"We shame ourselves to watch people like this live" - John Mellenkamp, "Jackie Browne"
This morning, the nation of Haiti is struggling with a devetating earthquake which hit this impoverished nation on Monday afternoon, and perhaps as many as 500,000 people have perished.
That soever which you do unto the least of me, you do also to me - Matthew:25
The United States, this monring, in a reflection of one of the greatest things about this country, is rushing hundreds of millions of dollars worth of aid, and will send thousands of people to help the people of Haiti.
To put into some perspective the devestation and death toll, more people died in one afternoon (potentially) than died fighting for the United States during the entirety of World War II. To put it in further perspective, the total population of Haiti is estimated at just over 9 million, so effectively, one in every 18 poeple just perished. If such a figure were applied to the United States, it would mean 13 Million people would have died in one afternoon - the population of the city of New York (roughly) - in one afternoon.
The horror is unimaginable - I am struck dumb, nausiatingly void of emotion or words - I expect that I will, like most, come out of what is essentially a state of surprise, and awaken into a state of horror. Horror in the carnage, but equally, in the reality that while I, as an American, sit safely in my home, there is a world where people are so poor, they construct their houses out of mud, their buildings out of unreinforced concrete, and are so ill-educated, they don't even know to go outside if an earthquake strikes, but instead huddle in terror inside that 'home' or that building, hoping and praying in the dark to be safe, and now, to be saved.
In this world where we have so much, we have nations which 1% of the populace owning 99.9% of the wealth - and we appear to think this is 'the best' way to engineer an economy - if so, then we must ask ourselvs as we rush to aid those in desparate need - whether in part we own some responsibility.
The Israelites did as they were told; some gathered much, some little. 18 And when they measured it by the omer, he who gathered much did not have too much, and he who gathered little did not have too little. Each one gathered as much as he needed. - Exodus 16:18
We are very fortunate indeed to be living as Americans. Although many parts of the US are subject to disasters, a disaster such has happened in Haiti is beyond imagination for most Americans.
ReplyDeleteThere are ways we can help. Although donations of material items are not being solicited at this point, the following organizations are accepting money donations. They are:
American Red Cross. Their website is http://www.redcross.org.
AmeriCares. Their website is: http://www.americares.org. This organization provides medical care for people throughout the world.
Doctors Without Borders. Their website is http://www.doctorswithoutborder.org. As expected, this organization provides emergency medical care from medical volunteers not only in Haiti but throughout the world.
I have donated today to the American Red Cross. I urge our readers to donate, if they are able, to the aid organization of their choice to help relieve by even a small part the suffering in Haiti.
The devestation in Haiti was an excuse for Rush Limbaugh to claim Obama was using this as a pretext, an opportunity to be exploited, to make brownie points with blacks.
ReplyDeleteJerry Falwell, utterly ignoring inconvenient sciences like seismology, claims what happened in Haiti was the result of Haitians having made a pact with the devil in the 19th century, a statement he asserts as confirmed fact.
I have never in one moment felt such compassion for the disaster victims, and such horror at some of my 'fellow americans'. At moments like this, I am utterly discouraged at the prospect of bridging the divide.
Falwell is a pig, but I think he's rotting in hell presently.
ReplyDeletePat Robertson made the comment you are referring to - I think you may have confused/transposed them.
You're correct, Pen - I was just about to make the correction.
ReplyDeleteI think that this is an example of times when all of us come together and show what is best about our country. There was a joke about a french admiral who remarked on Bush sending an aircraft carrier to Indonesia after the tsunami there. He asked if Bush was going to bomb them. An American officer commented that the aircraft carrier could supply 15k gal of clean water every day, enough power from its reactors to power 3 cities in Indonesia, had a full hospital staff with 3 operating rooms, 300 beds, and helicopters to bring the injured onboard. We are currently sending one of these, several coast guard cutters, an air traffic control ship, a naval construction battalion, 3500 marines, part of the NY city fire department and more money than most of us could spend in our lifetimes to help out the people in Haiti. We have in the past few yrs offered aid to Russia, China, and Iran (I think they turned us down) even as our relations with them are considered strained at best. During these catastrophic events the citizens of the countries like Haiti truly are glad to see American ships in the harbor and US marines on the ground because we truly are there to help.
