I HEARD A NEWS ITEM ON ALL THINGS CONSIDERED LAST WEEK about Paul O’Neill and Brazil. It ended with a line by reporter Martin Kaste about how O’Neill’s worries that economic aid might wind up in “Swiss bank accounts” went over badly. “For most South Americans,” Kaste reported, “that coment only confirmed their suspicions about the ruthlessness of American-style capitalism.” (Here’s the link to the archive page with the report. The line occurs at 4:01 into the report. You can stream audio directly from this link.)

Kaste, having gotten in his little dig, said no more. But I wondered — if O’Neill’s worries that development aid would be stolen were “ruthless,” what would count as “compassionate?” (Sorry, I can’t explain what the “capitalism” part has to do with this discussion of government-to-government aid at all, except to conclude that it’s there as a synonym for “policy promulgated by a Republican” — but at NPR, that’s probably close enough).

Anyway, I guess this is what Kaste would prefer to O’Neill’s ruthless desire for aid money to go to the people it’s intended for:

Swazi King Sparks Anger by Buying $55 Million Jet

Reuters

MBABANE – The king of the impoverished southern African nation of Swaziland, where about 250,000 people need urgent food aid, has sparked outrage by buying a $55 million private jet.

Prime Minister Sibusiso Dlamini told parliament this week a 20 million emalangeni ($1.96 million) down payment for the luxury plane was taken from development funds for projects aimed at making Swaziland economically self-sufficient.

“The plane’s price is more than twice the 192 million emalangeni the United Nations is asking in emergency relief from donor organizations to keep about a quarter of a million Swazis from starving this year,” Member of Parliament Nthuthuko Dlamini told Reuters on Saturday.

Aid agencies say up to 13 million people in Swaziland, Lesotho, Mozambique, Malawi, Zimbabwe and Zambia face a looming famine because of drought and government mismanagement.

The luxury Global Express jet, made by Canada’s Bombardier Inc., is worth about a quarter of the landlocked country’s national budget of 2.4 billion emalangeni. . . .

That mean old Paul O’Neill. No wonder they hate him so much.

(Swazi link via Dawson).