There is nothing more painful for a parent than to see their child suffer. The agony of feeling utterly helpless when he cries in pain is beyond description. The constant and continual fear that your child will be lost before he can receive the treatment that will save him is almost unbearable. Adding impact to injury is the unsettling acceptance that you don’t have the money to make him well or even ease his suffering. There are many loving parents in this and many other countries that live with these realities every day.

St. Jude’s Children Hospital sees patients and their families that match the above description every day. The difference is that this particular hospital offers its services to sick children with or without insurance, with or without the financial ability to pay. You might imagine that a hospital that offers this type of charity to its patients would somehow lack in the areas of care, technology and expertise.

But this is the farthest thing from the truth.

In 1996, Peter Doherty, Ph.D., of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, was co-recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for work that he did related to how the immune system kills virus-infected cells. In fact, many doctors from the around the world send their toughest cases and their most vulnerable patients to St. Jude’s.

Not only is St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital the 3^rd largest health care charity in pediatric treatment, it is also a world class research facility. Discoveries of new cancer treatments and other diseases have changed the way world treats these catastrophic illnesses. Some of the world’s most gifted researchers come to St. Jude’s to conduct their science work.

According to the 2007 Scientific Report released by St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital, the center accepts over 400 children each year for cancer treatment. The Cancer Center also includes a Cancer Prevention & Control Program. The center receives an outstanding amount of financial support from its independent fund-raising branch, ALSAC which stands for American Lebanese Syrian Associated Charities. The hospital also conducts a significant amount of research on immune deficiency disorders identifying and characterizing the genes responsible for these disorders. And this is just the tip of the iceberg on what this hospital has accomplished in research and treatments for ailing children.

The hospital was founded in 1962 by the late entertainer Danny Thomas and he insisted that no child would be refused treatment based on their inability to pay. According to the hospital’s website, cancer survival rates that ranged between 4%-20% in the 1960’s now enjoy survival rates that range between 64%-94% depending on the type of cancer.

This success rate is due mainly to the research that has been conducted right here in the hospital. This hospital was featured in the movie “The Client” based on the novel by John Grisham. The “client’s” little brother was admitted to the hospital after suffering from symptoms of severe shock when he witnessed an attempted suicide which was foiled by the two brothers. The family’s financial situation in the movie was completely destitute and so the chosen hospital to feature was very appropriate given this hospital’s policies.

Sources:

www.stjude.org, www.thefreedictionary.com, 2007 Scientific Report by St. Jude’s Children’s Hospital, www.britannica.com, wilkepedia.org, www.nobleprize.org

Growing up I had always heard of Make A Wish, knew the basic premise of what they did, but never really appreciated what was involved or how and when the charity begun and where it is today.

Luckily for me, their website Wish.org provides an extensive biography of the charity and the work it performs. It allowed me to gain a fresh perspective on my own life and my own life threatening conditionThe other thing that stood out was the power of one person to make a difference. Make a Wish was founded in 1980. Seven years old, Chris Greicius was being treated for leukemia. Every day, he dreamed of becoming a police officer. U.S. Customs Officer Tommy Austin had befriended Chris and his mother, Linda Bergendahl-Pauling. He also promised Chris a ride in a police helicopter. In the meantime, Chris’s condition continued to decline.

On April 29, 1980, Austin and a caring group of DPS personnel started Chris’ day with a tour of the city in a department helicopter, which also flew him to headquarters. Three cruisers and a motorcycle officer greeted him before his meeting with the DPS command staff. There, Chris was sworn in as the first honorary DPS patrolman in state history and was given a hand made uniform to prove it!

On May 2nd 1980, Chris was back in the hospital. He asked to arrange the room so he could always see his uniform, his motorcycle helmet and his “Smokey Bear”-style campaign hat. The following day, Chris passed away, but not before seeing his dream come true and experiencing the hope, strength and joy that came from receiving his wish.

And thus was born the Make a Wish Foundation. And Chris’s mother, Linda Bergendahl-Pauling, was one of the three founding members. She wanted to see the smile on other childrens faces as they saw their dreams come true.

Fast forward thirty years and more than 187,000 wishes have come true! Not all children have terminal illnesses but all have a life threatening condition. Anyone from the age of two and a half through to eighteen may qualify for a wish.

