Bummer of a Birthmark, Susan G. Komen Foundation

As a result of their abortive (pun no intended) attempt to defund Planned Parenthood, their revenue has fallen by $77 million, about 22%:

The Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation committed one of the great PR faux pas of the decade in January 2012, when it summarily cut off funding to Planned Parenthood in what appeared to be a bow to anti-abortion crusaders.

Now, with its release of its latest financial statements, the cost of that decision can be measured: It's more than $77 million, or fully 22% of the foundation's income. That's how much less the Dallas-based foundation collected in contributions, sponsorships and entry fees for its sponsored races in the fiscal year ended March 31, 2013, compared with the previous year. The raw figures are these: In the most recent fiscal year Komen booked $270 million; the year before that, Komen booked $348 million.

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The foundation's decision to cease funding Planned Parenthood was a huge blunder. Komen officials said at the time that they had merely tightened grant eligibility rules to exclude groups under investigation by government authorities -- Planned Parenthood was the target of a ginned-up "investigation" by anti-abortion Republicans in the House.

The decision by the nation's leading breast cancer charity to defund the nation's leading provider of health services to women sparked a predictable uproar, and Komen reversed the decision after only three days.

But the damage was immediate and, plainly, lasting. There were indications that the original decision had been driven by Karen Handel, the organization's vice president for public policy, who had joined Komen after losing a race for governor of Georgia on an anti-abortion platform. She resigned from Komen days after the reversal.

The affair led to more public scrutiny of the foundation's own record. It transpired, for instance, that while the foundation depicted itself as devoted chiefly to research for a breast cancer cure, it spent only about 20% of its donations on research; the biggest expenditure category was public education, at more than 50%. Critics questioned whether "education" really should be such a heavy priority in a field where research issues remain important.

George Herbert Walker Bush's, "Thousand points of light," in a nutshell.

All those people who talk about how how private charities can be a replacement for government action are full of it.

Not only are private charities rife with corruption and inefficiency, but we have wankers giving TED talks suggesting that the solution is to allow people to more aggressively loot. (More on that later)