HORN listener ‘Kevin from Brooklyn’ has been kind enough to send along an excerpt from his upcoming book, “Coming of Age in the Era of Conservatism”. It’s a candid look at how Haiti’s economy left the country in such a fragile condition, and how the United States isn’t too far behind, especially if we don’t stop following failed republican economic policies.

Since the time of Columbus the Caribbean has been responsible for the rise of at least five maybe six Empires if you were to count the former Soviet Union. Whether it has been political, economic, religious or military no other region on the planet has experienced such a massive transference of wealth outside of its base than that of the Caribbean. Reason begin we are wealthy enough to buy their goods but politically,economically and militarily weak enough not to demand a fare price for our goods for export hence they dictate the price we sell our goods for. Also no other region has been the “dumping ground” for imported goods than the Caribbean. It is my personal belief what is the most tragic about the Caribbean is the transference of the “Human Capitol” out of the region that has existed for over 500 years starting with the Arawak, Taiono and Carib people who were brought back to the various courts of Europe as imported household help. We Caribbeans regardless of the achievements and contributions to the various empires we have served, we have often been looked upon as imported “household help”. If you do not believe me just look the way they treated newly appointed Supreme Court Justice Sotomayer.

I often look into my family in which many had to leave their homeland in order to “better themselves” and create opportunities for loved ones. My Grandfather spent much of his working life in the industrial cities of Northern England in order to provide a decent life for my Grandmother, my Mom and Aunts and Uncles in Jamaica. Being a banana planter you are subject to the global market place and natural conditions such as droughts and famine. When such factors occurred many of heads of households simply worked abroad in order to keep their farms. I have often thought about the challenges and strain that puts on a marriage, I know from personal experience. I guess my grandparents had a very strong partnership.

There is a saying “debt equals slavery”, the great tragedy of the Caribbean and the third world altogether is that once we obtained political power, we went deeper into economic slavery. The Caribbean like much of the third world has suffered from one failed economic policy after another. One has to ask themselves how is a region the Caribbean so rich in natural resources can have so much poverty. One also has to ask the parallel question, How can a region primarily Europe be so limited in natural resources and be so wealthy, the answer is economic serfdom and economic racism. In 1492 when Columbus landed in the New World, the seeds of modern day capitalism began to be sown. From the start economic bigotry made its way into the early days of New World settlements, were Native Americans were put to work in a manner that was subservient to Europeans. As a result of extreme harsh working conditions, disease and down right brutality many of the Native Americans died off in massive numbers quickly. In order to replace the diminished Native American population, many European colonial authorities started shipping their convicts and displaced serfs to the New World. This would hold especially true with the Celtic people.

The Celts having a long tradition of serving in various European armies as mercenaries often faced the risk of life long indentured servitude in the plantations of the Americas if captured. In spite of this practice, it still was not enough to fill the demand for labour in the New World. In the year 1502 the first African slaves were brought to the Island of Hispaniola, which is now called Haiti and the Dominican Republic to replace the nearly wiped out Native American population on that Island. Like the Native Americans and Poor Whites, the African also would be pulled to capitalist system in a subservient position. The first two centuries the plantation economy did offer a certain level of upward mobility for all, Indentured servants and slaves could either purchase their freedom and began to farm their own lands, or move up with the ranks of the plantation system by becoming an overseer or learn a skill such as blacksmithing, As European settlements expanded in the Americas and more Native Americans began to disappear and due to the greater demand for physical labour. That small window of social mobility particularly for Africans began to disappear. European labour would continue to enjoy the opportunity of being able to rise up the social-economic ladder in the New World.

By the end of the seventeenth century the social order in much of the New World was solidified, with Europeans regardless of economic status on top, Africans on the bottom and Native Americans not even being in the equation. Mixed race people their station in life could vary from, being the on the upper tiers of the social economic order to the very bottom, however most would be some where in the lower middle class. No other place would exemplify this social order more than the Island of Hispaniola. In order to really grasp the sociological ramifications of the western hemisphere one really has to study the history of the Island of Hispaniola what is now called Haiti and the Dominican Republic. The island of Hispaniola is “ground zero” for much of the sociological issues that people of color has faced for the past five centuries. This Island was such a highly prized possession the Kingdoms of France and Spain in order to prevent them from going to war over it decided to split the island in two. When Great Britain decided expand its empire in the Caribbean they tried to invade the Island of Hispaniola and it was a total disaster so they conquered Jamaica instead which was a Spanish colony for the first one hundred and fifty years of its post-Columbian history.

