Why Oprah is a phony.

[columbine]

When people have money to burn, they burn it - do what they personally think will help the most, without getting relevant advice. Oprah's heart is in the right place. It's her information deficit that led to an inefficient use of her wealth.

It's a perpetual problem of philanthropy. The people who are in a position to make a real difference don't have a whole lot of clues about what differences need to be made.

Who here doesn't have an "if I win the lottery" idea about what you'd do to make things better? And where did that idea come from? Your own heart, right? Since you haven't won the lottery yet, of course you haven't done any research about whether or how well it would actually work. Well, people who have boatloads of money think that if they're smart enough to get all that money, they're smart enough to figure out how to put it to work. But it's a different flavor of smart, and a fairly rare one, and most rich people don't know much at all about the world outside of their own experience. So huge amounts of money end up going down inefficient holes because the rich people don't know that they don't know everything.

There's nothing wrong with bragging, in my book. If you do something, and present it honestly and in its entirety, there's nothing wrong with putting your name on it. And I like the recent trend for the rich to show off by trying to help the poor. But it's the ones who start with good solid research who actually succeed.

Love, Columbine

[Cataholic]

Columbine, very interesting post! Thanks for expanding my brain.

[gini]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16396343/site/newsweek/

This is just one article that I researched about this subject. Yes, she went way overboard - oversized closets - fireplaces everywhere - 200 count bedsheets -
great mattresses - so what?

I still see that Oprah did her homework and she is banking on the initial 73 (?) students to get a great education and then start making a difference in South Africa - and the next group of students will do the same.

Read the article from her point of view - why not give her a chance and look for the results of her efforts down the road?

I for one, hope that she has created an environment that will be a huge success in terms of educating young women that are from a background not unlike her own.

[carole]

well put Columbine, i found your post interesting too and something i had not given much thought, personally i don't give a toss if they want publicity or their name put on anything ,bragging as such, if it helps people that is all that matters to me.,and who are we to say where their money would be best spent, the simple fact is, it is their money, end of story, to do with as they wish,I would not take kindly to people telling me what to do with my wealth, if I had any ,I would probably help animals, and there would be people saying i should be helping human beings first,we should be thankful i think that they indeed are generous enough to share it , even if it is not what we think it would be best spent on,they could be complete miser's and keep it to themselves, so i say good on ya oprah.

[lizbud]

When people have money to burn, they burn it - do what they personally think will help the most, without getting relevant advice. Oprah's heart is in the right place. It's her information deficit that led to an inefficient use of her wealth.

Love, Columbine

I think it's very presumptuous of you to make a comment inferring Oprah
"has to much money and not enough sense". As a very successful business
woman who has very good council to help her make the most of the funds
she chooses to distribute. You certainly have an opinion, but so do the
people who see what a blessing she is to many people.

[catland]

What if Oprah is right?

What if these girls, having been given the best education that money can buy, go on to do great things and really help their country? Then we will look back at this and say "that was money well spent".

who knows?

[RICHARD]

I lost my dial up connection just as this thread was hot and heavy and I wanted to revisit it now that HARPO has the looset purse strings on the planet.,


I had left off with Dean Kamen.

The Techo Stud who refined that stupid engine -Stirling is the name- You know, the one that makes eleck-trcity off of Methane/Poop fumes at night and makes clean drinking water during the day...

In a Sundance Channel special he invited Isabella Rossellini to his home and showed her his invention. It was a wonderful look into his operation. Without the pompous guests, doctors and phone number for tickets to his show!


The gist of the convo was that people are dying becuse of the lack of clean water.


A machine like that will purify water so that it can be used for drinking and irrigating crops....Funny how a little fecal matter in water can ruin a whole village's outlook!

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Kamen went on to stae that politics is the main reason that his refined engine is not being shipped to areas that need it!

It's way too expensive for Kamen to donate machines to every area that needs them, and the governments are way too crooked to let those machines go to the people..

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A few Sterling/Kamen engines would be far more practical in some areas than a 150 person school.


But hey, Dysentery, explosive diarrhea, starvation and E coli are not as important as education.


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When the coup, junta or other civil problem breaks out I wonder which buildings will be plundered by the 'have nots'?


