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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=3>Though I still see an article I like occasionally
in THE NATION magazine, I began to sour on it several years ago.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial>Until I read John Nichols article, I use to think highly
of his work as well.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial>I saw Michael Moore on Democracy Now this morning and
he as well ( though I still like and respect his work, especially his last film
" Capitalism a Love Story " ) went to great rationalizing contortion acts of
defending Obama.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial>Well, it is discouraging, but I guess these are the best
of times and the worst of times, in the sense that we find out over time who the
real advocates for the people are and who are either oppurtunistic or gullible
to the liberal fascade of the ruling class.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial>David J.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial">----- Original Message -----
<DIV style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; font-color: black"><B>From:</B> <A
title=tanstl@aol.com href="mailto:tanstl@aol.com">David Sladky</A> </DIV>
<DIV><B>To:</B> <A title=undisclosed-recipients:
href="mailto:undisclosed-recipients:">undisclosed-recipients:</A> </DIV>
<DIV><B>Sent:</B> Tuesday, January 26, 2010 8:17 AM</DIV>
<DIV><B>Subject:</B> The Nation praises US intervention in Haiti</DIV></DIV>
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<H2>The<EM> Nation</EM> praises US intervention in Haiti</H2>
<H5>By Alex Lantier <BR>25 January 2010</H5>The US intervention in Haiti after
the major earthquake that devastated that country on January 12 has become a
subject of international controversy. Though there were no reports of attacks on
aid workers, US forces seized Port-au-Prince airport and the main government
buildings, flying in thousands of troops and blocking the flow of food and
medical supplies to hundreds of thousands of desperate Haitians.<BR>Anger is
rising in the country and in aid organizations. France’s co-operation minister,
Alain Joyandet, even rebuked the US operation at a summit meeting in Brussels,
saying, “This is about helping Haiti, not about occupying Haiti.”<BR><EM>The
Nation</EM> magazine, a leading publication of US “progressive” opinion, has
responded by applauding the US intervention in Haiti. The magazine’s Washington
correspondent, John Nichols, recently penned an Orwellian column, “Obama’s Fine
Moment,” to praise the intervention and particularly the “dignity and
determination” he sees in Obama’s response to the quake.<BR>He writes: “At a
time when there is so much disappointment regarding the unmet promise of a
presidency that finished its first year on the bitter note of a lost US Senate
seat, Obama has responded to the crisis in a spirit that has the potential to
reassure not just Haitians but Americans.”<BR>Nichols’ reference to the recent
defeat of a Democratic candidate for the US Senate in the liberal state of
Massachusetts, in an election that turned into a referendum against Obama’s
policies, is significant. Cheerleaders for the Democratic Party, such as <EM>The
Nation</EM>, feel surrounded by bitterness and disappointment. Their response
has been to deepen their support for the Obama administration. And they see the
historic tragedy inflicted upon the people of Haiti largely through the prism of
how it will affect Obama in the opinion polls.<BR>Nichols admits that he does
not want “to say that Obama has done right by Haiti at every turn.... But as the
world came to recognize the full scope of Haiti’s humanitarian crisis—a crisis
that grew more agonizing with a new tremor on Wednesday morning—the president
has projected a concern and a commitment that meets the moment.”<BR>Such
passages are altogether characteristic of the outlook of <EM>The Nation</EM>.
For Nichols, whether the US has “done right” by millions of earthquake victims
is less important than the question: has Obama “projected” an acceptable public
face for the US occupation of Haiti?<BR>Apparently convinced that the White
House has proved up to the task, Nichols continues: “It is early in what could
be a long presidency. So there is no need to suggest that we are seeing Obama’s
finest moment. Yet, we are seeing a fine moment.”<BR>Such claims constitute an
insult to elementary decency. Over 150,000 people are confirmed dead, not
counting those buried privately by their families or still under the rubble.