Once Known as Saint Dominique on the French controlled portion of the Island and Santo Domingo on the Spanish controlled portion of the Island at the time, The French colony of Saint Dominique exemplified the aforementioned institutionalized racism in its purist form. The racial caste system of Saint Dominique during the eighteenth century had a very complex structure of Grand Blancs (very wealthy whites) Petite Blancs (poor whites),Free Blacks and Slaves. Saint Dominique also established names for its Mulatto or mixed race class such Octune, Quadrunes so on and so forth. During the middle eighteenth century Haiti along with Jamaica produced almost seventy five percent of the worlds sugar. This high production rate involved the harsh brutality of the slave population on both Islands. Another factor for being responsible for much of the global supply of sugar is because both Britain and France had the Naval Power to insure that they would export almost seventy-five percent of the Worlds Sugar. Keep in mind Brazil, Cuba and Santo Domingo also produced as much sugar however the Naval strength of those colonies were never a match for that of Britain and France. Many historians agree that had Haiti not been the first Black Republic it would have been most likely Jamaica. Both were under constant threat of slave revolts, The Plantocracy of Jamaica basically bought off much of the renegade African population known as Maroons. This relationship was established when the British signed a formal treaty with the Maroons granting them political autonomy on 1st of March 1738.

Throughout the eighteenth century until the early nineteenth century Great Britain and France engaged in a series of wars for Global domination. Many Historians may say that this was technically ,” The Real First World War”. By 1791 Haiti was a tinderbox of human bondage just waiting to explode. Heavily influenced by the French Revolution and its spiritual doctrine “The Rights of Man”, What was thought of as being the typical slave revolt, snowballed into what can be described as the “Black Theatre of the French and American Revolutions.” The first issue it brings up the rights of humanity on a broader scale. In the language of the eighteenth century, the term Human or Man, had a very narrow definition. That definition only applied to European males with a certain level of financial means. So when Thomas Jefferson wrote in the American Declaration of Independence ”All men are created equal,” it was based upon the mind set of the day which was all white, financially well-off males are created equal.

The second issue it brings up is, the need to power share as much as possible even in times of crisis. All to often in those who study history present historically notable individuals as a Moses like figure that came out of no where that will go out to set things right. Even though this makes wonderful material for books and films it is not the reality. This Moses like figure if in power too long can easily become a despot themselves. If you look at the early stages of the Haitian Revolution, there was no real “Leading Man” but an ensemble cast of characters who were all very capable leaders such as Jean-Jacques Dessalines, Toussaint Louverture and Alexandre Pétion, Haiti during this time Haiti was an Island Citadel. Almost every major power in Europe took a break from their World War (The Napoleonic Wars) in order to assist in subduing this revolution. Every army that went into Haiti was destroyed this was owed in great part to the competent political and military leadership of Dessalines, Louverture and Petion. It should also be noted almost every republic in South America owes their independence to Haiti. Simon DeBolivar while in exile raised an army of Haitians to venture to South America to fight for the Independence of much of South America. This historical fact would be a major influence in the Cuban Revolutionary leadership of assisting oppressed people on a global level while still fighting for your own self determination.

How does a country with so much potential in its beginnings end up being the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere? My theory is economic siege warfare, after gaining its Independence Haiti was cut off economically from the world. The main proponent of this economic isolation ironically enough was the United States. The United States feared the Haitian Revolution would lead to slave uprisings and destroy much of the commercial interest in the South. Haiti would be the first country experience what is known as Neo- Colonialism, which is in theory you do not necessarily have to plant your flag on a country in order to run the country. How was this done? It was done by what I like to call the D.I.C.E method of submission.

D=Divide. Haiti covers the eastern third of the Island of Hispaniola. At one point in their post Revolutionary history, Haiti took over the entire Island. This was viewed as a symbolic and political threat to the interest of Europe and the United States at the time. Even though no outside force was able to influence the Haitian leadership, the alliance consisting of Africans and Mulatto’s was a fragile one. This would be key when the United States offered refuge to the many of the Islands French and Spanish leaning Mulattos in the newly acquired former French territory of Louisiana, with most of them concentrated in New Orleans. Automatically this act would cause deep scars within the African Diaspora in the New World. Haiti would be politically and economically isolated which is what the letter I stands for in this equation. Once the Island was divided in two, with the European leaning dominated government of the Dominican Republic set in place, Haiti would fall deeper into economic turmoil and political unrest also France would demand compensation for the half next century for all revenues lost as a result of the destruction a lucrative sugar trade. The next letter C which is to conquer, by the middle of the nineteenth century Haiti was politically weak and in economic turmoil. This would lead to the installation of a Mulatto political and economic elite, which would serve in the political and economic interest of Europe and North America. The last letter of the equation was the letter E, which is to exploit. By the 1850’s with the Island of Hispaniola ripped in two parts, and that generation of competent revolutionary political leadership dead, in jail, exiled or discredited, Haiti would be on the global open market. During the middle of the nineteenth century European and Middle Eastern immigrants would see Haiti as “A Land of Opportunity”. Thousands of German, Eastern European and Middle-Eastern immigrants, would buy out large tracks of land and formed businesses with the established mulatto elite acting as “middle-men”. This would form an economic and political alliance that still in existence today.

