>Offers of assistance CAME from Canada and a dozen or more other nations -
>voluntary OFFERS of assistance.

It is unusual, though not impossible, in diplomacy for offers to be made 
without having first contacted the recipient privately.  The diplomats work 
out how the statements of offer and acceptance will be made, sometimes 
requiring intense negotiations on topics far removed from the disaster and 
sometimes being genuine disaster relief efforts which are rapidly concluded. 
  Then, the statements are made public.  When that does not happen, 
media-fueled rows, diplomatic dancing, embarrassing backpedalling, 
hypocritical position-shifting, and sometimes outright conflict results.  
USA-Cuba, Ethiopia-Eritrea, USA-Iran, and India-Pakistan, are disaster 
diplomacy examples illustrating various levels of this situation with both 
parties in each case deserving some credit for the efforts and some blame 
for the problems.  Greece-Turkey, I believe to some extent Southern Africa, 
and I would guess North Korea (although I am not certain) are examples where 
backroom work outside of the spotlight functioned more effectively, while 
noting that factors other than disaster diplomacy were more prominent in 
producing the observed outcomes.

>A number of those offers - Venezuela's included - have political overtones
>not even worthy of discussion.

That sounds like a political diatribe!  Please provide some evidence, 
including the other examples implied, for this statement.  I am not making 
any claims regarding the motivations or possible sense of humour of Chavez 
and other leaders without significant popularity in DC.  I would request 
verifiable details of what actually happened and why the leaders made such 
offers.

>Your last paragraph is outrageous on its face and does little to further 
>the
>discussion of natural hazards and disasters to which this list is 
>ostensibly
>dedicated.

The piles of literature on hazards and disasters from fields including but 
not limited to anthropology, geography, sociology, and philosophy strongly 
suggest that politics, inequity, social systems and conditions, poverty, 
ethnicity, and culture amongst other factors strongly influence what happens 
before, during, and after natural hazard events and disasters.  While I 
appreciate that some might disagree with Ben Wisner's specific comments, it 
would be a disservice to our field to assume that the issues he raises are 
irrelevant to this discourse.

Ilan