January 22, 2010, - 4:15 pm

If You’re Planning to Give to Tonight’s Haiti TV Telethon, Remember . . .

By Debbie Schlussel

. . . one of the main celebs hosting the telethon, “Help For Haiti Now,” is charlatan Wyclef Jean.  Refer back to my analysis, earlier in the week, of his charity, the Wyclef Jean Foundation, Inc. a/k/a Yele Haiti Foundation.  Note the hundreds of thousands he spent on himself and friends versus very little he spent on the people of Haiti (and when he did it was for dumb hip hop stuff for condoms and against AIDS).

wyclefjean

Do you really think giving him more money will help a single person in Haiti?  Best to give to a reputable charity not pimped by mindless, self-righteous, lefty celebs on TV.




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22 Responses

I’m so glad we’re going out to dinner tonight. I am so sick and tired of seeing all this self aggrandizing crap from all this celebrities. The accounting statistics that came out of the tsunami charity concert (and other charities) were appalling.
I’ll be damned if my family and I are going to donate to that type of mess again.

I know! We’ll “celebrate” this gathering of celebrities by renting Team America. What a way to end the day.

cirrus1701 on January 22, 2010 at 6:11 pm

Foxnews.com reports that Wyclef has hired a new accounting firm for his foundation. He now admits he made mistakes with his charity. I don’t see where Fox has acknowledged your contribution to Wyclef’seeing the light.

Tim on January 22, 2010 at 6:56 pm

Dumb hip hop stuff for condoms against AIDS? So its a bad thing to be against AIDS?

Also, do you really think that he would keep money that is to go to his destroyed homeland? Do you think he doesn’t care or this your professional opinion on human nature.

Nak on January 22, 2010 at 8:55 pm

    What has aids got to do with helping earthquake victims. Looks like he’s using the terrible aftermath of a natural disaster to further another agenda. Maybe he needs to get his priorities in order.

    gerob on January 24, 2010 at 10:24 am

Exactly all the above. These “celebrities” come out, sing and dance and want all of the capatalistic pigs of America to donate for Haiti. I thought it was interesting that Madonna donated $250,000 and self rightously proclaimed that others match her. I guess no one told her Sandra Bullock had already donated 1 million. Now the last time I checked, Madonna was worth oh what 10 times more than Sandra….I guess Madonna has her money invested in Malawi (sp) trying to buy more children.

Also the other con artist George Clooney is involved in this or he’s doing something with MTV…Again he did this for Katrina and kept 60% or so of the proceeds for his expenses.
These people get their fair share up front before any money goes to the people.

Hey maybe Jay Leno will have all the celebrities sign another bike and he’ll auction it off and donate the money. Funny but if he wanted to help he’s worth several million.

This is just a photo Op for these ego maniacs. If people want to donate, they should send their money to the Red Cross, the Catholic Church, which is doing a great deal, or better yet donate to the Israeli charities since they’re the ones who first got to Haiti. Anything will be better than the celebrity telethon.

perception of truth on January 22, 2010 at 9:05 pm

    Nicely stated POT.

    I did not know that about George Clooney and the Hurricane Katrina charitable drive. I’m not surprised!

    Skunky on January 22, 2010 at 10:19 pm

I donated to Father Mark Boisvert in Les Cayes who routinely feeds 680 children at 3 locations – and educates them as well. This week and for the forseeable future he will be feeding refugees from Port au Prince.
His website is http://www.freethekids.org/.

Jamie Shafer on January 22, 2010 at 9:35 pm

Haiti money raising orgy. I stopped caring when I found out this is going to lead to hoards of Haitians bringing their ‘skills’ to the U.S. in the name of ‘compassion’. More illiterate and unskilled immigration which is what we so badly need. What I see up ahead? Voodoo Prison Chaplains.

poetcomic1 on January 23, 2010 at 1:18 pm

I don’t want to come across heartless, but just how much money does Haiti need to be put back to the mess it was prior to the earthquake? Hasn’t the U.S.A. alone donated probably four times the yearly Haitian GNP? To what end is all this money being raised for?
I am confident that there was plenty of money raised in just the first few days to rebuild that calamity of a nation.
I realize this would be great PR for the USA but for Hugo Chavez and France claiming the USA is occupying Haiti now. And to take refugees? Isn’t that depriving Haiti of a now much needed work force?
Who was it who said “you can’t fix stupid”.
Need I remind all of all the money that poured into New York City after 9/11? Almost ten years later and there is STILL just a whole in the ground where the Twin Towers once stood.

Bob on January 23, 2010 at 3:25 pm

We donated to a charity that we know has been doing good work in Haiti for years…. The International Orthodox Christian Charities which is located in Maryland.