Haiti represents the beginnings of neo-colonialism in its most pure form. The Economic and Political scars of Haiti run deep, not only for the Haitian people also for people of colour globally. To understand Haiti is to understand the plight of the African people and people of color in the America’s. This practice would replicate itself throughout the entire third world in one form or another and in many predominately black or brown areas of the United States. If you don’t believe me, just walk into any business in a predominately black or brown area in the United States and look at who owns and operates the businesses and look who makes up the professional and skilled classes in these neighborhoods. This setup was not designed by accident and I know at times I have been accused of being a conspiracy theorist but you have to ask yourself. Why did the Bush II administration and its Allies in the middle of the night sent a force to kidnap the Democratically elected president of Haiti Jean- Bertrand Aristide and planted him in the middle of the Central African Republic a country where torture is practiced on a regular basis. What is it about Haiti an impoverished, politically and militarily weak country that makes the United States and its allies want to perform such extreme covert measures? Even though the official reason was he was turning the Island into a dictatorship, as American history has well proven on many occasions the US does not have a problem with brutal authoritarian dictators here and abroad, so it must be some other reason besides the one given. What is Haiti today, a political and economic wasteland with one of the highest illiteracy rates on the planet, this once bio-diverse paradise, is slowly becoming a desert. Last much of its intellectual and skilled classes, its human capitol, are living in exile in other countries as second-class citizens.

Much of humanity’s future can clearly be seen in Haiti as a result of extreme deregulated greed and capitalism and media misinformation. Haiti is the true predictor of America’s future if the false Reaganomics gospel of “less government in business and business can police itself” continues to flourish and be accepted as economic policy. The United States needs quick and immediate political, social (especially its deep-seeded bigotries towards Race, ethnicity, religion and sexual preference), educational and most of all economic reform if the United States wants to truly be the “Global Powerhouse“ that its entertainment and information industries portrays it to be.

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Updates at Mountain Justice.

From Treehugger:

Understandably in the anticipation leading up to yesterday’s inauguration, your political eye was probably not focused on what’s going on in the aftermath of the TVA coal ash spill. But last week Sarah McCoin and Tom Gizzard, residents of Harriman, Tennessee, showed up at Congress asking questions and bearing gifts of coal ash in mason jars. They also delivered hats with “Filthy Coal” written on them to then senator, now Vice President, Joe Biden and senator John McCain, in recognition of their support for clean coal on the campaign trail. Here’s some of what McCoin and Gizzard told members of Congress:

McCoin: Coal Isn’t Clean. It’s Filthy.

We are here to say that real coal comes with a heavy cost and disastrous consequences. In reality, coal isn’t clean, it’s filthy. We want answers on why these toxic ponds of coal ash are allowed to remain dangerous to so many people, and why policy-makers have failed to protect us from the dangers posed by coal to the American people and communities all across the country.

Gizzard: Coal May Look Clean on TV, But It’s Toxic

I have lived in this community since 1956, and I have never seen a disaster like this. I would like the folks at this PR firm to come to my community and witness first-hand the havoc their clients have brought to Harriman. I can tell you this, their coal may look clean in a TV ad but it is filthy and toxic when it is piled up in yards and playgrounds and rivers. This will harm the wildlife we hunt for and has destroyed the crappie holes where my family has fished for generations.

More photos of the TVA coal ash spill disaster:

-Article with Photos, Continued @ Sourced Site.

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Courtesy The Christian Science Monitor:

The billion-gallon wave of toxic coal-ash sludge that burst from a power-plant retention pond and buried 300 acres of rural Tennessee hints at a far larger problem: hundreds of similar threats nationwide.

More than 1,300 coal-ash waste sites are dotted across the United States, about half of them actively used, federal data show. Some are landfills. The rest are “surface impoundments” (storage lagoons), which, like the one in Tennessee, mix ash with water.

