I meant to get this up last week for Armed Forces Day, but didn’t get to it, so I’m posting it for this week’s Wordless Wednesday. Thanks to all the men and women who fight for our country.

New reports are coming out of Haiti. Reports of hunger, hopelessness, violence against women…It is heartbreaking to think that Haitians are fighting over things like sanitary napkins and don’t have a place to sleep at night where they’ll be safe. I know that there are, as hard as it is to believe, people in our country that face the same issues. But this is on such a massive scale that it seems impossible that we can’t do something. It seems like we would have learned something from the U.S. Hurricane Katrina disaster and the Asian tsunami that caused similar destruction.

Part of the problem is that there aren’t enough people on the ground to distribute supplies and, while dropping them from the air sounds like a nice idea, there are going to be a few very fast, very desperate people who decide to hoard supplies while someone who is ill or elderly is too slow to get even one of the items dropped.

Another problem is that people left the city where aid organizations were set up to head out to the country. There aren’t any resources in an empty field.

To make the situation worse, many aid organizations are hesitant to take people in need of medical help to a place where they can receive it because of the disaster with the Americans who decided to skip red tape and take a busload of unauthorized children out of the country.

I wish I had a solution to even part of the puzzle. I don’t. But someone out there has to have one. Someone has to be able to figure out how to build simple one room homes that have a sturdy, locking door that can be folded flat, shipped over to Haiti and assembled in minutes. Someone has to have a warehouse filled with compost toilets. Someone has to have enough materials to make a thousand solar ovens. Someone has to have water purification systems.

Maybe what we need to do is to ask a bunch of survival experts and off grid living folks to head to Haiti with the supplies and show people how to use them.

In the meantime, there are aid organizations on the ground working to help these people around the clock. And they’re going through money like it is water as they pay for all the supplies they need. So, while I don’t have a solution, I’m doing what I can do. I’m continuing to donate what I can afford to give each month. The Red Cross, Doctors Without Borders and a number of other organizations are all accepting donations for their Help for Haiti campaigns.

Do you have a blog? Do you want to help out with the Haitian crisis? If so, you can combine the two to help even more. If you blog about what you did to help Haiti and leave a link to your post on her post about the project, Money Saving Mom and her husband will donate $10 to Compassion’s Outreach in Haiti.

I donated to the Red Cross because it is an organization I know and trust. I’m also looking for a local organization that can accept food, clothing and toiletries from my pantry, so if anyone knows of organizations collecting items, let me know.

Thanks to Money Saving Mom for putting this together!

With every state in the nation having a very lenient baby drop off law in place, you’d think we’d stop seeing story after story about people throwing newborn infants in the trash. However, it still happens, as recently as last month. I don’t know if people don’t understand how easy it is to give up an infant under the safe haven laws in all 50 states and Washington, DC or if they just aren’t aware that the laws exist. All I know is no child should ever grow up and find out he or she was found in a trash bag and no infant should suffocate to death in one because the woman who gave birth to it didn’t want it and didn’t know where to take it.

I’m not sure what else can be done, especially when some states have gone as far as putting stickers on dumpsters telling people about the safe haven law. But it breaks my heart to see that someone didn’t want a new baby so much that they threw it away. A baby. Somewhere in that same neighborhood, a woman is desperately trying for the fifth or sixth year in a row to get pregnant and, when it is put up for adoption, will welcome that same baby with open arms if it lives through its ordeal.

So, the trial over Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon’s misappropriation of gift cards is over. She has been found guilty of misdemeanor crimes. Now, I’m sure many people are applauding the conviction or may be disappointed that she wasn’t found guilty of felony theft. Here’s my problem: Why would someone in her right mind risk losing everything for a bit over $600 in gift cards?

If Mayor Dixon deliberately took the gift cards meant for people in need to buy gaming equipment when she obviously has enough money to buy it herself and has done many other things that show that she thinks she is above the law, is a jail term really the answer? Julie Bykowicz and Annie Linskey of The Baltimore Sun say:

The gift card case has revived talk of Dixon’s perceived sense of entitlement. Her critics point to a pattern of behavior that suggests she thinks rules don’t apply to her.

Perhaps a jail term is the answer. Perhaps it would shock her into realizing she isn’t above the law. But what if it doesn’t fix anything? What if it makes it worse? I would like to hear from a psychologist who deals with people who seem to be exhibiting narcissistic behavior.

So many times over the years, people have mentioned a burning desire to quit a hated job. Then, when I ask what stops them, they bring up benefits. Not money. They’re earning enough with self employment or a part time job they love to make ends meet. But they know they can’t get individual medical insurance because of health conditions they or a family member have and are trapped working for that insurance.

With the health insurance reform bill through the House of Representatives and the Senate looking at its own bill, that may be about to change. So, I’m curious. If there is national health care in the U.S., will you quit your job?

I’m all for safety. I don’t want kids who are walking to school hurt by a passing motorist. But I’m a librarian. I read 1984. So, no. No, I don’t think a law allowing cameras to automatically ticket anyone speeding within a five mile radius of a school or work zone is a good idea.

Photo: SXC/Dan Shirley

For one thing, if you’re not familiar with an area, you don’t always know the speed limit. You’re thinking that nice, straight road – it has to be 45. So, you’re sailing along and…Whoa! Speed limit 30! You hit the brakes and now that you know, you’re going the speed limit. Too bad you passed two cameras before you saw that speed limit sign. That’ll be 80 bucks, please.

Oh, and that joy rider that swiped your car and decided to see just how fast it would go? He gets a fun ride. You get a tab of $160 and then you get to try to prove that you weren’t the driver. Oh, it’ll only take a few hours of your time. Maybe a missed day of work or two.

Sigh. Maryland Senate, what were you thinking? Maybe that you’d all get another 8 million or so in your county’s coffers like Montgomery County? Umm. And Senate President Thomas V. Mike Miller Jr? Just so you know, a cap of 10 percent of a jurisdiction’s total budget will not reassure voters that it isn’t a revenue issue. When you’ve got a deficit, you want to make up the difference and 10 percent is 10 percent.

Thanks to the 20 Senators who voted against the bill and didn’t switch their vote just to make other politicians happy or to raise revenue.

(Although the House hasn’t yet passed the bill, it did pass it last year, which means there is about a 99 percent chance we’re getting camera issued speeding tickets.)

Go slow, Mama. And don’t let anyone else drive your car. In Maryland, it kind of feels like Big Brother is watching and, while he’s not a threat to your health, it sure seems like he’s after your cash!