(This will serve as an information space regarding this horrifying earthquake that devastated the people of Port Au Prince within approximately one minute.
Beyond that, though, it it will expand to include some work toward telling the story of Haiti - aiding us in confronting reports of a place "mired in poverty," as if economic ruin came raining down on the Haitian people from above.
As if they are just a "long suffering" people of conditions with no origin.
In the meantime, all things going well, Port Au Prince Brothers and Sisters are about to knock two millions cracks into that war mongering ceiling - in their effort to stay alive. Hopefully some of us need to help them).
Beyond that, words can not describe the heartache.
Haiti: "A Powerful Symbol of Resistance"
Haiti Needs Reparations, Not Sanctions, 2003
"Haiti's poverty lies mainly in the centuries-long crime of slavery, which produced enormous wealth for France, followed by 200 years of economic, political and military aggression waged by the European and U.S. bourgeoisies against the first free Black republic.
The only country in the world where slaves had liberated themselves by overthrowing their masters, Haiti was a powerful symbol of resistance and had to be punished."
"Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA), chairwoman of the Congressional Black Caucus, said her organization's members "will continue to monitor the situation in Haiti and are committed to providing whatever humanitarian assistance is need."
Contact the Haitian Embassy at (202) 332-4090 or for information about the status of U.S. citizens in Haiti, contact the American Citizens Services at (888) 407-4747.
Help Haiti Earthquake Relief
Take a moment to donate just $5.00 by Texting YELE to 501501 (Wyclef's yele.org)
Keep in mind that this shocking event the capacity to eclipse the devastation of New Orleans.
Send at Text Message: HAITI to 90999 and a $10 donation will be made to the Red Cross for earthquake emergency response.
This amount will be charged to your bill for cell phone.
Haiti Emergency Relief Fund
Founded March, 2004 by Walter Riley, Danny Glover and Harry Belafonte
Make your check out to "Haiti Emergency Relief Fund/EBSC" - donations are tax deductible - and mail it to East Bay Sanctuary Covenant, 2362 Bancroft Way, Berkeley, CA 94704.
EBSC is a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization, tax ID 94-3249753.
National Lawyer's Guild Attorneys Respond to Devastation in Haiti
"In the aftermath of the catastrophic earthquake in Haiti, NLG attorneys respond by providing ways to help, demanding an appropriate response from the US government, and offering a counterpoint to the mainstream media's one-dimensional coverage."
"The whole city is in darkness, you have thousands of people sitting in the streets, with nowhere to go," Rachmani Domersant, the charity's operations manager, said.
"I've seen seven to eight buildings, from office buildings to hotels and shopping stores, collapsed ...
I think hundreds of casualties would be a serious understatement."
Folk should treat Pat Robertson like Dionne Warwick might treat a bad statue.
Walk on by.
T. Howcott
US Policy On Haiti Needs Adjusting, Congresswoman Waters Says
(2007)
"People would argue about whether they like the way Mr. Aristide managed his country, but he was elected by the people," she said. "He was a priest that came with the liberation theology.
He was a person that spoke to the people in ways that they had never been spoken to before.
He spoke their language. And so, he was a threat to the way things have always been."
"In 1794 and 1800, the federal government passed anti-slave trade laws to prevent the possible spread of the Haitian slave revolt to the U.S.
The first prohibited citizens from equipping ships engaged in slave trade commerce, and the second prohibited Americans from serving aboard such ships or from having any interest in their voyages."
" From this time until approximately 2 years before his death Douglass held a succession of offices, including that of recorder of deeds for the District of Columbia and minister-resident and consul-general to the Republic of Haiti, as well as charge d'affaires to Santo Domingo.
He resigned his assignments in Haiti and Santo Domingo when he discovered that American businessmen were taking advantage of his position in their dealings with the Haitian government."
