20193: Esser: Re: 20189: Nealy: RE: 20126... (fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: D, Esser torx@joimail.com

Republican representative Mark Foley stated: "We did our best to
observe the fact that he's [Jean-Bertrand Aristide] a duly elected
president. The die is fairly cast, and he's either going out in a
Learjet or he's going out in a body bag." according to Rafael Lorente
in the South Florida Sun-Sentinel on Feb. 27th. Not very sensational
as this was only one of many statements, that were not quite as
blunt, but had the same tenor. Guess work is nice, but why if there
are facts at hand? The stated goal of the U.S. was to have Aristide
out, I won't go into the details here, since others have written
extensively on why the U.S. didn't like Aristide. His security
reinforcements from the Steele Foundation were held back, does that
look like they had his well being in mind?

The objective of the U.S. team was and is to ensure continued
hegemony over Americas backyard, while Haiti is unique in that it had to
endure such "helpful" interventions over and over, it is one of many
counties that have suffered the same fate. Grenada had an invasion,
so did the Dominican Republic, Panama was invaded and so on. While
there's always a nice little story to explain why the occupation du
jour is so humane and unselfish, looking deeper one can see that all
take place on the same political continuum.

A common definition of kidnapping is: "In criminal law, kidnapping is
the taking away of a person against the person's will". (Wikipedia)
See very easy, it doesn't mean a gun has to be shoved down your
throat or that the victim has to suffer actual harm. The threat of
violence as perpetrated by the U.S. caused Aristide to leave. An
analogy would be: if I tell you that I hold your child at a secret
location and if you don't come with me the child will be harmed, you
are likely to follow my orders even if I do not threaten you directly
with violence. If you have friends with guns around that protect you,
but are outgunned, you still might conclude that it is better to go
along with the program. While I doubt that anybody so far has
compiled all the facts leading up to Aristide's departure, many
astonishing details are already in. Aristide was not able to choose
his country of exile, that does not fit tin with a voluntary
departure. Aristide was held incommunicado for long periods of time,
if he left on his own free will, shouldn't he not be a free man?
According to White House statements Aristide was given several
assurances, for example that his property would be protected, which
the U.S. reneged on as soon as he was in the air.  If Aristide's
statement doesn't say "I resign" no matter how one tries to twist the
short statement, as others on the list have ably demonstrated.

Are you stating that the "International Community" was not able to
work with Aristide? This is a curious argument. The International
institutions on urging of the U.S. government cut aid to Haiti, it
wasn't Aristide that severed the ties.
.