Canada in Haiti

I haven't read this yet, but it's on order. I came across it today on Black Commentator and thought it was worth a mention.

A new book, Canada In Haiti: Waging War On The Poor Majority by Yves Engler and Anthony Fenton opposes Prime Minister Martin on the question of Haiti. Fenton is a Vancouver-based independent investigative journalist, radio correspondent, and activist, who traveled to Haiti one month after the coup that removed former president Jean-Bertrand Aristide from power. Montreal-based Engler, who is also author of Playing Left-Wing - From Rat to Student Radical, is an activist who traveled to Haiti in December 2004. Canada, France and the United States are all in bed in Haiti.

Engler and Fenton spoke at a public forum and book launch at Osie and discussed the growing support in Canada for the people of Haiti against the Canadian, U.S., French, and Brazilian occupation. The meeting was packed. Canada In Haiti exposes Canadian government and business responsibility for anti-Aristide coup against democracy. The chapter "Responsibility to Protect or A Made in Ottawa Coup?" points out the coup against Aristide was actually planned on Canadian soil.

You can see some of my links below for more information.

This land is my land, this land is...

For sale! The LA Times is reporting that a certain little provision has "slipped" into a Senate bill.

Slipped into a massive budget-cutting bill late last month by the House Resources Committee, headed by Rep. Richard W. Pombo (R-Tracy), the provision has been eclipsed by higher-profile battles over two other controversial plans that would expand oil drilling offshore and allow it in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Those proposals have been dropped for now, but the land-sale provision remains.

The bill would lift an 11-year-old moratorium on the patenting — or sale — of federal lands to mining companies for a fraction of their mineral worth. While the patent fees would rise from $2.50 or $5 an acre to $1,000, the price would continue to exclude the mineral worth, which can amount to billions of dollars

I am for wise-use policies of public lands, and sometimes selling them is the right thing to do. However, this is clearly a gift to the mining industry, which might make huge profits while paying a pittance for the rights. Mineral rights are the epitome of the public/private debate. Given that, once extracted, Americans may never see these minerals again as they dissapear into value-added products, industrial processes, shouldn't we be charging more for their use? Shouldn't the extractors pay for what is a one-time shot at their use? Shouldn't we demand that extractors be more like caretakers than exploiters? Apparently not.

Since some 60% of large corporations pay no income tax, I'm just wondering where along the line they are supposed to contribute to our society. Really, such land giveaways are poised to become the worst examples of corporate welfare, the kind which has no long-term benefit for Americans but instead huge risks: depletion of resources, pollution from strip mining, and lack of corporate responsibility.

The Politics of Food (not what you think)

The politics of food are taking an interesting twist. A man was arrested by the FB I for burning some SUVs. One suspect, who was mistakingly arrested was eventually released. It turns out the the basis for the arrest, as Newsweek is reporting, seems quite dubious:

In their wrongful-arrest lawsuit, Connole's lawyers demanded to know why the FBI looked at Connole in the first place. Court documents show agents were initially tipped off by a neighbor to "suspicious" activity at the commune the night of the attacks. (In fact, says Connole, members were simply helping one of the residents move out.) Agents placed the commune under surveillance and developed a political profile of the residents, discovering the owner of the house and his father "have posted statements on websites opposing the use of fossil fuels," one doc reads. Another says the owner had ties to a local chapter of Food Not Bombs, an "anarcho-vegan food distribution group." Among activities flagged in bureau docs: the father of the owner had conducted a "one man' daily protest" outside a Toyota office, was interviewed for an article called "Dude, Where's my Electric Car!?" and posted info on a Web site announcing "Stop Norway Whaling!" Critics say such info has been increasingly collected by agents since the then Attorney General John Ashcroft relaxed FBI guidelines in 2002. "How does advocacy of electric cars become the basis for suspicion?" asks Bill Paparian, Connole's lawyer. Bureau officials say they collect such info only when there might be ties to violence or terrorism. A spokesman declined to comment on Connole's case, saying that because no settlement has been entered into the court record, it remains "a pending legal matter."