Frederick Douglass Speech on Haiti at the World's Fair
January 2, 1893
"We should not forget that the freedom you and I enjoy today," he said, "is largely due to the brave stand taken by the black sons of Haiti ninety years ago . . . striking for their freedom, they struck for the freedom of every black man in the world."
Earthquake and Colonial Domination Equal Deadly Combination
"The outcry from Western countries that have historically bled Haiti dry is the ultimate in hypocrisy.
U.S. and European media are blaming the profound impact of the serious quake on the "lack of building standards" in Haiti’s construction."
"But the African Socialist International charges that the imperialists are responsible for the devastating impact of this natural disaster.
The large numbers of people who died in this earthquake is mass murder because the past 200 years of imperialist control of Haiti has prohibited the development of Haiti's infrastructure and ability to build sound living structures."
"They are broken,
They are hungry, they are thirsty
Haiti's people
They have been gourged open;
Mouths opened, hearts opened;
Like sieves their tears flow;"
"Haitian officials say nearly 80 percent of the current debt was accumulated by the regimes of Francois and Jean-Claude Duvalier, Doc and Baby Doc. Both regimes operated under the benign gaze of the United States, which has had a long and sordid history of keeping Haiti well within its sphere of economic and political influence."
Troubled Island: Langston Hughes and the Haitian Occupation
"Reading Langston Hughes' Emperor of Haiti, Troubled Island (1936) alongside his coverage of the Spanish Civil War, I outline a black internationalism that yoked domestic racial policies to the threatened sovereignty of Ethiopia and Haiti and to the rise of fascism in Western Europe."
Haiti: We will bend but we will not break - part 1
Part 2
US Role in Haiti's Plight
"Much of the devastation wreaked by this latest and most calamitous disaster to befall Haiti is best understood as another thoroughly manmade outcome of a long and ugly historical sequence."
"On November 14, 2007, actor-activist Danny Glover participated in the launch of a weekly fast, a call for the release of kidnapped Haitian human rights activist Lovinsky Pierre-Antoine.
This event occured in front of the Brazilian consulate in Beverly Hills, California. Brazil has headed the U.N. forces in Haiti since the U.S. - backed coup against President Aristide, Haiti's first democratically-elected president."
"But shocked Americans can do more than shake their heads and, with pity, make a donation.
They can confront their own country's responsibility for the conditions in Port-au-Prince that magnified the earthquake's impact, and they can acknowledge America's role in keeping Haiti from achieving meaningful development.
To accept the incomplete story of Haiti offered by CNN and the New York Times is to blame Haitians for being the victims of a scheme that was not of their own making."
"To any fleeing enslaved person anywhere, there is a home for you in Haiti."
"The Haitians continued to help to spread the contagious seeds of freedom across the world. In 1774, Jean-Baptiste Point Du Sable, founded the City of Chicago. In 1779, The Haitian saved U.S. revolution in Savannah, Georgia.
The first ornithologist in the U.S. was the Haitian born John James Audubon.
In 1813 and 1815, the Haitians helped Simon Bolivar and Francisco Miranda in the fights for the independence of Venezuela, Bolivia, Peru, Colombia and Ecuador.
In 1820, Haiti assisted Greece during its struggle for independence against Turkey."
Haiti and The Impotence of Black America
"I remember how happy this country was when it celebrated its bicentennial.
That joy has been denied to the Haitian people. Jean-Bertrand Aristide's slogan during the country's commemorative campaign was restitution, reparation, celebration.
And he had declared Haiti an African country.
Aristide was no COINTELPRO leader. No "clean Negro." And, in the language of J. Edgar Hoover, he "excited the Negroes."
Ghana Supports Haiti: Mobilization Efforts Are Underway
"Even as I mourn the massive loss of life in Haiti I am feeling very proud of Ghana today. Ghana is stepping up!
The President of Ghana, John Atta Mills, has Issued an official statement on the Haitian tragedy that reads in part, "The People of Ghana and my Government are deeply shocked by the event and wish to express our solidarity with our brothers and sisters in this hour of despair."
