The story of the tragic earthquake in Haiti, is one of human despair. I was initially very angry with our foreign affairs minister Lawrence Cannon, when acting on false information, claimed that "no Canadian was affected." He also implied that his government had not yet made a decision whether or not to send aid. This should never have been debatable.
But this horrific event raises other concerns. This was a natural disaster but we've seen similar scenes in other parts of the world, that are justified as war. Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine. We couldn't prevent this earthquake but we can seek peaceful solutions to conflict.
And it also raises the question, why is Haiti so poor? American author Ted Rall knows. It's called U.S. Foreign Policy.
Haitian Earthquake: Made in the USA
Why the Blood Is on Our Hands
by Ted Rall
January 14, 2010
As grim accounts of the earthquake in Haiti came in, the accounts in U.S.-controlled state media all carried the same descriptive sentence: "Haiti is the poorest country in the Western hemisphere..."Gee, I wonder how that happened?
You'd think Haiti would be loaded. After all, it made a lot of people rich.
How did Haiti get so poor? Despite a century of American colonialism, occupation, and propping up corrupt dictators? Even though the CIA staged coups d'état against every democratically elected president they ever had? ...
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