22238: Simidor Re: 22202: Justin: Felux: Re: 22193: (Chamberlain) re 22118: Simidor(fwd)

[Bob Corbett <corbetre@webster.edu>]

From: Daniel Simidor <karioka9@mail.arczip.com>


>From: Justin <justins@alacrityisp.net>
>
>Democracy Now is one of the finest sources of news in the United States.
>Fenton & Esser were correct--it isn't an important mistake.  The director
>said that over 1000 bodies had gone through the morgue and been dumped in
>March alone.  This is striking, considering that the worst violence is
>OUTSIDE the capital by most accounts.  Every other delegation that has gone
>to the country has reported a similar systematic campaign of repression as
>outlined by the NLG delegation.  For Simidor to ask for names and the
>circumstances of the victims' deaths is simply asinine....
>That people like Mr.
>Simidor are happy about this is frankly shocking to me.
>
A lot of accusations packed in a single paragraph.  Kindly hear me out, Justin.

I’m not happy that Haiti is under UN trusteeship in the bicentennial year of its independence.  If trusteeship could solve our problems that would be one thing, but it’s like asking if the disease could cure the patient.  (Do you know this one: Yo di peyi m okipe, men m pa wè pèsòn kap okipe m!)

UN trusteeship in 2004 is nothing but US occupation by proxy.  I’m opposed to it, and I think the point for US progressives is to be the watchdog and mobilizing force against this occupation, and not to reinforce the personality cult around Aristide -- a flawed leader who would have destroyed the country to prove his point.  History will judge Aristide more harshly than Latortue, even more harshly than Salnave who at least had the courage of his convictions.

Everything that happened to Aristide has been “the consequence of his own inconsequence,” as Haitians are fond of saying rather pedantically.  Including TWO US interventions under his watch.  Including the Guy Philippe/Chamblain “Rebel Army.” Was it really conceivable, in retrospect, that the bourgeoisie would allow Aristide to arm the “Chimères” into a powerful new militia, without constituting a force of their own?  Including the parody of a coup that he’s obsessing over in a new book that should be properly titled “Le Dindon de la Farce.”

In previous posts, I made the point that unnamed morgue workers are less than reliable because they are too easily invented, and that bodies had been piling in the morgue in the days leading to Aristide’s departure for lack of trucks to cart them away.  We know there had been a lot of random and not so random looting and killing in the days and weeks BEFORE and AFTER Aristide left.  But the bodies in the morgue are not even the real issue.  It is common knowledge that Lavalas Family members are organized into neighborhood cells known as “baz.” To ask for names is not as “asinine” as Justin would have it, for the simple reason that the dead, in their “thousands,” have been claimed as Lavalas party MEMBERS.  Even if bodies could not be recovered, each cell (baz) ought to be able to submit the names of members who have disappeared.  (Granted that names can be invented and non-party victims claimed posthumously.)  This is the basic obligation of any political organization, the very first step toward claiming justice for fallen members.  But unsubstantiated numbers make better copy. Like Manno Charlemagne used to sing: “Mwen pran sant fondanman!”

You say that “Democracy Now is one of the finest sources of news in the United States.”  That may be true, but Democracy Now’s reporting on the Haitian crisis has been less than stellar.  Too much “embedded” journalism, too much on the personality cult building, and not enough of the watchdog in terms of the US presence in Haiti.  The reporters who went along, on that trip to fetch Aristide from Bangui and bring him to Jamaica, never bothered to ask who was footing the bill for chartering that plane.  Don’t ask, don’t tell, about the corruption involved? Democracy Now featured key Aristide lobbyists (Kurzban, Robinson) as ultimate Haiti truthsayers, and even used their products as fundraising premiums, without any mention or question about their client relationship with Aristide.  Frankly, I’m less than impressed.

Now, nothing pisses me off more than Aristide’s fake sympathy for the recent flood victims, as expressed in his departure speech from Jamaica, which some folks have posted here as proof of the man’s statesmanship or humanity.  Aristide’s “sympathy” is more like throwing salt over a fresh wound. The man spent more of the country’s meager resources on his own entertainment (mercenaries, public relations, bicentennial dinners, chartered planes, international conferences, etc) than on the budgets for the departments of agriculture and health combined.  He appointed an environment minister and gave him a small fleet of SUVs (!) to show his proper concern, but no budget.  (With Aristide, it’s always style and no substance.)  As Ernst Weche pointed out recently, study after study on the country’s ecological disaster called for immediate intervention to stop the erosion, stop cutting down trees.  Aristide did nothing, absolutely nothing.  In fact, his partisans took over the charcoal operation in Forêt des Pins, in the Southeast area where the disaster took place.

Daniel Simidor