ReplyDeleteTuck,
ReplyDeleteAgreed, though I think the statistics regarding the beds and operating rooms apply to a hospital ship (as they quoted as much on the news today).
Our tendency toward humanitarianism is laudable - my only question is, and remains - what is our responsibility to fundamentally change the nature of economics in the world such that places like Haiti become extinct? I think we have such a responsibility - and I think it starts with challenging the attitude that anyone, king, prince, CEO, deserves to get SOOO much to start off - even if they share it or are charitable, rather than all of the people having some basic subsistance items. If we did that there would be problems of overpopulation, but then we have to deal with birth control too.. but I believe our challenge still lies in this direction or we are doomed to see this repeated time and time and time again.
I would agree we should try to make sure places like Haiti do not become complete hellholes of poverty, but how do you go about that. The US and Europe have poured tons of money into places like Somalia and it has helped but not solved the problem. Haiti has not had a ruler that was not corrupt for at least 30 yrs, every one of them skimmed millions off foreign aid meant to help build a better infrastructure or create industries there so they would not need the aid and left most of the people still in poverty. So when the problem is that the leadership of the country is content for the country to be impoverished as long as they get paid how do we change that? In Somalia,where there was no government, having marines escort food supplies to keep the warlords from stealing them, cut the number dying of starvation from 200 a day to less than 20 a month. But as soon as we brought in more UN troops and decided to establish a government and kick out the warlords, things went downhill pretty fast. In Iraq we got rid of a guy who let his sons torture and rape people, in front of their families, just for fun. The Iraqi people were overjoyed, for about 2 weeks, and then they became resentful that we were telling them how to set up a government. I don't recall where I read it but I once read that about 80% of the world's poverty was caused by the government or person ruling the country where the poverty was. Until we figure out how to change that anything we do will be a temporary solution.
ReplyDeletePen, this is an excellent article about some of the problems we face trying to change third world countries into a bit nicer place to live.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/15/opinion/15brooks.html?em
Tuck,
ReplyDeleteI did not immediately reply to your comment (now two comments) because I wanted to consider a reply.
First, the United States has alternated between being the world's greatest altruist (at times), and being another in a line of imperialists (such as the Mexican American, Spanish American, and Banana Republic wars - including the application of the Monroe Doctrine). We have helped to remove AND prop up dictators - in some cases brutal ones - and we have removed others. In virtually all cases, but NOT ALL CASES, we did so not to protect the people, but to protect our economic interests. We supported Batista in Cuba, Noriega in Panama, Pinochet in Chile, Marcos in the Phillipines - and then helped topple all of them except Batista - in a couple of cases for humanitarian reasons in addition to economic - but often because we saw that the handwriting was on the wall.
Haiti has been impoverished since 1808 (or so) when they paid an enormous sum to the French for their independence - and have had NOTHING but corrupt governments since with a rare exception of a government which worked for the people rather than the scant few and powerful wealthy.
Yet my comments weren't about the challenges of the third world (at least not in their root) - but rather a comment about the paradox that we understand the essential unfairness of a nation where 80% are poor and 1% own nearly everything - but do not object to the vast wealth grab which occurs around us every day in THIS country - and which abets the permissiveness of the same attitudes in those same brutal dictatorships, so long as we get our labor (including in China btw). In the US, 5% of the people own 92% of the real property - and it's getting much worse, not better. Obama was elected to in help address this - yet has utterly sold out to banking interests and has ZERO intent to inact actual reforms, like Glass-Steagal - such as those done in the 1930's when the people actually DID grasp the fundamental wrongness and unfairness of how the gilded age affected the disparity of wealth and education to the population of the United States. Our greatest period/generation - that which survived the Great Depression and fought the Second World War was epitomized by its egalitarianism - its desire for a world where each person had a right of self-determination certainly, but also where capitalism was balanced against the responsibility to allow for a decent life and living wage to ALL workers - not just the scant elite.