We also send the health( Hygiene), baby-needs and school kits that we can make up at a meeting at church or at home. We send the kits to the IOCC and then the IOCC sends them to people who need them. Our group has 50 health kits ready to go right now. Will have many more done by Monday.

I REALLY prefer NOT ever to send ANY money to any telethon-type event which is advocated or advanced by twinkle
“stars” , you know those silly, vapid ego maniacs! No matter which charity. I just do not trust “stars”.

Sewsalot on January 23, 2010 at 3:28 pm

Bob:

So your “solution” is to simply allow all the Haitians to die of starvation and disease? And precisely who would benefit from this “solution” of yours?

poetcomic1:

So … this is any different from the MILLIONS of unskilled Irish, Germans, Italians, Polish etc. that were allowed to emigrate here for over 100 years how? Had it not been for the potato famine, we never would have had the notorious Democratic urban union political machines (Kennedy, Daley, Tammany etc.) that elected three generations of politicians that gave us the New Deal and other liberal/socialist ideas in the first place. But it was OK when you guys did it, right? Of course it was.

Gerald on January 23, 2010 at 4:53 pm

What are you smokin’ Gerald? A little problem with reading comprehension? I hate to even dignify your casual dis, but I feel I should. Did I say that we shouldn’t donate? I said we have already donated hundreds of millions. Let’s see if works. If they need more in a few months (if Haiti doesn’t change it will always need more money) then we can reavaluate.
As far as the comment on refugees, you brought up the potato famine. All those Irish that built the inferstructure of NYC. Was Ireland if need of workers at that time? Apparently not. With Haiti in ruins, who should rebuild it? Why not the Haitians themselves with all the money we are sending then.
Gerald, how much money have you donated? And to who? Do you have a spare room for a Haitian refugee?

And, as a side note to all other readers here, remember Clinton accepted thousands of refugees from the Bosnia War. We were told at the time that it was just on a temporary basis. They all stayed. Now they have a nice little mafia that makes the Sicilians look tame in comparison (Not to mention that they added to the muslim population in the U.S.).

Bob on January 23, 2010 at 5:24 pm

    Yes Bosnians stayed in the USA, unfortunately but the worst ones are the Albanians from Kosovo. They are the ones with the GANGSTER reputation that aeven scares the Mafia…. And yes they are Moslems, and like the Bosnians, violently anti-Christian and anti-Jewish.

    Now that several of both groups have plotted or committed terroist acts in the USA, the USA should send them ALL back to the “new”countries the USA made for them at the expense of the Christian residents of those areas… Bosnia and Kosovo.

    Sewsalot on January 25, 2010 at 12:31 am

This is just more race-baiting from Debbie Schlussel as usual. The problems with Wyclef Jean’s charity are no different from those run by a ton of other folks, including the white, conservative and Zionist charities and nonprofit organizations that Schlussel loves.

The fact is that Wyclef Jean is already rich. He has been a professional musician with a major record deal for 20 years and has sold tons of records and played tons of sold out shows. He doesn’t need a charity to enrich himself. He could make 3 times the money that Schlussel is accusing the guy of bilking out of his charity by performing one show in London (or by taking $1 million to perform for Qaddafi’s son) or by releasing some “live album” from some concert that he performed years ago without anywhere near the hassle or bother of even TRYING to administer a charity.

Second, Jean is just about the ONLY famous Haitian – or for that matter famous person of ANY race or nationality – that was doing ANYTHING for Haiti before this earthquake. There are more than a few Haitian professional athletes, actors, singers etc. out there. Where are their charities? And even the black leadership doesn’t mention Haiti anymore because it will demonstrate how their involvement in Haiti in the 1980s and 1990s (toppling the admittedly fascist and oppressive Duvalier regime and putting socialists in power) were complete failures.

Third, rather than presuming that Jean went through the trouble of administering a charity for a cause that PRACTICALLY NO ONE CARES ABOUT (instead of getting involved in more lucrative stuff like global warming, AIDS awareness, breast cancer, gay rights etc.) the FAR MORE LIKELY EXPLANATION is the same problem that afflicts THE VAST MAJORITY OF SMALL CHARITIES AND NONPROFIT ORGANIZATIONS: the people who run them lack the training, background and experience required to run one effectively and efficiently. As Schlussel fully knows, the overwhelming number of small charities and nonprofits spend the vast majority of the money that they raise on fundraising drives and managerial overhead. Often they get into such boondoggles that they will spend $50,000 to put on an event that only raises $10,000. It is a bigger issue with small charities because the more you rely on poorly trained people, part time workers and volunteers, the more waste and mismanagement is going to happen.