All in all, I would have to say that this is one of the most important charities I can think of. The work they do, the happiness they bring – the Make a Wish Foundation has a lot to be proud of.

If you would like to help some of these kids’ wishes come true, there are many ways you can help. You can find them all here on Wish.Org.

Here is a video of one very special volunteer. Her story is so heartwarming. She is a Wish Volunteer who had survived cancer and was herself a recipient of a wish and was looking to give back.

This is a story about the best and worst that humanity has to offer.From the depths of cruelty, despair and hopelessness to the freedom of life, liberty and economic self sufficiency.

Imagine a world where girls as young as five working a brothel house, having sex with up to thirty paedophiles a night; paedophiles who make their way to South East Asia specifically for the purpose of having child sex.

Not only are these young children rape victims; they are also sex slaves. To me, the biggest shock came when i read the facts page from their press release: AMERICANS PAEDOPHILES MAKE UP A FULL 25% OF THE CHILD SEX TOURIST INDUSTRY.

In their official press release from 2008, The Blind Project states:

Sex Trafficking FACTS

“Child sex tourism involves people who travel from their country of origin to another and engage in commercial sex
acts with children.
It is estimated that 2 million children are enslaved in the global commercial sex trade.
Nearly one third of the global trafficking trade, of about 200,000 – 225,000 women and children, are trafficked
annually from Southeast Asia.
Many of these children are either sold into prostitution or forcibly recruited on the street to work in brothels, where
they are required to have sex with as many as 30 men each day.
Victims of trafficking are subject to rape, torture, forced abortions, starvation and threats of torturing or murdering
family members.
Some prostituted children are as young as 5 years old.
Misconceptions that having sex with a virgin can cure HIV/AIDS have fueled an increased demand for
child prostitutes.
Virgins are highly sought after and purchased for as much as 750 US dollars for their first sexual experience.
A brothel owner will pay as much as 100 US dollars for the ownership of a young girl. The average annual income in
Cambodia is 286 US dollars.
An estimated $9.5 billion is generated in annual revenue from all trafficking activities, with at least $4 billion
attributed to the worldwide brothel industry. (Ibid.)
25% of child sex tourists around the world are U.S. citizens ”

American Paedophiles in Cambodia

While Thailand used to be the world capitol of child sex slavery, Cambodia has now taken over that mantle, due to its appalling poverty and little to no child protection laws. And US paedophiles are out there in droves, as evidenced in a Fox News story dated August 2009

And as bad as these kids lives are, some are getting rescued from their hell on earth and are given a second chance at life due to the wonderful work of a handful of people who founded The Blind Project.

In 2006 co-Founders Chad Riley, Anthony Dodero, and Liem Nguyen embarked on a month-long journey across
Southeast Asia where they investigated and documented first-hand accounts of the sex trafficking industry. This included the use of surveillance tapes, mics and other equipment, that if discovered while inside a brothel could well have put these brave young mens lives in great physical danger.

They realised that something lasting needed to come out of this, merely rescuing these children from the brothels and set free would provide opportunity for the next slave master to continue the cycle of despair.

So they teamed up with Hagar of Cambodia. On  its home page Hagar goes into alot of detail as to the equally important work they do.

To summize:

Trauma Recovery Centres provide critical crisis care including safe and secure shelter, food and clothing, and intensive counseling and therapy.

Building Resilience: Hagar’s goal is justice, dignity and empowerment for the women and children who come to us.  Education, literacy classes, life and vocational skill development, social enterprise and job placements are all crucial pieces in Hagar’s recovery model.

Pedrhaps most importantly, Hagar’s social business, Hagar Catering, provides jobs for many women from Hagar’s programs. Each business has a safe working environment, pays living wages, and gives its employees the chance to develop new skills, make friends, and provide for themselves with dignity.

The Blind Project is making sure potential donors understand that the wages these women earn are not slave wages, but instead provides them with a quality of life that enables them to live fear free and full of hope.

Both charities are truly life changing for the most vunerable in society. Two fantastic charities to support.

Oh, and if you were wondering all along why The Blind Project is called The Blind Project- you will have to go their the website to find out why.

For further information about The Blind Project, please visit their website.

To make a donation to The Blind Project, aswell as buy some mega cool T-Shirts that spread the message of hope  click here.

For further information about Hagar, please visit their website

To make a donation to Hagar, click here and see how much difference your money can make.