Coal ash has some beneficial uses. It can be mixed with concrete to make roads, for example. But storing coal ash in a retention pond – common at coal-fired power plants nationwide – can be a threat to the environment and humans as well: The ash contains many toxic metals, including arsenic, lead, and chromium.

At least 67 coal-ash sites have been found to be damaging drinking-water supplies in communities across 23 states, the US Environmental Protection Agency reported last year. But those EPA-identified sites grossly understate the threat, environmentalists say.

EPA study finds only 13 ’safe’ coal-ash waste dumps

Among an additional 155 landfill and surface-impoundment sites in 36 states reviewed by the EPA in 2007, all but 13 had no liner or an inadequate clay liner. Most – two-thirds of them – had no liner at all. (An impermeable liner is needed to keep toxic metals from leaching from the ash into groundwater supplies.)

This concerns Kevin Madonna, who, with his law-firm partner, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.,  keeps a close eye on water-pollution issues. Using last year’s EPA data, Mr. Madonna cross-checked coal-ash lagoons and landfills that had either a clay liner or no liner to see which ones were close to human populations and waterways.

One-third are close to human populations

Of the 155 waste sites, more than one-third were close or very close to significant human populations; two-thirds were near or very near key waterways, Madonna found. About half of the sites were coal-ash surface impoundments (lagoons).

“You have toxic wastes leaking into water bodies from probably every single one of these lagoons,” Madonna says. “It’s a huge mess.”

Little is known about coal-ash storage sites, which are lightly regulated by states and exempt from federal hazardous-waste regulations. Many are decades old, which increases the potential for leakage and containment failure, experts and environmentalists say.

Lisa Evans, an attorney for Earthjustice, an environmental group, says the EPA underestimates the problem. “Most impoundments are not monitored at all,” she says. “The list of sites identified by the EPA in 2007 is far from comprehensive.”

-Article Continues @ Sourced Site.

Courtesy El Paso Times:

EL PASO – Mexico is one of two countries that “bear consideration for a rapid and sudden collapse,” according to a report by the U.S. Joint Forces Command on worldwide security threats.

The command’s “Joint Operating Environment (JOE 2008)” report, which contains projections of global threats and potential next wars, puts Pakistan on the same level as Mexico. “In terms of worse-case scenarios for the Joint Force and indeed the world, two large and important states bear consideration for a rapid and sudden collapse: Pakistan and Mexico.

“The Mexican possibility may seem less likely, but the government, its politicians, police and judicial infrastructure are all under sustained assault and press by criminal gangs and drug cartels. How that internal conflict turns out over the next several years will have a major impact on the stability of the Mexican state. Any descent by Mexico into chaos would demand an American response based on the serious implications for homeland security alone.”

-Article Continues @ Sourced Site.

Courtesy The Washington Post:

Millions of tons of toxic coal ash is piling up in power plant ponds in 32 states, a situation the U.S. government has long recognized as a risk to human health and the environment but has done nothing about.

An Associated Press analysis of the most recent Energy Department data found that 156 coal-fired power plants store ash in surface ponds similar to one that ruptured last month in Tennessee. Yesterday, a pond at a northeastern Alabama power plant spilled a different material — water laced with calcium sulfate, a component of a material known as gypsum — and some lawmakers said the incident was more evidence that Congress needs to overhaul coal waste regulations.

“One disaster convinced me that we ought to subject coal ash impoundments to federal design, construction and inspection requirements,” said  Rep. Nick J. Rahall II (D-W.Va.), chairman of the House Natural Resources Committee. “But two incidents in less than three weeks at a TVA site illustrate that we must act swiftly if we hope to ensure a basic level safety for our communities and the environment.”

-Article Continued @ Sourced Site.

Courtesy KnoxNews.com

HARRIMAN — Inspection reports indicate there were two prior breaches in six years at a TVA steam plant’s ash retention pond that failed early Monday morning, spilling an estimated 1.7 million cubic yards of fly ash and water over about 400 acres in Roane County.

The reports were released Tuesday during a news conference in Knoxville, where TVA President and CEO Tom Kilgore provided updates about the recovery effort. Kilgore showed photos of the flooded area, commenting how it looks “rather like a moonscape.”

The environmental group Greenpeace called for a criminal investigation Tuesday into what it alleges was TVA’s failure to prevent the spill. Meanwhile, TVA officials on Tuesday said a cleanup plan had not yet been drafted and that “all options are open.”

