Actions Speak Louder Than Words
President Bush is reacting more forcefully to the tsunami disaster needs... by forming a coalition of nations to coordinate relief:

Making his first public appearance to talk about the disaster that has claimed tens of thousands of lives in a dozen countries, Bush said the United States, India, Japan and Australia have formed a "regional core group" to coordinate relief. "I'm confident more nations will join this core group in short order," he said.

But he's playing catch-up to other world leaders, including a certain former U.S. President:

In Germany, Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder cut short his vacation and returned to work in Berlin because of the Indian Ocean crisis, which began with a gigantic underwater earthquake. In Britain, the predominant U.S. voice speaking about the disaster was not Bush but former president Bill Clinton (news - web sites), who in an interview with the BBC said the suffering was like something in a "horror movie," and urged a coordinated international response.

Earlier yesterday, White House spokesman Trent Duffy said the president was confident he could monitor events effectively without returning to Washington or making public statements in Crawford, where he spent part of the day clearing brush and bicycling. Explaining the about-face, a White House official said: "The president wanted to be fully briefed on our efforts. He didn't want to make a symbolic statement about 'We feel your pain.' "

Many Bush aides believe Clinton was too quick to head for the cameras to hold forth on tragedies with his trademark empathy. "Actions speak louder than words," a top Bush aide said, describing the president's view of his appropriate role.

Some foreign policy specialists said Bush's actions and words both communicated a lack of urgency about an event that will loom as large in the collective memories of several countries as the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks do in the United States. "When that many human beings die -- at the hands of terrorists or nature -- you've got to show that this matters to you, that you care," said Leslie H. Gelb, president emeritus of the Council on Foreign Relations.

There was an international outpouring of support after the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, and even some administration officials familiar with relief efforts said they were surprised that Bush had not appeared personally to comment on the tsunami tragedy. "It's kind of freaky," a senior career official said.

The first Washington Post article noted above also has this interesting figure:

Although the U.S. government is the world's largest relief donor in total dollars, some international officials have complained that its contributions are often among the lowest as a percentage of gross national product.

According to the Paris-based Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the United States ranks at the bottom of 30 wealthy nations in foreign aid, giving 0.14 percent of its GNP, compared to 0.92 percent by the top-ranked donor nation, Norway.