I am no fan of Sarah Palin. I don’t believe that she has any right to be a torchbearer for anything political since giving up the governership of Alaska.

Her naked ambitions to run for President are all too apparent, no matter how poorly she attempts to disguise it. Her well timed book publication and its inevitable top ten placement in the New York Times Best Sellers List will probably end up funding her presidential campaign in 2012….which she will lose and probably lose badly.

She is her own best friend as well as own worst enemy. The conservatives think the former, what remains of the Republican Party believe the latter.

So I was quite surprised to read about Newsweek’s latest publication with Sarah Palin on its front cover. It is a photo cropped from an authorised publication of her in very short running shorts, sneakers and a lot of thigh.

That photo was originally published in the August 2009 issue of Runners World, accompanied by a caption – “I’m a runner”. I am sure that the caption was not referring to her political ambitions but to her love for all  sports and the importance of exercise.

Newsweek cropped that photo for its front cover and in a rather snarky way wrote ” Why she’s bad news for the GOP – and for everyone else too.”

Palin retorted on her Facebook page, “The choice of photo for the cover of this week’s Newsweek is unfortunate. When it comes to Sarah Palin, this “news” magazine has relished focusing on the irrelevant rather than the relevant. The Runner’s World magazine one-page profile for which this photo was taken was all about health and fitness — a subject to which I am devoted and which is critically important to this nation. The out-of-context Newsweek approach is sexist and oh-so-expected by now. If anyone can learn anything from it: it shows why you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover, gender, or color of skin. The media will do anything to draw attention — even if out of context.”

And for once Sarah Palin is absolutely right. Depicting her in a rather skimpy outfit on the front page of the second largest news weekly magazine in the U.S, published in New York and known to be left leaning is indeed sexist and Newsweek should learn some manners.

I am all for a laugh, but imagine for a moment that agreeing to be photographed in a pose that in context is absolutely appropriate – to encourage more people to exercise more often; and then without your consent have that photo cropped and placed on the front cover of Newsweek so that it appears to be rather suggestive and to support the theory that Palin is nothing more than a political wannabe airhead, is insulting, sexist and unfair.

Newsweek should know better.

You may think twice once you read this list of most stressful low paid jobs compiled by CNNMONEY.COM.

In no particular order: social workers, special events co-ordinators, parole officers, news reporters, music ministry directors (where did they pull that one out from?!) membership managers, fund raisers, commercial photographers, assited living director and Ministers all made the top ten most stressfull jobs.

The highest paying job out of all the above is $46,000 as an assisted living director, and the least paid is a news reporter at $32,000.

I must admit only a passing interest to the Carrie Prejean story that has developed over the last year or so. My interest however was peeked when I heard about some (manual labour) sex tapes that Carrie had claimed she had put together when she was seventeen, and almost surfaced on the net; a rather unusual thing for a lady of such high moral values to do.

So the fact that she is now hawking her 15 minutes of fame book on TV is regrettably not surprising at all these days, but she managed to take her own hypocrisy and petulance to new levels in an interview with Larry King on Thursday evening.

As war veterans they give their life due to lack of health care. Over 2200 veterans lost their lives last year due to lack of access to care coverage according to a Harvard research report issued on November 10th. That figure is more than 14 times the number of deaths (155) suffered by U.S. troops in Afghanistan in 2008!

Using their recently published findings in the American Journal of Public Health that show being uninsured raises an individual’s odds of dying by 40 percent , they arrived at their estimate of 2,266 preventable deaths of non-elderly veterans in 2008.

The report continues, and I am quoting verbatim: “Like other uninsured Americans, most uninsured vets are working people – too poor to afford private coverage but not poor enough to qualify for Medicaid or means-tested VAcare,” said Dr. Steffie Woolhandler, a professor at Harvard Medical School who testified before Congress about uninsured veterans in 2007 and carried out the analysis released today [Tuesday]. “As a result, veterans go without the care they need every day in the U.S., and thousands die each year. It’s a disgrace.”

“Its a disgrace”??

Its so unacceptable that a “disgrace” cannot describe the palpable anger I feel towards anyone and everyone who is responsible for the status quo and lack of healthcare for each and every veteran from “deployment to grave”

It is an indictment on American society that it even abandons those that give their lives to protect it.