The issues with Jean’s charity is due to the fact that entertainers tend not to have master’s degrees in public administration, ten years of experience working for the United Way, or anything resembling the background required to effectively run a charity. So, the celebrities who run charities use the same methods that your stereotypical bored trophy wife of a wealthy family does, because those are the type of charity events that they themselves attend. Most of these guys learned all they know from running charities by attending the little soirees put on by people like Ivana Trump, Melinda Gates, Bono or whoever and have no idea how to actually run a real charity.

Again, Schlussel knows these facts, and she also knows that Jean’s charity is no different from how most of the other small charities, foundations, nonprofits etc. are run. So does she go after them on a regular basis, telling her supporters to avoid them? Nope. Instead, she targets Jean because he is black and famous, and the fact that Jean is a liberal entertainer makes it ok. Just part of her ongoing mission to make sure that good conservatives view all blacks other than well known vocal Zionists (like Martin Luther King, a socialist subversive who inflicted far more harm this country than Jean ever will, and by the way Jean IS NOT one of the rappers who trades in violent/drug/misogynistic/racist lyrics) and Clarence Thomas with suspicion.

Just part of Schlussel’s “it’s imperative that conservatives oppose all blacks except for the 2% that are registered Republicans” theme. It’s precisely the same reason why she goes after Jean instead of the many wealthy Jews who spent more money than she is accusing Jean of stealing on hors d’oeuvres for their upscale cocktail party “charity events”, and then invested what little is actually raised on the little socialite “charity party” scene with Bernie Madoff.

Gerald on January 23, 2010 at 5:32 pm

Bob:

I have been following the Haiti situation since the early 1980s. To be very brief and extremely kind, Haiti is permanently dysfunctional. They have endemic structural problems that would take decades to fix if even they had good leadership and a populace that was willing to follow (presently they have neither). It is so bad that even the Dominican Republic, itself a third world country with its own dire economic situation, has to dedicate a significant portion of its meager resources to fighting illegal immigration from Haiti. Without a great deal of foreign support, those people will literally starve to death. If you are into Malthusian economics, then I suppose that is precisely what you advocate. If so, go ahead and declare those to be your beliefs: that the Haitian population should be allowed to die off so that people who are actually capable of running a country can take it over.

As far as whether Irish, Italian, etc. immigration was justified by an alleged American labor shortage, I will reply that many similarly allege there to be a shortage of low-skilled labor in America today. Those include the “comprehensive immigration reform” advocates at the Wall Street Journal, the National Review, and also George W. Bush and John McCain. (Remember McCain’s famous statement that American citizens wouldn’t pick produce in the hot sun even if it paid $50.00 an hour?)

So perhaps the European immigrants were needed only because a great many employers didn’t want to hire a certain large group of people that were already living in America, people who would have been perfectly willing to building the New York infrastructure for money after they built the southern infrastructure unwillingly and for free.

Gerald on January 23, 2010 at 5:53 pm

Gerald, you seem to think that there were 8 million people in New York at the turn of the century and that they were all out of work. In addition, that was long before welfare and all other forms of Government Handouts that today’s illegal immigrants are privy to. I won’t argue that back then the crime rate was high, but these immigrants learned English quickly and became part of the fabric of the nation willingly and many fought against their homeland in WWI and WWII.
The comparison between immigrants of the mid nineteenth century through the mid twentieth century to immigration today is just plain rediculous.
And today, I think there are many Americans that would gladly pick strawberries for $2o/hr. Cash, of course.

Bob on January 23, 2010 at 7:11 pm

There is one group I feel safe donating to Team Rubicon Haiti. They are a self financed group that was started by a former marine after seeing a news report after the earthquake in Haiti. He put a note on facebook asking for volunteers. It started with 4 guys. They now have doctors and nurses that joined them after seeing their blog. They are reporting on the blog from Haiti so you can see all the good work your money is funding. They’re at http://blog.teamrubiconhaiti.org

Jennifer on January 23, 2010 at 9:54 pm

He was on Oprah professing ALL monies will go to the Haitians…

People are so ignorant to fall for this scammer! Now, it is ok cause he has a “new” accountant” that makes all of the fraud just go away? Hardly.

That is why I have not donated. We send billions of dollars from our country and the people NEVER see it. It lines the pockets of the elected officials/dictators and those people wonder why no one helps them. We do! We are the most generous country in the world and people do not realize just how great we are and how much money is sent to countries in need.

