What to do with Haiti?

Our hearts go out to the Haitian People on their great loss and tremendous suffering; though things have not gone well for Haiti's people for the last 200 hundred years and more.



From the far right we have Pat Robertson explaining Haiti's troubles away as the result of the Country's Pack with the Devil. And on the far left there is Danny Glover believing that the recent earthquake was caused by the breakdown in negotiations at Copenhagen.


Wackos, the both of them.




But something has certainly gone wrong with Haiti and something sure as hell needs to be done to fix it.



Already commentators are looking at spending more money as a final cure to what ails this tiny country of less than 10 million - not much bigger than a modest sized modern city. That is to say: money on infrastructure; money on schools and hospitals; money for this and money that.

But money alone is not the answer. If money was the cure, Haiti would be one vibrant nation today despite the recent Earthquake.

Even at yesterday's Montreal Conference, you had the President of Haiti stating that another 10 years of international financial help is required.

Hilary Clinton, in turn, spoke about the need to work through the Haitian Government to effect change.

They are both wrong.

First, in regard to an additional 10 years of international funding; it will take at least twice that long to achieve success and only under the conditions I've outlined below.

Second, to see funding funnelled through a Haitian Government, as suggested by Hilary, will only see it dissolve into a sea of corruption and inefficiency. Christopher Dufour, a resident of a homeless camp near (Haiti's) national palace, says it best, "don't give the money to the government (Haitian) because they are going to take it and steal it."

There is a problem greater than even the corrupt Haitian Governments and that relates to the lawlessness rampant in their Society. Sadly, it gets little attention but until it is successfully addressed, real progress will never be made.

This Leads To My Solution:



Marshall Law needs to be imposed as a first step.

It is the only way to address the combined negative issues of lawlessness and corrupt / inefficient governments.


This step should be taken by the United Nations, but given its pathetic track record, will more likely have to be done by the United States, with strong backing from Canada.



Our two Countries are Haiti's most important geographical neighbours, each of us with a long history of providing support for this poor, ignorant and down-trodden nation.



So once its dead are buried and its injured attended to, a concerted effort must be made to address these two major underlying problems.


Only when peace and security have been attained, and good government put in place, can the other essential ingredients of nation building, mentioned above, be achieved.


This work can be done in parallel, but the early emphasis must be on restoring public order. Put the hoodlums to work and those not willing to work - lock them up until they are.



Build a police force that is properly staffed, trained and equipped. (An army for such a tiny nation is not needed).

Educate the children and get them ready to take back the reins of power. This alone will take nearly a generation to achieve.


All the while, North American Military Officials can work with the Haitian people through their councils and various committees, but all the while retaining central control.

You can imagine the howls of indignation this action will create from the near-by dictatorships - the Cuba's and Venezuela's, but those howls will simply confirm that we are on the right track.

One could argue that a generation to effect real change is too long to wait, but for a nation that has already waited for over 200 years., it is but a moment in time.

A few years back my wife and I visited the Dominican Republic. One day we went out on excursion to visit some of the ubiquitous sugar can plantations. There we found Haitians working from sun-up to sun down hacking away at the canes with machetes. Their pay was but a pittance; on a good day they earned but $5.00 US and were paid by the ton cut. Their lifeless eyes told the story.

Sadly, this continues to this very day - modern slavery at its worst.

To sum up, if we here in North America cannot help a tiny nation on our doorstep to achieve a decent life what chance is there for those nations further afield - primarily in Africa?

As I see it...

"Galagher"

We Will Do Our Best...

An olde cub scout motto, but it is also part of a phrase used by the late great Winston Spencer Churchill - my life-long hero.



I will come back to Churchill in a moment, but what has prompted this Blog, is the Christmas Day attempted bombing of Northwest Flight 253 bound for Detroit Michigan.



I have not commented on this before now, since there were enough articles and talk shows that mirrored my thinking - i.e. that the time has come to get tough with the Psalmist Extremists.



Indeed, that time came with the levelling of the Twin Trade Towers in 2001.



But since that attack in 2001 we, in the West, have gone off the rails in our misguided attempt to defeat Terrorism.



This is most visible in the areas of flying and trade in that we have turned legitimate travellers into mere objects to be prodded and probe at will and have thickened our borders to the point where commerce has suffered greatly.



Below the radar, with the new Super Security Departments, our countries are becoming more and more police states.



In all of this, we have turned ourselves inside out and by so doing have allowed the Terrorists to win.



In all of the articles I have read on the subject, one article in particular stood out. This is an article that appeared in the National Post on January 9 under the authorship of George Jonas.



Here are some direct quotations from Mr. Jonas' article entitled 'Our Own Worst Enemy' wherein he focuses on air travel:

• Terrorists don't have to blow up anything to win. They win by reducing travellers to Alcatraz inmates.


• Letting ourselves be body-scanned without profiling passengers' ethnicity, religion, and behaviour is a waste of time.


• Medieval minds - roasting puny penises, in preparation for virgins - are turning our airports in replicas of Devil's Island.


• Fighting terrorists wisely means paying them whatever attention is commensurate with the danger they represent, no more.


• Islamists can bring down a planeload of vacationers - or even an office tower. That's all they can do.


• They cannot endanger us as nations or societies.

Projecting 'Jonas' beyond just what has happened to air travel since 2001 I believe it comes down to this: Like a mosquito, the terrorist can only annoy us, he cannot change us - either as an individual or as a society. We can only do that to ourselves and in fact we have been doing just that in the face of Terrorism.

Sadly, then, since 2001 the Terrorists have been winning.

Now back to Churchill, at a time when his Island was facing nightly attacks by the German Luftwaffe, here is what he had to say:

• We will have no truce or parley with you (Hitler) or the grisly gang who work your wicked will. You do your worst and we will do our best.

Unlike the Obamas of this world, Churchill did not talk about negotiating with the devil and nor did the people of Great Britain. They went into the shelters at night and in the morning came out, buried their dead, dusted themselves off and went to work.

We need to do the same.

The Terrorists cannot defeat us with their bullets - but they can defeat us through instilling fear in our hearts and we are the only ones that can defend against that.

Let them continue to do their worst and we will start doing our best. We'll call them what they are - spineless terrorists who prey on the weak and defenceless.

But we won't cave into fear by turning ourselves and our societies inside out.

That is not to say that we do not defend ourselves against terrorism. Of course we do, but we do it through profiling and through undercover work to the point where we know who and where the terrorists are.

Going back to the airport analogy; we need to nail the Terrorist before he buys his ticket.

The time has now come when we all must march right through the airport without scanning, without prodding and without being made to feel like a criminal.

Terrorist - you do your worst and we'll do our best...

As I see it..

'Galagher'