The 40-acre pond was used by TVA as a containment area for ash generated by the coal-burning steam plant. An earthen wall gave way just before 1 a.m. Monday, flooding the road and railroad tracks leading to the plant. Officials say up to 400 acres of land adjacent to the plant are under 4 to 6 feet of material. No injuries were reported.

Late Tuesday, a TVA spokesman estimated that at the time of the slide, the area contained approximately 2.6 million cubic yards of ash and that two-thirds of that was released.

A December 2007 inspection report, which Kilgore said is intended to be “self-critical,” cited failures in the ash retention pond in 2003 and 2006, in which “the dike at Kingston experienced smaller, localized seepage that released some ash from one of the dredge cells,” TVA said in a fact sheet released Tuesday.

“After each incident, TVA made changes and repairs to improve the condition of the dike. These ‘failures’ were determined to be caused by excessive water seepage inside the retention dikes because of inadequate internal drainage and infiltration of surface water into the dike.”

TVA said the most recent annual inspection was performed in October 2008, but a formal report was not complete. A preliminary report shows a “wet spot” was found, which indicates a “minor leakage issue.”

“There were no significant problems found that indicated that the dikes were unstable to the point of failure,” TVA wrote.

-Article Continues with Video @ Sourced Site.

(CNN) – Estimates for the amount of thick sludge that gushed from a Tennessee coal plant last week have tripled to more than a billion gallons, as cleanup crews try to remove the goop from homes and railroads and halt its oozing into an adjacent river

The sludge, a byproduct of the ash from coal combustion, was contained at a retention site at the Tennessee Valley Authority’s power plant in Kingston, about 40 miles east of Knoxville. The retention wall breached early Monday, sending the sludge downhill and damaging 15 homes. All the residents were evacuated, and three homes were deemed uninhabitable, according to the TVA.

TVA’s initial estimate for the spill was 1.8 million cubic yards or more than 360 million gallons of sludge. By Friday, the estimate reached 5.4 million cubic yards or more than 1 billion gallons — enough to fill 1,660 Olympic-size swimming pools.

Environmental advocates say the ash contains concentrated levels of mercury and arsenic.

The plant sits on a tributary of the Tennessee River called the Clinch River. At least 300 acres of land has been coated by the sludge, a bigger area than the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill.

A spokesman for TVA, a federal corporation and the nation’s largest public power company, said the agency has never experienced a spill of this magnitude.

“There’s a lot of ash there,” spokesman John Moulton said Friday. “We are taking this very seriously. It is a big cleanup project, and we’re focused on it 24 hours a day.”

Initial TVA estimates put the cleanup timeline at four to six weeks, but Moulton said the agency will no longer say how long it expects the effort to take. Environmentalists say it could take months or even years to clean up the mess.

Video footage showed sludge as high as 6 feet, burying porches and garage doors. The slide also downed nearby power lines, though the TVA said power had been restored to the area. An estimated 78,000 cubic yards, or 15.7 million gallons, of sludge covered local railroad tracks and Swan Pond Road.

-Article Continued @ Sourced Site.

By A.C. Thompson

This article appeared in the January 5, 2009 edition of The Nation.

December 17, 2008

A.C. Thompson’s reporting on New Orleans was directed and underwritten by the Investigative Fund at The Nation Institute. ProPublica provided additional support, as did the Center for Investigative Reporting and New America Media.

The way Donnell Herrington tells it, there was no warning. One second he was trudging through the heat. The next he was lying prostrate on the pavement, his life spilling out of a hole in his throat, his body racked with pain, his vision blurred and distorted.

It was September 1, 2005, some three days after Hurricane Katrina crashed into New Orleans, and somebody had just blasted Herrington, who is African-American, with a shotgun. “I just hit the ground. I didn’t even know what happened,” recalls Herrington, a burly 32-year-old with a soft drawl.

The sudden eruption of gunfire horrified Herrington’s companions–his cousin Marcel Alexander, then 17, and friend Chris Collins, then 18, who are also black. “I looked at Donnell and he had this big old hole in his neck,” Alexander recalls. “I tried to help him up, and they started shooting again.” Herrington says he was staggering to his feet when a second shotgun blast struck him from behind; the spray of lead pellets also caught Collins and Alexander. The buckshot peppered Alexander’s back, arm and buttocks.

Herrington shouted at the other men to run and turned to face his attackers: three armed white males. Herrington says he hadn’t even seen the men or their weapons before the shooting began. As Alexander and Collins fled, Herrington ran in the opposite direction, his hand pressed to the bleeding wound on his throat. Behind him, he says, the gunmen yelled, “Get him! Get that nigger!” Source Article