Wednesday, January 7, 2009

Interview, Part 2


Jaime said "interview me!" She gave me such good answers, I'm going to post them one at a time.
1. If you were given one million dollars to do one charitable thing, what would it be?
Wow, this is the kind of question I hate. One thing? There is so much suffering and injustice in the world. One thing seems so cold, so exclusionary. There are so many causes about which I feel strongly, it would be hard to single out just one of them. And really, so many of the organizations and non-profits I support probably do bring in a million dollars or more each year, so how could I be sure that my money was doing the most good? So hard … I think that it would make the most sense to give it to individuals, rather than a possibly bloated organization. I guess I would start a grant foundation and give money to anyone who could demonstrate a real need and prove that the money would make a real difference over time, and not just act as a Band-Aid. I’d want to see concrete results, and I’d want those results to have a long-term benefit. Maybe I’d give $50,000 (for instance) to an organization that wants to build a water sanitation facility in some African village somewhere, and another $50,000 to provide schooling for teenage prostitutes in Bangladesh (or wherever) ... Whoever comes forward. Show me a need. Show me a plan to meet that need in a specific long-term way, and I’ll write you a check. I hope that’s not a cop-out answer. . .That’s the best I can do right now to limit my response.

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