He Haiti Me

I haven't been following the news in Haiti to the extent that I should. It's the ex-Catholic in me that won't go away no matter how hard I try: how we treat the poorest of the poor says a lot about us.

And I don't think there's any denying that Haiti takes the grand prize in the poverty game, at least here in the Western Hemisphere. Haiti makes Mississippi look like a science fiction version of the future.

The recent history of the country is a microchasm of the issues affecting it since independence: a small minority of elites, called blans (I assume that's Kreyol for blanche, or white, although these elites are mixed race) attempt to maintain their power and privilege, while a large majority of African-Haitians live in squalor. From there it gets complicated--more that I'm able to explain in a short post, although Stan Goff, who participated in the US occupation of Haiti in 1994-96, goes into more detail here.

The Goff article is somewhat long, but if you have the time, it's worth reading, especially considering how the US media, aka, a gaggle of sniveling syncophants, has painted the latest events in Haiti as being virtually the entire fault of Jean Bertrand Aristide, who STILL hasn't managed to serve an entire term as president without being harrassed, threatened, or overthrown. His "crime" is that of not caving in immediately to the wishes of the Haitian elite--not that it would help him to do so. Compared to how the blans treat Aristide, Clinton and the Republicans was a veritable love-fest or orgy.

After checking out the Goff article, take a look at this shameful piece of "journalism" over at ABC news. Then, if you haven't yet hurled, try this Miami Herald article: while the US remains officially "neutral," (and up to our eyeballs in the Middle East debacle) there are definitely elements that see no problem with overthrowing an elected government in this hemisphere.

And, for anyone thinks the "opposition" has democratic tendencies, here's an op-ed from The Jamaica Observer. Given Jamaica's proximity to Hispanola, it might be worthwile to consider their point of view...

Here's more to speak to the character of the "opposition." They have no more right to call themselves an alternative to Aristide than murders for hire have the right to call themselves an alternative to the system of justice.

In Spanish, the line was, "pobre Mexico--tan lejos del Dios, tan cerca de los Estados Unidos." Poor Mexico--so far from God, so close to the United States. Substitute Haiti for Mexico, and change it from Spanish to Kreyol, and it isn't much different. According to Goff, here's an old saying in Haiti:

If you don't say 'Good morning' to the devil, he will eat you. If you do say 'Good morning' to the devil... he will eat you."

Ouch.