Monthly Archives: January 2018

From John Rickford (my friend)

In the many discussions of Trump’s crass and racist comments about Haiti and other countries, I have seen little if any awareness or acknowledgment that the two beacons of national liberation in the late 18th century–the USA (1766) and France (1789)–did not recognize the first Black Republic in the New World (Haiti, 1804) until decades later, and seriously undermined its development. (Compare Walter Rodney, How Europe Underdeveloped Africa.) The US only recognized independent Haiti in 1862, after the South seceded, and France did so in 1825, after forcing Haiti to begin paying them “reparations” for the slaves and property France lost after the successful struggle of Haitians for their freedom. Those reparations, in today’s dollars, amounted to $21+ billion dollars, and it took Haiti until 1947 to pay off the debt with interest! Imagine if America had had to pay off a similar debt to Britain after 1776. And the irony is that instead of Haitian slaves getting reparations for THEIR years of exploitation and unpaid labor, it was the other way around, with the victims paying the victimizers. Even so, Haiti has gone on to produce some of the most impressive intellectuals, artists, and men and women of distinction in every field, many of them (like my friend #Michel Anne Frederic DeGraff, professor of Linguistics at MIT) helping to give American students the education Donald Trump apparently never had. DT’s ignorance reminds me of Nathanael in John 1:46, who, hearing from Philip that “we have found Him of whom Moses in the law, and also the prophets, wrote–Jesus of Nazareth …” said, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?” For info on Haitian reparations, see this Wikipedia entry. Michel and others mayl give us deeper historical references:

External debt of Haiti – Wikipedia
Haiti’s legacy of debt began shortly after gaining independence from France in 1804. In 1825, France, with warships at the ready, demanded Haiti compensate France for its loss of slaves and its slave colony. In exchange for French…
EN.WIKIPEDIA.ORG

Roll Up You Pants Cuffs

Roll up your pants cuffs. It’s the fashion style for 2018. Why? The shit is really deep that we’re walking in, and if you don’t want to get your pants soiled, you’d better roll up the cuffs and watch you steps (to avoid the mess).

As one astute political observer said this morning, “See what happens when you make friends and mess with the Devil!”   He said he personally has lived his life, at all costs, to avoid that fatal error.  Woe to he (or she) who doesn’t.

Two points jumped out of my collective subconsciousness this morning: 1.  Greed causes individuals to abuse power for personal gain, when it’s really unnecessary and diminishes the public good.  2.  The president cannot claim “Executive Privilege” based on the “Cease and Desist” letter from his attorney.

a.  Executive Privilege would only apply to acts taken as president.

b. Ex-post facto law is illegal (thus the president cannot do whatever he wants about what he’s done, illegally)

In other words, the shit has gotten really deep. How, for example, can a Cease and Desist letter be written, the precursor of a legal action to prevent use of information or data, when the information is not about the president, but the president’s son?  Apparently, the lawyer doesn’t know who his client is.  Or, perhaps, he does!

I’m assuming Donald, Jr. is going to somehow utilize the attorney-client privilege to avoid disclosing what he knows as truth. Or, perhaps, plausibly not denying what he does not know to be a lie. Now, we know the intent of Shakespeare observation and words about lawyers.

Then, it’s on to the nuclear threat of North Korea.  Imagine saying that North Korea will not be allowed to be nuclearized, when North Korea has demonstrated (1) nuclear events can be created  and (2) nuclear events can be created. Who cares about missiles?  Don’t you think that there is more than one way of delivering a thermonuclear bomb?

So, why is the Twittering continuing on the subject.  Thus, my suggestion:  Roll up you pants cuff, keep on walking and making good vibes.  The shit we’re walking in is getting deeper.