Thirty-three percent. That was President Bush’s approval rating the day before Tuesday’s State of the Union Address, according to a Washington Post survey. That is the lowest approval rating for a president not on the verge of resignation.
Not only is that number abysmally low, but now 71 percent of the country responded in the same survey that the country was on the wrong track. Clearly, the nation is tired of the rhetoric of patience and stay the course.
Much can be said about how poor this president has performed. Unfortunately for us, there will probably be much more at which he will fail throughout these next two years, but we are stuck.
What is more unfortunate is that this poor performance has overshadowed the good that President Bush has been able to accomplish. That statement might seem oxymoronic, but he has accomplished good in at least one field: AIDS relief.
In his 2003 State of the Union, Bush proposed the Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. The plan called for $15 million to be committed over the next five years to the global struggle against HIV/AIDS. The proposal passed overwhelmingly in the House and Senate and has been in effect for nearly four years.
One statistic was correct in the President’s most recent State of the Union – that “the number of people receiving life-saving drugs has grown from 50,000 to more than 800,000.”
Although this is a great improvement, much more needs to be done. According to the White House Web site, nearly 30 million people on the African continent alone are infected with HIV/AIDS. That is almost three times the entire population of Ohio, and three million of those infected are under the age of 15.
It is hard to imagine facing the hardships that the impoverished in Africa deal with every day, and to struggle with a debilitating disease only compounds the problems. In the past, those who were fortunate enough to receive care had to deal with being on constant medications, and those not fortunate enough were left on their own.
Thankfully, there have been great advancements in the antiretroviral (ARV) drug community. Those infected need less amounts of medication that last for a longer period of time, at a fraction of what ARVs previously cost. This not only means more people can be treated for the same amount of money, but that those infected now have the opportunity to live a life worth living.
This is important not only for those adults seeking employment to care for their families, but for those children who, in the past, would have never had a chance in life. It is because of actions like the Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief that these children are given not a second chance, but a first chance.
Every day, parents die from infection, leaving more and more children left to fend for themselves. In many countries, South Africa for example, locals have attempted to alleviate the stress by setting up orphanages so these children can survive.
One such orphanage, the Zamimpilo Orphanage, has received notoriety lately because of its attachment to pop singer Josh Groban. Its message is simple: “Don’t let me go it alone.” Zamimpilo is a member of NOAH (Nurturing Orphans of AIDS for Humanity), and receives its help from this group. NOAH is funded by many different countries, including the United States under the Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief.
There is no way to know if any amount of money will ever be enough to end the struggle against HIV/AIDS, but every dollar counts. It may or may not be America’s role to be world policeman, but it our responsibility to follow the President’s words: “To whom much is given, much is required.”
Matt Martin is a junior in
political science. He can be reached at [email protected].
