We humans are a quirky bunch, especially when it comes to compassion.

Last month, the National Geographic Channel aired an hour-long show about the Battle at Kruger. Many have seen the gripping Youtube video in which a young wildebeast is separated from the herd, attacked by lions, then attacked by a crocodile. You feel terrible for this poor animal and then something miraculous happens: the herd returns, scares off the lions and the little guy survives.

Happy ending. We all feel good. Then we celebrate with a burger or steak.

Compassion for other humans is equally quirky. If American Idol shows us suffering children in Africa, we feel compelled to donate money to help. If we see a parent beating a child — not spanking, but beating — most of us would be compelled to intervene.

If we lived next door to a family where the children and mother never stepped outdoors and we heard screams at night, we’d feel compelled to call the police. And yet we can sit back and watch massive pain inflicted on hundreds of thousands and do nothing. Remember Rwanda’s 800,000 dead?

Robert Mugabe has taken a prosperous nation and ruined it, killing many tens of thousands of his own people and displacing millions. Zimbabwe was once the kind of African nation that all the Western aid is intended to foster. It is now nearly dead — all from the evil of one man. If we’re compelled (some say morally responsible) to help poor nations, why aren’t we equally compelled to prevent a rich one from becoming poor?

Saddam’s Iraq was a nightmare for Iraqis. His sons ran rape rooms for kicks. Children were tortured in front of their parents. Families were ordered to pay for the bullets used to kill their fathers and sons. Hundreds of thousands were murdered and bulldozed into shallow graves. This went on for decades. 25 million Iraqis internalized Saddam’s terror, and are only now beginning to heal.

But only in the mid-’90s, when economic sanctions squeezed Iraq, did the West evince any sympathy for everyday Iraqis — and that was after Saddam hired a PR firm to generate said sympathy. Which he then parlayed into Oil for Food, a scam that generated billions for Saddam and enabled him to continue his tyranny.

Despite all that’s happened in Iraq, you’d think we’d be able to take some satisfaction in knowing that unlike, Hitler or Pol Pot, Saddam was desposed, arrested, tried and executed. Yet I see little of that. In fact, many supposedly humanist progressives claim that Iraq was better off with Saddam.

Many of these same folks sport “Save Darfur” bumper stickers. The New Republic recently called for military intervention in Burma. It’s just another example of how conveniently compassion can be summoned or stifled to suit ourselves.

On Mother’s day I was cutting roses from the garden when I found a featherless, baby mockingbird on the ground covered with ants, alive and struggling. I brushed off the ants and considered stomping it to end its misery. But I couldn’t.

Thus began a rescue attempt that involved putting it out where the parents would find it (they did) and digging worms to feed it.  The little bird gained strength and hopped over to a shady spot. My daughter and I felt pretty good about our rescue. Until a short while later I heard her scream, “Hey, stop!” and charge out the door. A crow had spotted the bird, swooped down and took him for a meal.

Those poor worms.