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I apologize to you all that have no patience for my opinions.


I do respect yours!

Going back to bed now!

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BTW,

LH, Where is your sense of helicopter adventure?

It's not like the chopper was burning the whole 50 gallons in one trip!

[Edwina's Secretary]

My sister works at a school in New Jersey. It is for boys and uses the discipline of music to help educate boys (happens to be all minority -- location -- but open to all.) They are always raising funds....that is what my sister does for them.

Do you know Oprah has a group that does School Makeovers -- all her money. My sister is working to get a makeover for her school. It would be a VERY BIG help for a school that does lots of good in a city that needs it.

No...it isn't written up in PEOPLE magazine. Just one of the many things she does for people right here in the United States.

Why bashing one philanthropist over another? Why not just say...here's is a guy who does a lot of good and doesn't always get recognition.

Isn't that rather.......phony????

Maybe you should learn as much about all that Oprah does....

[RICHARD]

Isn't that rather.......phony????

Maybe you should learn as much about all that Oprah does....

Wow,

Now that you mention it....


Nope- Kamen is about keeping people alive- Check out his work with medical tech- like dialysis machines- some of his technology kept my dad alive for a few years- Oprah didn't do squat for him.

You have to keep people alive before you can educate them.

Kamen looks at the welfare of people with little or no fanfare, Oprah's outlook is kinda skewed.cameras, T.V. specials and "hey Look at what I did!" just smacks of a little self-agrandizement!
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I saw a blurb for her road trip/TV special with her buddy...Funny how two chicks in a car make interesting TV? I was hoping for a Thelma and Louise ending!

The shot was of Oprah trying to put gas into a car....and she could not do it.

Her line was, "Ha ha ha ha, It's been years since I put gas in a car."

I guess philantrophy and common sense don't run in the same circles..

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If there is no coverage of her good deeds here in the US, why the fanfare for a foreign school?

[sabies]

I am more concerned with how my tax dollars are wasted then I am about how others spend their disposable income. Oprah, myself, and anyone else can spend their money on the charity of their choice.

Maybe the girls Oprah educates will run the government one day and then people like Kamen will be able to get their help to the people who need it. Clean water will only go so far if the government is that crooked.

[Edwina's Secretary]

So doing something that benefited your father is better than doing something that benefits someone else.

Got it.

Without education...who will figure out how to keep people alive?

Entertainment...that is what Oprah does. It is how she makes the money that enables her to do so much good.

You know when I was a teenager (before your time I know) you went to a gas station and there was a person who pumped the gas for you. (I lived in the country and we had to pump our own from the pump on the farm.) Most people...especially women...at that time did not know how to pump gas.

Based on what you posted...that made them stupid? Or lacking common sense?

Give it a rest RICHARD. She is a successful woman. Something you seem to find terribly offensive.

[RICHARD]

Give it a rest RICHARD. She is a successful woman. Something you seem to find terribly offensive.

One of my alltime favotite gals is Bernadine Healy.

She is a doctor and ran something called the Red Cross.

Carly Fiona, Hewlett Packard?

My mom?


I like to save my sexism for the truly irritating girls. Hey, Did I mention Rachael Ray?

[lizbud]

I like to save my sexism for the truly irritating girls. Hey, Did I mention Rachael Ray?

or Pariis Hilton. Now there's a piecs of work for ya. but Rachel
Ray ? without her we never would have had the memorable " Hi rocking chair
Lady" line.

[Catty1]

ummm...is it possible that the school Oprah built has CLEAN RUNNING WATER???

[RICHARD]

ummm...is it possible that the school Oprah built has CLEAN RUNNING WATER???

For about 150 people, same with the elek-tricity?

Let's review?


Putting up a school for 40 million dollars is fine and dandy.
Making a huge deal about it makes me laugh.

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Finding a way to get clean water and electricity to places that don't know either is kinda specail.


A few months ago we were looking at infected spinach killing people.
SO what! We find other spinach. Ii winder what the options are for a small tribal group in the bush?

The narrow focus on some Oprah-ette factory is laughable.

saving a few thousand people by cleaning up their feces infected water and giving them a a life without diarrhea, intestinal parasites and death really isn't that big a deal.


Mea culpa.