US Congress Discovers Urbanization – director’s cut

I try to keep my blog posts to one major point. If I have a lot to say, I turn it into a series. So when I wrote my most recent UN Dispatch post, about Congress and USAID, I ended up cutting the last paragraph. It was a good last paragraph, though, so I’ll put it right here. Kind of like a DVD extra:

Finally – maybe our legislators should consider letting USAID do its job. We know that development works best when programs are integrated and part of a larger strategy. Holding USAID programs hostage to every trendy new stand-alone topic – avian flu (remember when it was a USAID top priority?), job creation, rebuilding Iraq, basic education, drug resistant TB and so on ad infinitum – is the exact opposite of the kind of coherent long-term planning we need for development.