We have an African policy

Oddly enough, it's rarely mentioned in the press, but the Washington Post  actually pays attention to it here:

President Bush's legacy is sure to be defined by his wielding of U.S. military power in Afghanistan and Iraq, but there is another, much softer and less-noticed effort by his administration in foreign affairs: a dramatic increase in U.S. aid to Africa.

The president has tripled direct humanitarian and development aid to the world's most impoverished continent since taking office and recently vowed to double that increased amount by 2010 -- to nearly $9 billion. . . .

Beyond increasing aid to Africa, Bush has met with nearly three dozen African heads of state during his six years in office. He visited Africa in his first term, and aides say he hopes to make a return visit next year.

Although some activists criticize Bush for not doing more to end the ongoing genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan, others credit him for playing a role in ending deadly conflicts in Liberia, the Congo and other parts of Sudan. Meanwhile, Bush has overseen a steady rise in U.S. trade with Africa, which has doubled since 2001.

"He should be known for increasing -- doubling development assistance and tripling it to Africa after a period in which U.S. development assistance was essentially flat for decades," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said in a recent interview with the Associated Press. "He should be known for the largest single investment in AIDS and malaria, the biggest health investment of any government program ever."

Comments

[John Salmon]

Bush won't get credit from the lefties for this (at least until he's out of office), because he's George Bush and to them he's an evangelical Jesus-loving idiot from Texas. Their antipathy towards Bush is 99% snobbery.

The Post is the home of at least somewhat sensible moderate liberalism. The New York Times is now utterly useless, except for its arts coverage.

[gail]

The WaPo attributes the policy to the influence of the evangelical Jesus-loving idiot lobby, which has a strange fascination for the poor --probably because they want to make them into rice Christians. So Bush is even dumber than THEY are. Har har.

[ken]

Not to mention the recent nuclear agreement with India that the entire MSM yawned (or carped) about.