Opposing fossil fuels, being a member of a co-op (a "anarcho-vegan food distribution group"), and advocating electric vehicles is becoming a dangerous business! Very strange.

Haiti news

Recent Haiti news on the ground has been much the same as I've reported before. However, out of the Washington establishment comes some interesting twists.

First of all, the USINFO Washington file reports that "prospects for holding safe and fair elections in Haiti later in 2005 have improved as all key political parties in the Caribbean nation have submitted their candidates to the country's electoral council, reports the International Monetary Fund (IMF)."

Given that several election officials pulled outjust two or three weeks ago, this pronouncement seems rather odd. It would seem more likely that there has been a clear stabilization not of Haiti, but of the people who speak for it: Department of State, USAID, Canada and Europe, the IMF, and business interests. What do I mean by this? 1) The International Monetary Fund of course works hand in hand with the U.S. Government, and I suspect that here the some of main contacts are through USAID which has been funding activity in the Haitian police; 2) This announcement comes shortly after appointing a new ambassador; 3) several companies have just announced business plans in Haiti. All of the above is related to the IMF/US D. of State donor conference held in October, where final economic and political planning were done for Haiti and where the interested parties came to their final agreements.

The press release seems thus to indicate some stabilization on the diplomatic plane while, on the ground, things are as bad as they always were.

Given the importance of the situation and the flurry of recent activity, it's worthwhile paying attention to the press release in more detail.

The IMF and Department of State note improvements in stability, "safety" and "transparency," all of which set the stage for the elections. Given that only a few hundred polling sites are going to be open (compared to nearly ten thousand for the last elections), it is hard to believe that true democratic progress has been made. In spite of this obvious fact, government officials seem determined to say that everything is fine. To that effect, the press release seems to obfuscate the true conditions by waiving statistics:

Patrick Duddy, the U.S. State Department's deputy assistant secretary for Western Hemisphere affairs, said at an October 20-21 international donors' conference for Haiti that the more than 3 million Haitians who have registered to vote will set the stage for broad participation in the elections.

Just because 3 million are registered to vote does not mean they they have access to polling places. As I said earlier, we know there are not enough polling places. Furthermore, increased spending on weapons and policing, could mean intimidation during the elections, so this is truly a misleading quote.

The press release concludes:

Duddy said that international donors and Haiti's interim government are "strongly committed" to ensuring the Haitian elections take place within the country's "constitutional timetable," and that the elections are peaceful, open, inclusive and fair. Haiti's government, he added, "must take all necessary steps to implement a work plan that results in the inauguration" of a new Haitian president on February 7, 2006

The U.S. and Europe, along with the IMF, have clearly set stringent timelines, but this seems mostly to avoid embarassment since, while the U.S. could have easily restored Aristide--universally recognized as a democratically and fairly elected president--to power, it chose to support an interim regime, citing Aristide's "corruption" as an excuse. (Amy Goodman over at Democracy Now! has reported on the likely involvement of the U.S. in Aristide's ouster.) New elections will thus legitimize current U.S. policy, so the quicker the better. Indeed, the stern language coming out of U.S. diplomatic circles underlines American concerns with having legitimacy in the wake of our substantial manipulations at the time of Aristide's ouster.

But there is more at stake than legitimacy. The donor's conferences have had a focus on privitization of Haitian companies and resources. For example, last week, Digicel Jamaica/Eriksson announced plans to work in Haiti.

Canada, Europe, and especially the U.S. want privitization, but they feel it could be in jeopardy. They are concerned about the effects of Bush's foreign policy in the Carribbean. Again, getting the diplomatic voices to speak in unison about Haiti can be seen as a response to these concerns.

The flurry of activity is not only on the the U.S. side, however. U.S. policy is creating a global backlash with vocal opponents. Of these voices, Hugo Chavez is one of the loudest and his plans to sell oil without (American) middlemen is audacious:

Haiti could be the latest Caribbean country to join the government’s PetroCaribe initiative. State-owned Petróleos de Vene-zuela (PDVSA) sent a delegation to Haiti early this month to evaluate the possibility of incorporating the impoverished country into the Caracas-led accord, which offers oil to Caribbean countries on preferential terms.