What occured in Haiti in part occured precisely because of this disparate gulf between the haves and have-nots. While corruption is an enabler - corruption is not the cause, it is the symptom. Clearly we COULD make enough food to feed the world, but it does not NOT get to the teaming masses simply because the powerful prefer to pocket the wealth, but also and precisely because it is by keeping those teaming masses poor, that they retain their power.
While we manifestly object to this state of affairs in a place like Darfur, or Somalia, or Haiti, we seem unable to see that we embrace this avarisciousness (if that's a word) we embrace this 'no regulation get in my way of business' attitude - which is essentially the SAME attitude as is embraced by the wealthy of Somalia, Darfur, or Haiti - and before THEY will change, we . must.
When I was studying economics in college we discussed a lot about regulation. If there is not healthy competition then regulation is necessary for the market to function properly. Take a look at interest rates on home loans, auto loans, credit cards. Given that the applicants are the same (income, credit rating, etc.) the rates will be same wherever they go, this is not healthy comptetion. The other problem in that market is that thanks to Bush and Obama and the last two Congresses, some of the banks now know they are considered too big to fail. No matter what risk they take if it does not pay off the government will save them. So what you end up with is a market with no real competition and no consequences for unsafe practices, definitely not a healthy market. Back in the 40's and 50's if a bank made so many bad loans that they went under the bank president who allowed it lost everything also, now they walk off with millions to try again at another bank. I don't think we need to go back to the days of requiring 20% down and 3 months payments in the bank to buy a home, I could not do that but have no problems with my house payment, but Glass-Steigal needs to come back and we need to put some accountability back into the financial industry. We definitely need to end some of the credit default swaps, anything that can cause a total loss of 500k for every 100k loan that goes bad is worse than foolish.
ReplyDeleteI concur, Glass-Steagal should be reinstated.
ReplyDeleteFrankly, I think the inter-state banking prohibitions should be as well. That would be much harder, but the idea, and ideal, always was that banks should not pay high returns, but instead were the place the community went to get loans and to save money - the money saved went out as loans.
Investment banks were tapped to build large infrastructural projects, but then obviously carried that risk.
Insurance and financial investment services should be, as they were prior to 1995, required to be entirely separate.
In the end the question is, how much is enough - is 10% profit enough that we don't need to ash-can benefits, or ship jobs overseas? Is 15%? The idea that everything must be beholden to the stock-holder getting every last penny is only a recent advent (in the last 20 years) - and we used to have a natural and I think proper and ethical aversion to conspicuous consumption and the over-concentration of wealth in the hands of a few - wherever that went, we need to find it again.
Yes, in the past businesses acted as if they had an equal obligation to the employees and the stockholders. I am not sure why but that balance shifted so that they have no obligation to the employees anymore at most companies. It always cracks me up when they cut out bonuses, reduce benefits, reduce annual raises, and then whine about employees leaving for higher paying jobs with little or no notice. If you show no loyalty to your employees you cannot expect it in return.
ReplyDeleteOver the last several days, to my utter astonishment, on another blog for which I write, one of Pat Robertson's adherents has attempted to argue in comments that Robertson's assessment of events in Haiti was correct and accurate. Further, to argue that pacts with Satan were responsible for certain equally horrible events in Africa --- where "a missionary made it rain" by praying to Jesus.....and so informed the indigenous black population.
ReplyDeleteI was not kind in my response, but I could have been so much worse.
I think my favorite reaction to Robertson has been the response that America must have made a pact with the devil -- and our crse is Pat Robertson.