Haiti Earthquake Disaster Little Surprise to Some Seismologists
"Although seismic predictions work on geologic timescales and can miss big quakes by decades, one expert said last week that a temblor in Port-au-Prince was of greater concern than a San Andreas slip."
(And THIS has been what your host has been harping on. Barack Oama and Bush were purported to have been two different characters based upon their intent - Barack Obama was supposed to be more deliberate and more particularly conscious.
Upon winning the Presidency, he was provided with the most sophisticated information system on the planet . . . a Star Trekian information gathering system.
He is surrounded by experts who are supposed to be always thinking about the science and next steps in how they might respond to various catastrophies around the world.
The moment I heard the science a few days ago - widely known science - that there are tectonic plates under Haiti that are grinding one another, and that had the potential to cause a major catastrophe.
Even while it had been 200 years since an earthquake in Haiti, we have all known to expect unusual occurrences based upon Barack Obama's own GREEN knowledge which he discussed in his own campaign speeches.
He also knew that Haiti is a country with no sewage system. He knew that that it was a rich Black country living in squalor.
My complaint is that if he had've concentrated on Haiti - rather than on Abraham Lincoln and Israel - he would have amassed that knowledge by asking his staff what might be some of the possibilities - possibilities not just with respect to Haiti, but for various areas around the world that the "US of A" has ravaged to their knees.
We as laymen don't necessarily have the time or the wherewithall to decide how success might be achieved in Haiti.
But, we do know that when catastrophes occur with oppressed populations, roads are blocked, many people have very few hours in which they can survive and that folk have to move quickly and pointedly.
So, the question remains, why didn't those people who are paid up to 100,000 a year, many of who are certainly Al Gore-ites and the like, and who know the science come together with others to develop an international catastrophe force that would be prepared for these various potential scenarios).
"Clearly visible: Tanks and guns, not aid. An earthquake met by occupation troops. 'It looks more like the green zone in Baghdad than the center for aid distribution"
A full-blown invasion and occupation under the guise of "aid"."
Shades of Katrina: No Help For Haitians Who Need it Most
"Rescue efforts were stalled today in Port-au-Prince with foreign rescue workers overwhelmed and unprepared to deal with impoverished people.
Crews arrived with neither vehicles, nor gas, nor translators, nor guides."
Doctors Without Borders Cargo Plane Blocked From Landing in Port Au Prince
(January 17).
"Despite guarantees, given by the United Nations and the US Defense Department, an MSF cargo plane carrying an inflatable surgical hospital was blocked from landing in Port-au-Prince on Saturday, and was re-routed to Samana, in Dominican Republic."
�This is why Haiti is the poorest country in the western hemisphere today, why Africans are forced to live in shanties, subsist on a diet of mud pies and are regularly shot down by U.N. armed forces!
Africans continue to have no control over our resources, our Africa and our lives everywhere.�'
"When Bush said the New World Order, he was putting a new name on the same old process, imperialism:
"I'll take your resources, I don't want you to invest in your people, and you are going to open your markets so that we can flood it with our imports."
Haiti policy statement for President Obama and Congress
January, 2009, Marguerite Laurent
"The Haitian Diaspora invests $2 billion per year in Haiti.
That investment is destroyed, diluted and undermined when it must be used to bury family members killed in political turmoil or kidnapped in the chaos of anarchy and instability that follows coups d'etat or to move and help rebuild the family of a relative or friend traumatized by the U.N. soldiers' rapes, molestation, arbitrary detention and indefinite incarcerations of their children, relatives and friends in Haiti."
"Later that night, he reported that Cuban doctors and ELAM's Haitian graduates were being deployed throughout the country.
They had already seen more than 1,000 patients in Port-au-Prince, immediately establishing and putting into operation a hospital that had not collapsed and using field hospitals where necessary.