Such plans add coals to the fire already under the U.S.' diplomatic feet. Hence Washington's response is direct and, again, stern:

Washington has a different opinion. U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Daniel Fisk has called PetroCaribe the result of Cuba and Venezuela’s “failed statist ideologies” and has said it “undermines the position of private sector companies in the region.”

Clearly, Venezuela would/could create enormous pressures to counter the privatization forces since energy ranks very high in Haiti's needs. The "threat" of such an oil market clearly run counter to Washington's goals, hence the stern word's from Duddy and Fisk.

So I guess it's just another week of the same: no democracy for Haiti as the West intervenes.

[Note: I came back and edited this a little for clarity's sake, though it still is not as clear as I would like!]

N(ice) P(olite) R(epublicans)

It's been a while since I've written about NPR. I guess this is because I don't listen to them anymore. I just finished a comment over at Digby's so I thought I would reproduce it here:

I started by saying:

The fundamental fallacy is this: Nowhere in evolution does it state that God does not exist. ID'ers are makeing a political argument, not a theological one. This is a battle between competing discourses, not competing ideas, since ID has very few of the latter.

I was rightly critiqued by NonyNony who pointed out that Evolution challenges the Bible, even if it does not refute God.

Then I responded:

I wanted to add some finesse to my earlier point that

"The fundamental fallacy is this: Nowhere in evolution does it state that God does not exist. ID'ers are makeing a political argument, not a theological one."

While I maintain that God's existence is not invalidated by Evolution, it is true, as NonyNOny points out, that Evolution challenges the Bible's account of creation.

If I were to rewrite this, I would underline that Evolution challenges certain readings of the Bible, and that it does so overtly. What I think is most important here is not Evolution vs. Religion, but the competing discourses between religious sects.

Jerry Falwell no more wants a modern interpretation of the Bible than the Taliban wants of the Coran. By constantly framing the argument as Evolution vs. Religion, they keep the true debate about biblical interpretation out of public discourse.

I haven't read "Don't think of an Elephant" for a while, but my main point is about framing discourse. By pointing out that Evolution does not challenge the existence of God, it allows one to argue within a religious framework and point out that one can support Evolution and Religion.

I for one have no religious beleifs, but many people I know do, so what is important for me is to bring the discourse into a different field of reference so that it can be discussed differently. The problem, of course, is that NPR time and time again does this sort of thing and lets the debate fall back to the ultra-right-wing framework.

I've stopped listening to NPR in the last year or two and I've done several posts agaist them. I'm not sure whether they are worse than before or whether I've just gotten older and can see through what they say. Who knows? All I can say is that I'm really tired of their schtick.

My point here is that NPR is really sucking and is doing the public a real disservice. I also wrote to Day to Day back in May. I actually got on the air. Here's what I wrote:

Dear Day to Day: I have no problem that Jonathan Last did not like Star Wars III: Revenge of the Sith. In fact, I agree. The wooden acting, the hackneyed dialogue and the silly plot are, at best, irritating. However, his review made me, well, uncomfortable. I understand that Mr. Last found the transformation of Darth Vader more interesting than the a light-saber-weilding-pseudo-philosophizing Yoda. However, we should separate falling in love with the character from falling in love with what that character means. Mr. Last's review, which lauds the Empire's order, strength and ability to effectively suppress those that disagree with it is, quite simply, praise for fascism and despotism--yes, the same fascism and despostism that can be associated with Hitler and Mussolini. While I hesitiate to convict by association, Mr. Last's employment at the Weekly Standard only reinforces the idea that his review of Star Wars III was a thinly-veiled piece of propaganda that could have emerged from his magazine. Take for example "The Case for American Empire" in which the Weekly Standard's Max Boot argues that "The most realistic response to terrorism is for America to embrace its imperial role" (10/15/2001, Volume 007, Issue 05). Mr. Last's review was not about the politics in George Lucas' movie, but rather those of today and his own vision of political utopia--one where "messy" civil liberties are less important than order, one where the inherent disorder of any democratic republic (read filibuster) make it somehow less desirable than goose-stepping our way to a well-organized, smoothly operating and, ultimately, despotic empire.