The horror that is the aftermath of the Haitian earthquake has many of us, of course, looking around for explanations of why Haiti is so poor. Since I have no ideas to offer for the resurrection of Haiti, I've spent my time looking for people to blame, and there are many. Some of them are French, since the government of Charles X committed an act of armed extortion in 1825 when it demanded of its former slaves 150 million francs in reparations (you know those French, the pact with the devil that was enslavement wasn't enough for them--they had to make a second pact with the devil that insured Haiti's impoverishment for generations). The US has been fiddling with Haiti off and on since the French went away, but the sin that really struck me in my researches took place during the Reagan Administration (as did so many in all areas). American hog farmers became nervous about the appearance of African Swine Fever in Haiti, in the 400,000 strong population of indigenous black swine, animals that the peasantry depended upon for survival (article here). American authorities and Haitian authorities then set about exterminating ALL of these hogs. Don't you love that? Then they sent the peasants a few experimental white hogs from Iowa that were used to luxury conditions, just to see if they might be able to live there. The Haitian hogs were classic hogs who did classic hog business--scavenging, getting fat, making use of what they could find. The new American hogs needed to live in American hog idleness in a world without the facilities they were used to.
Guess what happened to the Haitian peasantry and to their land? The land is denuded, the peasantry has moved to Port-au-Prince, and over-populated Port-au-Prince is now one of the great disaster areas in modern history.
I don't know--is everything the US does a shocking embarrassment? Couldn't the hogs have been tested for the virus? Couldn't the virus be contained? Couldn't they have waited and seen? Couldn't they have used the opportunity to breed some hogs for the conditions, or maybe exported some of these wild boar we have in my neighborhood, who are good scavengers? Did we have to panic and kill all of them? Did we have to then drop the ball? I can't find anything on the net other than this Time article, so if someone knows what happened next, please fill me in. But it seems to me that slaughtering those black Haitian swine was a disgustingly short-sighted and hubristic thing to do. I guess I'll send some more money to Haitian relief (Mercy Corps this time). I'll send in the name of our own Missouri pig, Rush Limbaugh.
Clinton -- pushed by his friend Perdue (as in chicken) -- presided over that fiasco.
Today, Haiti import some $300 million in frozen, unwanted, dark meat chicken parts from the U.S. Considering Haiti's GDP is a little over a billion dollars the money exported for poultry is simply criminal.
Last year, I attempted to start a poultry farm operation that would have hired Haitians, purchased feed from Haitian farmers and keep money in Haiti. I have struggled in part because an entire generation has come of age totally ignorant in the ways of operating a poultry business.
If anyone is intrested in signing a petition urging the Obama's adminstration to address the problem of lowered tariffs please visit my webpoage by googling Germer Haiti.
Thanks
So, if the law is not restraining corporate greed and it's being encouraged by politicians, who should take the blame?
Let's fix it.
Outlaw ALL political contributions for the Bribery they are.
Actually, Bribery is already clearly illegal IN the constitution, so we just need to announce:
Henceforth, Bribery, in the form of ANY political contributions, will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
Force all candidates to sign a binding pledge to outlaw all political contributions.
What happened to the chickens?
Also, if you look at a map, there's this huge blue thing on most parts of the country called the "sea," and I hear they have something in it called "fish," which people can actually eat.
Which is really sad and scary. With an ever increasing human population depleting so much of the planet's resources, fish is a protein source that the world is still very much dependent upon. I hope we can stop being so destructive and find some equilibrium. Here's to healthy oceans and thriving fish populations again.
At this time, though, I hope the Haitians get back on their feet soon.
According to Mr. Johnson, the price of this empire will eventually be this; bankruptcy and the loss of any true democracy as envisioned by our founders.
That said, I vaguely remember going to a presentation, something about Jessie Helms and sugar plantations. Don't remember the details, maybe it was the pigs, but the gist of it was that individual farmers were foreclosed from subsistence farming, while Jessie Helms made lots of money off of sugar.
I should know when reading the article your first response to the earthquake would be to look to blame somebody, preferably a conservative or a republican. Reminds me of the poll that said 25% of liberals hoped, thats right, hoped we lost the war in Iraq. That's true patriotism for ya!
I guess when lib'rals criticize the government, it's treasonous, but when conservatives do it it's patriotic, eh? Must be nice to live by that double standard.
I have no doubt the cull may have been heavy handed, but I doubt the reasoning was completely flawed, and is such a contributing factor to Haiti's poverty. I also noted the author stated she was looking for someone to blame, that is very constructive right now. Glad she is on our side.
Keep digging for something with a little substance.
If the United States is as evil as you imagine then you should have no problem.
http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/42/458.html
Here's a little more background on the "corporatization" of Haiti by U.S. firms.
http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/43a/index-cb.html
Too bad I'm not buying any of it.
In case you didn't notice, Bill Clinton was a "Reagan Democrat".
Imagine that....
"Imagine that, 500 years of enslavement and abuse by the French, followed by dictators who took the money and did nothing to build the people. The USA, gives loans, fogives loans, gives aid, gives time talents and more money,"
and the word "Republicans" doesn't appear in the piece even once. Imagine that.
It's as if the facts of history are an accusation to you, buddy.
I think the best way for Republicans to avoid being critically noticed for their actions is to behave humanely and well. Then they'd get praised! Imagine that...
In fairness, almost all 20th century American presidents of both parties have to bear their share of the blame for our Haitian policies which either actively supported corruption in Haitian leadership or tolerated it as a means to some other end in foreign policy, especially the tolerance of nearly anything so long as it was anti-communist during the cold war.