Here at GamePolitics, we'd like to wish every reader a happy and healthy Thanksgiving Day, even those who don't celebrate this uniquely American holiday.

Yes, we live in a world wracked by war, poverty and disharmony. But gamers have much to be thankful for. Games have never been better, more exciting, more educational or had a greater impact on society at large.

While we give thanks for our games, let's take a moment to reflect on these gamers who are giving back:

The Contra Costa Times reports that more than 800 gamers gathered last Saturday for a giant LAN party for the benefit of the Get Well Gamers Foundation and the Alameda Food Bank:

The contest, organized by NVIDIA and Electronic Arts, also gave die-hard gamers the first opportunity to play new games and test out software and other PC components that are expected to be among the hottest-selling items this holiday season...

Get Well Gamers, by the way, is run by GP regular (and occasional contributor) Ryan Sharpe.

In one of the most imaginitive approaches we've seen to raising money for a worthy cause, four Canadian gamers will play Desert Bus, an unreleased, completely monotonous mini-game, for as long as the donations keep coming in. They hope to raise $5,000 for Penny Arcade's Child's Play Charity:

Not only are you donating to Child’s Play but you are also making a bunch of idiots up in Canada play a very boring and never ending game... You could donate twenty dollars through the Child’s Play Website, or you could donate your money through our website, your money is going to exactly the same place but you get to force us to play Desert Bus for just that much longer.

The boys start driving tomorrow. Make a donation and keep their monotony going.

Don't forget Fun For Our Troops, a nonprofit which aims to send games and systems to our military personnel in Iraq. Read the full GamePolitics report on this terrific group here.

PlayStation 3 owners can help just by leaving their PS3 turned on. 

Stanford University's Folding at Home project harnesses the distributed processing power of home-based PS3's in research computations aimed at curing disease.

Finally, Gaming4Others is raising money for Child's Play by holding online game tournaments.

UPDATE: We neglected to mention the 2008 MMO Calender, which benefits St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital. GP purchased the 2007 version, and it's fabulous. The 2008 calendar includes the following MMO's: Age of Conan, Dark Age of Camelot, Dungeons & Dragons Online, Eve Online, EverQuest, EverQuest II, Guild Wars, Lord of the Rings Online, Pirates of the Burning Sea, Star Wars Galaxies, Stargate Worlds, Warhammer Online, World of Warcraft...

UPDATE 2: Entertainment Consumers Association (ECA)prez Hal Halpin dropped GP a line about Gifts from Gamers, another organization devoted to getting games and systems to U.S. military personnel overseas.