The Red Cross? Give me a break! Just like the 911 scam, they promised the monies would go to help the families. Well, after all was said and done, they decided they should “keep” money for administrative costs. They only dished out a fraction of what they collected.

Just like Obama…they use a crisis to get money and follow out their agenda…TO STAY IN BUSINESS AKA PROFIT!

I am pissed Obama’s pledge 100 million to Haiti (our tax money). We should not give that amount. Help them with material needs. We should help them build housing, buy clothing, shoes, etc. out of the thrift stores and Goodwill in this country, sending those to the victims. Then we are helping those businesses/charities as well by giving financial support when the economy is suffering here.

We should allow people out of work to go there and build low cost housing. I mean low cost. 100sf at the most per family, helping them with plumbing, irrigation, growing crops all the things they need to become productive and start bringing revenue but ending this poverty they are enslaved to.

We cannot keep sending money to countries and no accountability for it. The people in these countries surely do not see it. People keep coming here illegally cause of the poverty they face. It is bankrupting this country because we are supporting them here and their native county as well. They break our laws, pay no taxes and use our programs that simply drain our system. Countries outside of the U.S. should see that what we have works (before Obama) and socialism, communism does not work. Out people lose jobs because they are given to illegals, so again it attributes to the decaying of our economy.

I am truly saddened the people of Haiti are suffering so. I want to help them, but not by just sending cash there and say “here ya go and do whatever you want with it”. After it is all said and done and the money is gone…HAITI WILL BE AS IT WAS THE DAY BEFORE THE EARTQUAKE. POVERTY AND WANTING MORE MONEY!

Just like welfare, giving people money freely does not work. Welfare here is the worst thing that ever happened. Most all of welfare stay on it for life and have no desire to leave their impoverished situation. Women keep having kids as a source of income, free housing, money and food. Why work with all that for doing nothing? That is the mentality for the greater percent of welfare recipients. Add to the mix the illegals coming here; having anchor babies and the billions we spend for their lazy asses to do nothing, becomes trillions of tax dollars we should not spend.

Soon, the Dems will not be in control and we can get on the right track. We need leaders that follow the Constitution, not kiss asses of Muslim terrorists and keep our money and jobs here. I am hoping that out of the next batch of leaders we can somehow find a George Washington to get us back to our founding beliefs and practices.

Pat on January 24, 2010 at 2:45 pm

“We send billions of dollars from our country and the people NEVER see it. It lines the pockets of the elected officials/dictators and those people wonder why no one helps them. We do!”-Pat
That’s how America shows its compassion, by allowing crooks to take the money intended for the poor? Obama takes a $4,000,000 vacation on a $400,000 salary while his country is in such a deep recession Walmart is laying off workers!
And Gerald I will gladly make room for a couple of Haitian foster children. YOu are the racist for wanting the government and celebrity elite to continue to profit on these people’s misery. I don’t care how much this rapper has or can make. He is a PIMP. Liberal losers toss the poor their garbage and cast offs and think they are doing them a favor. Thousands of black died while Hillary Clinton flew in for her photo op. Of course we won’t hear a peep out of you about that, those kids become statistics so they can pimp for more money to line their pockets. America pandering to the UN and the corrupt Haitian government has cost lives. These people weren’t given any warning and I don’t think they were wanting a 7. earthquake so they could collect welfare. But for the grace of God none of us were born in Haiti. God loves those people and this tragedy should cause every one to readjust our priorities. Prayers for the people of Haiti. May they experience the freedoms and comforts we take for granted every day.
And Gerald, Wyclef Jean’s charity committed fraud. “No one cares about Haiti” because liberals care more for their pets than little black children. You don’t have to be an accountant or even half way intelligent to know that is is wrong to take money intended for the poor and mismanage it. He’s from Haiti he knows kids are going to bed hungry without that money. What does he care? Anyone who pockets one penny of money intended for the victims of Haiti should be shot for looting.

Sarah on January 25, 2010 at 3:58 am

sorry typo 1000sf on the size of housing in my previous post.

Pat on January 25, 2010 at 11:35 am

Nice hat on this pimp.lol

Joe on January 26, 2010 at 10:44 am

I’m not trying to sound heartless. I really do feel bad for those people in Hati BUT what about here? America always wants to play hero every time something happens around the world bt our own counrty is looking like S***T lately. Instead of having celebrity telethons givig donations to Hati why dont people have these telethons for the homeless in America? or send money to a food drive? The unemployement rate is pathetic and now they’re bring Hatians over to offer their “skills”!!! REALLY?!?! My family has all pretty much refused to donate money to Hati. Were going to continue to donate money right here in America.

Allie on January 30, 2010 at 5:08 pm

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