and then never getting around to providing all of it once people get distracted by the next big thing - we have to make sure that does not happen this time."

Hear, hear!