Many have died because the string of corrupt, US-backed regimes that ruled Haiti
did not enforce basic building codes. Approximately 250,000 people wounded in
the quake are being treated largely without antibiotics or anesthetics, with
thousands dying preventable deaths from gangrene and septicemia as the US
military blocks the arrival of medical supplies.<BR>Far from constituting a
“fine moment” in history, such events testify to profound social obstacles
preventing humanity from realizing the potential inherent in its scientific
progress. For anyone with a shred of political or moral honesty, the situation
is not exemplary, but rather deeply troubling.<BR>Nichols praises Obama’s
conduct in talks with Haitian President René Préval, installed in the wake of a
2004 US-backed coup against elected President Jean-Bertrand Aristide. Préval has
barely been seen in public since the earthquake, and is reportedly holed up
inside the US-controlled Port-au-Prince airport, guarded by thousands of US
troops.<BR>Nichols comments, “The American president paid due respect to Haiti’s
sovereignty—an appropriately touchy issue for a country that has suffered more
than its share of imperial abuse.”<BR>Combining a fleeting acknowledgement of
Washington’s oppression of Haiti with unrestrained support for the latest US
intervention, Nichols’ statement is saturated with imperialist hypocrisy.<BR>The
Préval regime has acted as Washington’s puppet in handing over full control of
Haiti to the US government, which has acted without any regard for the country’s
sovereignty. The talk of Haiti’s sovereignty being an “appropriately touchy”
subject merely reflects fears of mass anger in Haiti over the US takeover and US
interference in relief operations.<BR>Nichols is remarkably vague on the
“imperial abuse” suffered by Haiti, much of which was meted out to further the
interests of the US ruling classes.<BR>After the initial slave revolt against
French colonial rule that gave Haiti its independence in 1804, the US blockaded
the country for fear the revolt would spread to the black slaves of the American
South. From 1915 to 1934, US Marines occupied the country to suppress the
<EM>cacos</EM> peasant armies and block growing German influence in Haiti before
World War I. From 1957 to 1986, it backed the anti-Communist dictatorship of the
Duvaliers. After the collapse of the Duvalier dictatorship, it mounted two
coups—in 1991 and 2004—against Aristide, whom it had reinstated in 1994 on the
condition that he impose IMF austerity plans.<BR>Nichols comments: “After French
colonial rule was overthrown by the Haitians, [in 1805 Thomas] Paine urged
Jefferson to position the United States as a ‘guarantee’ of the freedom of Haiti
in a manner that ‘accords with the humanity of her principles.’ Thomas Jefferson
did not rise to Paine’s call. Nor, for the most part, did succeeding presidents.
But Barack Obama can.”<BR>Only someone promoting the most appalling delusions
about the US can describe the military-financial clique that now rules
Washington as being able to guarantee Haiti’s freedom. The Obama administration
presides over a deeply unequal and divided society, and its main representative
overseas—the US military—is engaged in unpopular wars in both Afghanistan and
Iraq, and now an apparently open-ended occupation of Haiti.<BR>Nichols’ writings
are a sample of a significant strand of bourgeois public opinion: the
“progressive” supporter of imperialism. This corresponds not only to these
layers’ worship of the Democratic Party, but their increasingly privileged
social status and close integration into the state apparatus. <EM>The Nation’s
</EM>editor, Katrina van den Heuvel, for instance, now regularly appears as a TV
pundit and is a member of the US Council on Foreign Relations.<BR>The
<EM>Nation</EM> has enthusiastically promoted “regime change” in Iran, backing
the US-supported candidate Mirhossein Mousavi in last June’s disputed
presidential election, while both Nichols and van den Heuvel praised Obama for
his bellicose Nobel prize acceptance speech defending the ongoing US wars and
warning that Washington will launch new military actions whenever and wherever
it sees fit.<BR>From the standpoint of these pro-war “progressives,” it is not
abhorrent but praiseworthy when an oppressed country targeted by Washington
receives—to use Nichols’ phrase—“its share of imperial abuse.” There is no more
revealing demonstration of the right-wing character of today’s ex-lefts.<BR><BR>
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