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The end of Haiti?

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Re: The end of Haiti?

#91

Post by gizmomagico »

mahmud wrote: post #10

I am from Somalia, and I have witnessed its decay right to its downfall, including the three days during which the government dispersed and the central bank threw out its stash of local currency in large garbage bins. Haiti will not die. For one, the suffering has been universally afflicted on all Haitians. This will strengthen their bond more than anything. Even if warlords and gangs form their own fiefdoms througho…

> Probably as many Somalis died as in Haiti (though not in one day) but we only have ourselves to blame, and each victim left a blood debt on his killer, which "must" be avenged (or it has been avenged, and now the victim's family are awaiting reprisals)

What are you talking about?

Re: The end of Haiti?

#92

Post by itgoon »

mahmud wrote: post #36
kiba wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Somali have customary laws which allow them to operate and grow their economy despite political chaos. However, it would seem to me that that Haitians have no common law system or a customary kind which would permit the growth of an informal economy.

That's just offensive to Haitians and downright wrong. Somali traditions are the #1 cause of our strife; tribalism. We don't have any "laws", neither written nor verbal. It's all tribal handshakes and the whims of whoever is in charge. If you're referring to Islam, well, that hasn't saved us, or the Iraqis, or Afghanis .. come to think of it, maybe they're better off without a prominent political religious establishm…

> Where there is a will for violence and anarchy, the dominant or pre-existing "laws" only become pretexts, never deterrents, or they become marginalized by "circumstances".

That's probably the most astute observation I've heard this week.

Re: The end of Haiti?

#93

Post by drinian »

patrickgzill wrote: post #50

Does the Dominican Republic want Haiti? I don't think so considering how hard they are on Haitians who try to go to the DR part of the island. Will the USA take on Haiti and make it a second Puerto Rico? I don't think so; for one, it would be expensive; two, all the Haitians would move to the USA as soon as they could; and there are probably other reasons as well. So my analysis shows that Haiti will remain a barely…

Unfortunately, the other two recent American protectorates, Iraq and Afghanistan, have had mixed results. Iraq seems to be doing better because it had pre-existing infrastructure. Afghanistan might be a better analogy. At least it's geographically far smaller, and easy to support from the continental US.

There are currently several thousand US troops in Haiti performing aid activities; I would bet that we could get a UN mandate if so desired.

Re: The end of Haiti?

#94

Post by pbhjpbhj »

philwelch wrote: post #59
pbhjpbhj wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it is a reasonable question. There are plenty of places without drinking water and sewage infrastructure of any real note. Why then does this earthquake mean that we should fix Haiti's water/sewage. Why not fix Somalia's instead? Given the comments about Haiti's resources it seems it should be quite rich monetarily, certainly enough to pay for the rapid construction of Hospitals and the like. Yes, we'd want t…

The quick answer to "why not fix Somalia" is "we tried, and they ended up shooting at us, so we left". Oddly enough, we tried fixing Haiti a few times, too. It's not very successful, but they don't seem to shoot at us quite so much.

FWIW I was defending the asking of the question, questions are good, not for lack of an answer which would have been a mix of those answers here for sure.

Re: The end of Haiti?

#95

Post by pbhjpbhj »

gojomo wrote: post #69
seldo wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Coming from Trinidad and Tobago, where we get both, I assure you it's possible to build in a way to withstand both.

GDP per capita (World Bank, 2008): $24,742 Trinidad and Tobago (28th) $1,177 Haiti (146th) What's possible in a rich country isn't much of an example of what's possible in a dirt poor country -- the poorest in the western hemisphere. (What other expenditures should Haitians have forgone to afford in-advance disaster preparations and rich-country building standards, for an earthquake that might never come?) Poverty is…

>Poverty is the ultimate killer here.

But what is the cause of the poverty. Is it overpopulated for the resources available? Is the endemic use of heroin marring the countries ability to govern itself? Is it being exploited by outsiders who are creaming off the benefit of the natural resources for themselves? ...

Re: The end of Haiti?

#96

Post by pbhjpbhj »

mahmud wrote: post #48
sailormoon wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well then that's the problem, isn't it? Look, my point is that something could have been done to prepare, and was not. Mahmud's talking like it's a no-fault act of god that's going to bring everyone together in a solidarity of fellow suffering - I'm saying, if I was Haitian and I'd somehow managed to survive this disaster, I'd compare to how other countries deal with this kind of thing and probably be more angry than…

I don't think the Haitians have that sense of 1st World, consumer rights, entitled mindset. Most construction is done by the local guys, up to the budget and specs of the owner. Really. Safety or aesthetics play very little role; you just build what you can afford and you're done with it. They have been hit with a 7.0 Richter earth quake; even the U.N. and government buildings were floored. Sometimes you just don't h…

"you just build what you can afford and you're done with it"

So if you can't afford a 2 story townhouse with earthquake and hurricane proofing you build a one-story that does have proofing and live in 2 rooms instead of 4 but have 2 rooms that are likely to stay standing. If you go for the 4 rooms then the consequences are yours to live with.

There are provisos, if earthquakes and hurricanes haven't ever happened where you live for example.