They were preparing to swiftly set up other centers for emergency care."
"The facts indicate clear priorities: the Haitians are not first in line.
In fact, the rescuers seem to have a widespread fear of the poor and desperate Haitians.
A Scottish reporter said, "aid workers in Haiti today called for more security amid fears of attacks by increasingly desperate earthquake survivors." [2]
Yet, the Haitians have been extraordinarily patient despite the fact that their world has collapsed around them."
(In Haitian Vodou, Papa Legba is the intermediary between the loa and humanity [As a way to keep Europeans from interfering, and to appease the authorities who prevented them from practising their own religions, the African slaves in Haiti syncretised the Loa with the Roman Catholic saints] . . .
They are the cosmic gate keeper . . . so Vodoun altars will frequently have images of Catholic figures displayed]
Papa Legba is also known to bestow protection upon children . . .
He is the patron of finding lost items, and many call upon him when they have lost something, a job, a loved one, etc.)
"Straight from Haiti, Mambo Florencia Pierre and her daughter Djenane St.Juste lead songs, dance and music for Papa Legba on the final day of the Haitian Dance and Drum Conference '09 in San Francisco, with Haitian Master drummer Frisner Augustin, Zeke Nealy, Scooter Fein and Baba Duru on drums."
Inspired by a post from Abena.
This website is serious about honoring a wide variety of spiritual beliefs of African people.
Aid Struggles to Reach Haiti, DN 1/15/2010
(Audio. The video for this is beyond belief, and too difficult for this site.)
Haitian People Have Mobilized, While Foreign Aid Efforts Continue to Stall
(Video, excellent work, Democracy Now!)
"Two US Navy helicopters flew overhead in opposite directions while we talked. Earlier in the day, I saw hundreds of American soldiers walking back and forth inside the airport.
Dozens of Haitian men organized a digging and rescue operation on a pile of rubble in the suburb Santo.
An huge orange Caterpillar bulldozer sat nearby, stationary.
Heavy equipment from the Haitian construction company CNE is all over the city."
"Elite rescue teams, such as the one from Fairfax County, VA, were focusing primarily on the Montana Hotel and the headquarters of the UN "peacekeeping" force, MINUSTAH.
Anyone who knows Haiti knows that the Montana Hotel is the most lavish lodging your can find in Port-au-Prince and is frequented by wealthy business people, foreign dignitaries, and served as the initial headquarters of the MINUSTAH force.
Meanwhile, in the neighborhoods most heavily hit by the earthquake, Haitians, equipped with nothing more than their bare hands, dug frantically to save their families and neighbors."
"CNN would probably get an Emmy award if Gupta would quit playing journalist and used his time there being the doctor he was trained to be.
This is not a place or time where ANY medical professional on the ground in Haiti should do anything other than treating the injured."
"They took over the airport the day after they arrived. Privatized it.
The Haitians manning the damaged control tower fought the privatization."
"Just as the Black Katrina victims were vilified and criminalized, so too shall the Haitian earthquake victims be criminalized, vilified and evacuated at the point of guns."
"Usually when people are sad, they don't do anything. They just cry over their condition.
But, when they get angry, they bring about a change." Malcolm X
"Unbelievably catastrophic."
"We are the world, we are the children, we are the ones that make a brighter day so let's start giving . . ."
Masks of Wolokoton and Desso
Hundreds of thousands of African - Haitians - have joined the ancestors within one week.
Here, have a few minutes of emotional relief from the most horrible week we have seen in our collective lifetimes - and then keep giving and fighting and spreading some truth.
Closeup image is from The International Solidarity Free Haiti Movement which is not affiliated with disaster relief, but which has advocated "against the Coup, the defacto protectorate, and foreign occupation of Haiti," and who's relevant motto is, "Many hands make light a heavy load."
Thumbnail is a painting of the great Toussaint L'ouverture who liberated Haiti from France and Britain.
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Terryhowcott.com
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