Last night we attended a fundraiser silent auction and light dinner for Room to Read. Jenn's brother Jason organized it, and it appeared to go well. How well, of course, depends on how many donations they raised.

Regardless, the founder of the effort made a great presentation. They build libraries and schools in Nepal, Vietnam, India, etc. and work closely with local people, who donate their time and effort to the projects using funds from the charity to purchase the resources.

RtR's philosophy of concentrating efforts on putting girls through school via scholarships seems very sound to me: teach a girl to read, and she will teach her kids. It's not just a hand-out, it's a hand up, as they say, and helps others help themselves.

Dollars spent this way certainly make a more lasting foundation for building good international relations that those spent on military purposes. Just think what the $30 million tip reward for Saddam's sons would have done for projects like this. (Hint: it costs $250 per year to educate a girl. That's 120,000 girls for a year, or 10,000 girls for 12 years.)

And that's just one reward payout.