Embedded in the above Title is the annual United Nations Millennium Goals Report for 2008. As it currently stands the majority of the Millennium Development Goals set for 2015 will not be achieved. This is a travesty for the three billion plus people who need our help. Here are just a small quantity of the troubling statistics quoted from the report:
1: "About one quarter of all children in developing countries are considered to be underweight and are at risk of having a future blighted by the long-term effects of undernourishment."
2: "Of the 113 countries that failed to achieve gender parity in both primary and secondary school enrollment by the target date of 2005, only 18 are likely to achieve that goal by 2015."
3: "Some 2.5 billion people, almost half the developing world's population, live without improved sanitation."
4: "More than 500,000 prospective mothers in developing countries die annually in childbirth or of complications from pregnancy." (as a side note that is roughly the equivalent to the population of Portland Oregon.)
The list could go on and on, and does so in the afore-mentioned report. When you closely examine the cost and investment figures required to deeply impact these horrifying statistics, does it not put our recent economic difficulties in perspective? Why is America not taking a more active role in securing the developing world through alleviating these shocking conditions?
Doing whatever it takes to help the UN achieve The Millennium Development Goals should be a cornerstone piece of our foreign policy. We lose our ability to project power, serve as a global moral compass, or continue as a beacon of human accomplishment if we fail in our obligation as a global citizen in doing whatever it takes to reach these goals. And the enduring legacy of this POTUS could very well be defined by many on his production accordingly.
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