G8 Africa pledge is a smokescreen, says Bono

[maddezmom]

Source: Reuters

By Madeline Chambers

HEILIGENDAMM, Germany, June 8 (Reuters) - Rock star Bono denounced world leaders on Friday for producing a "deliberately misleading" pledge to fight AIDS and other killer diseases.

"I am exasperated," Bono told Reuters in a telephone interview at the Baltic resort where leaders from the world's rich nations were rounding off their three-day summit.

"I think it is deliberately the language of obfuscation. It is deliberately misleading," he added.

G8 leaders announced a $60 billion pledge to fight AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis with great fanfare but many activists were disappointed that they failed to set a timetable for the spending plans and that it contained little new money.

"They have taken language hostage. We wanted numbers but this is burobabble," Bono said, criticising the lack of a timeline and the fact that the pledge did not apply specifically to Africa.

Read more: http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/L08834935.htm

[Massachusetts]

1. "it is deliberately misleading,"

That is correct.

Sadly very few people even care. Political football and CYA at its best.

[Maccagirl]

2. Will Bono have to wage this fight alone because

the lazy-ass media won't ask the right questions? I understand his frustration-and hope the entire world "has his back." Screw the politicos-we don't need them.

[rodeodance]

3. Bono--get a clue. do not trust Bushco and his pledges

[MrPrax]

4. So Africa isn't sexy?

"Africa is sexy and people need to know that," The New York Times quotes Bono as saying. "We've got to get better at telling the success stories of Africa in addition to the horror stories."

Bono rebrands "sexy" Africa
Alertnet Reuters

__________

Costly Red Campaign Reaps Meager $18 Million

COLUMBUS, Ohio (AdAge.com) -- It's been a year since the first Red T-
shirts hit Gap shelves in London, and a parade of celebrity-splashed
events has followed: Steven Spielberg smiling down from billboards in
San Francisco; Christy Turlington striking a yoga pose in a New
Yorker ad; Bono cruising Chicago's Michigan Avenue with Oprah
Winfrey, eagerly snapping up Red products; Chris Rock appearing in
Motorola TV spots ("Use Red, nobody's dead"); and the Red room at the
Grammy Awards. So you'd expect the money raised to be, well, big,
right? Maybe $50 million, or even $100 million.

Try again: The tally raised worldwide is $18 million.

The disproportionate ratio between the marketing outlay and the money
raised is drawing concern among nonprofit watchdogs, cause-marketing
experts and even executives in the ad business. It threatens to spur
a backlash, not just against the Red campaign -- which ambitiously
set out to change the cause-marketing model by allowing partners to
profit from charity -- but also for the brands involved.

Reprint - AdAge

__________

Bono's Aids campaign spent £52m for the cause

The star-studded RED charity campaign was said last night to have raised just £9 million to fight Aids, tuberculosis and malaria - despite a £52 million marketing drive.

The huge gap between the figures brought concerns that the major brands involved are benefiting more than the charities they are meant to be helping.

RED was launched by rock star Bono in January last year as a ground-breaking bid to commercialise the fight against disease.

It is a huge enterprise involving clothes, sunglasses, credit cards, iPods and mobile phones.

Daily Mail

__________

Make Poverty History in turmoil over new wristband scandal

Following the damaging revelations last month that more than a million of the Make Poverty History wristbands have been sourced from Chinese sweatshops in ‘slave labour conditions’, a new scandal is about to break that goes right to the top of the star-studded anti-poverty coalition, Red Pepper can exclusively reveal.

Clothing and shoe shops across the UK, owned by the Scottish multi-millionaire business tycoon and philanthropist, Tom Hunter, who is bankrolling the Make Poverty History campaign to the tune of £1million, are selling the coalition’s special white anti-poverty wristbands branded with the logos of companies campaigners accuse of violating workers’ rights in developing countries.

The wristbands in question, personally endorsed by Bob Geldof and Hunter, have been on sale since Monday 6 June for £2 at every store of Hunter’s high-street fashion retail outlet, USC, and his shoe chain, Office. A quotation from Geldof is printed on the perspex display box in which the special edition Live8 wristbands are displayed:

‘When you buy this band you promise me you will do everything you can to get on the road to Edinburgh and join us in changing the world. This rubber band is your solemn word, you are now part of Live8, well done!’

Red Pepper blog

[The Stranger]

6. Let me see if I have this straight: They spent approx. three times what they took in?

Then this?

The huge gap between the figures brought concerns that the major brands involved are benefiting more than the charities they are meant to be helping.

RED was launched by rock star Bono in January last year as a ground-breaking bid to commercialise the fight against disease.

If I weren't laughing, I would be crying.

[EFerrari]

5. Why does the G8 meet? All they do is draw fire by showing

utter contempt for humanity. Do they get off on anger and hatred. :wtf:

[Nihil]

7. Simply because they *can*.

They like rubbing everyone's nose in it.
They love to waste irreplaceable resources.
They love the photo-ops with equally vain "partners".
They thrive on their "leadership" positions.
They dream that they are viewed with respect.

One day they will wake up with a most unpleasant realisation.

[Roland99]

8. So they can take a break from jerking themselves off to have someone else do it.

[burrowowl]

9. I agree with Bono

and of course Bu$h didn't even show up because his stomach hurt.