This sounds incredibly harsh and I, like most, would probably go with the group and build whatever anyone else was building assuming the worst wouldn't happen to me.

God have mercy.

Re: The end of Haiti?

#97

Post by pbhjpbhj »

khafra wrote: post #86
sailormoon wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also lack this elusive "Third World Perspective" but considering the alarming regularity with which earthquakes shuffle several hundred thousands of their friends, family and neighbours off this mortal coil, perhaps those citizens should, in fact, start encouraging their governments to make building codes and disaster preparation more of a priority.

I'm not sure that you quite understand how poverty works. There are no resources in Haiti, not even arable land. No human capital, nothing to trade. Even if it were possible to build earthquake-resistant buildings, without engineers, out of mud, they couldn't--because the mud was literally all they had to eat: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/jul/29/food.internation...

You're over egging it a little - if they didn't even have building materials to try and eat ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geophagy ) then they wouldn't have buildings that could fall on them.

A mud hut may fall down in an earthquake or blow away in a hurricane but is less likely to kill you when it falls over then a brick or concrete building.

Isn't this more about living within the societal means than simply about poverty: If where I live all cars crash or blow up because we lack resources to produce quality cars then one must accept a bicycle or horse and cart for family transport or suffer the consequences, no?

Re: The end of Haiti?

#98

Post by pbhjpbhj »

joubert wrote: post #82
mahmud wrote: post #10

I am from Somalia, and I have witnessed its decay right to its downfall, including the three days during which the government dispersed and the central bank threw out its stash of local currency in large garbage bins. Haiti will not die. For one, the suffering has been universally afflicted on all Haitians. This will strengthen their bond more than anything. Even if warlords and gangs form their own fiefdoms througho…

"An earthquake has no one to blame" I agree. However, you can get spin doctors and loonies who manage to convince others that some group is to blame. Once they have done that they can manipulate the situation in a direction that pleases them. Witness for example demented Pat Robertson who makes the superstitious claim that the misery in Haiti is a direct result of a pact with the devil when Haiti's people (then slave…

I've heard this name Pat Robertson a few times on the 'net. I assume he's in the USA? Can anyone give an audio/video link to his talk where he suggests Haiti's slaves shouldn't have overthrown their French masters as they did?

---

Oh never mind, found it here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59NCduEhkBM#t=0m48s on a show called The Young Turks (TYT).

If you listen to what he says, rather than the commentary, then here is the progression.

1) Haitians were under the heel of the French colonialists

2) Some Haitians [in 1804] made a deal with the devil for release from slavery

3) They were cursed because of that deal

4) Bad stuff has happened to Haiti since, including this earthquake

Note, he doesn't say it's the Haitians fault - though I'm sure he would say it was the fault in part of whichever small group made the pact in (1) 200 years ago. Nor does he say they shouldn't have revolted; just that they did it wrong. He seems genuinely concerned to me. He rightly notes that DR is a lot better off and they share the island with Haiti. This last point makes the tragedy of Haitian poverty as much about politics as anything else.

If you don't believe in the Devil then you can ignore his statement as it will be nonsensical to you. To the TYT guy I'd say that he shouldn't be too shocked - people do "make deals with the Devil". Robertson may also be using it as a metaphor for rejecting the Gospel.

Edit: there is actually some evidence to support Robertson's claim, eg[...]

Edit2: cut and pasted to my blog, http://alicious.com/2010/haitian-revolution-devil-pact/ as is OT here.

Re: The end of Haiti?

#99

Post by mahmud »

gizmomagico wrote: post #91
mahmud wrote: post #10

I am from Somalia, and I have witnessed its decay right to its downfall, including the three days during which the government dispersed and the central bank threw out its stash of local currency in large garbage bins. Haiti will not die. For one, the suffering has been universally afflicted on all Haitians. This will strengthen their bond more than anything. Even if warlords and gangs form their own fiefdoms througho…

> Probably as many Somalis died as in Haiti (though not in one day) but we only have ourselves to blame, and each victim left a blood debt on his killer, which "must" be avenged (or it has been avenged, and now the victim's family are awaiting reprisals) What are you talking about?

Mostly killings in Somalia are for revenge.

Re: The end of Haiti?

#100

Post by gojomo »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #95
gojomo wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

GDP per capita (World Bank, 2008): $24,742 Trinidad and Tobago (28th) $1,177 Haiti (146th) What's possible in a rich country isn't much of an example of what's possible in a dirt poor country -- the poorest in the western hemisphere. (What other expenditures should Haitians have forgone to afford in-advance disaster preparations and rich-country building standards, for an earthquake that might never come?) Poverty is…

> Poverty is the ultimate killer here. But what is the cause of the poverty. Is it overpopulated for the resources available? Is the endemic use of heroin marring the countries ability to govern itself? Is it being exploited by outsiders who are creaming off the benefit of the natural resources for themselves? ...

Those are good questions. I defer to some theories aired on the MarginalRevolution blog -- none definitive, some quite arguable, but most plausible enough to consider:

http://www.marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2010/01...

And an essay on the topic also relayed via that blog:

http://www.webster.edu/~corbetre/haiti/misctopic/leftover/wh...

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