Daily history

Good morning,


Quote of the day:

“I will permit no man to narrow and degrade me by making me hate him.”

                                Booker T. Washington

Today’s lesson will include a brief History of Haiti.

Over in Seneca, SC the county cops were called to a domestic disturbance. When the cops arrived a man came out the door with a shotgun in hand and then retreated back into the house and barricaded himself. The cops retreated and a “negotiator” was called in and he was able establish rapport with the man. Eventually the man surrendered, was arrested and charged with criminal domestic violence. The cops had a right to open fire at the man as soon as the weapon was sighted but they didn’t. This man is alive today because the cops used restraint. Over in Union County, South Carolina a 15 year old girl showed up for school with a bruises and scratches on her face. When the principal questioned the girl she said that her mother administered the wounds. The police arrest the 37 year old mother and charged her with child endangerment. I have mixed emotions about that. Where does the application of discipline end and brutality begin? Kids get into fights and bruises and scratches happen all the time and no one gets arrested. Then everyone should have protection from personal injury. One other thing, did the 15 year old attack her mother and suffered the wounds when her mother defended herself? Who knows what goes on behind closed doors?

A couple of days ago a woman was shopping in a Barnes & Noble over in Spartanburg, SC she noticed a man following her around the store. When she left the store the man followed her to her car. When she opened the door the man identified a Marselino Rodriguez grabbed the woman by the waist and pulled toward him and hunched her leg a couple of times. I don’t get it. What kind of gratification is that? Maybe things are different in the land of the Latino’s.

History of Haiti

This is a history of an island in the Lesser Antilles called Haiti or Ayiti in Creole and Arawak Indian. In Arawak it means “mountainous country”. The island was home to several tribes of Carib and Arawak Indians until Christopher Columbus tried to establish a settlement on the north coast of what is now Haiti. It took three tries to get one settlement to stick because the Indians were not pleased with the honkies taking their land and pushed two of the settlements back into the ocean. The settlement that stuck was named La Navidad. Spanish control ended with the Treaty of Ryswick in 1697 when the island was divided between the Spanish and the French with the eastern Spanish colony known as Santo Domingo and the western French colony of Saint Domingue (Haiti). For over 100 years Saint Domingue was known as “The Pearl of the Antilles”. The Island provided France with sugar cane, rum, cotton and coffee among other things. During this period there were over 500,000 slaves, mostly West Africans, operating in Saint Domingue for the French. Then in 1781 a 13 year long slave rebellion arose against the colonists. The person that initiated the rebellion was a Jamaican named Boukman and the leader of the rebel armies was General Toussaint Louverture. Eventually the French army led by Napoleon Bonaparte and an English army and a Spanish army arrived on the island trying to suppress this rebellion. Two of Louverture’s officers disagreed with him about his policies, which including reparations with France, and had Louverture exiled to France where he died. The two officers were Jean-Jacques Dessalines and Henri Christophe. In 1803 there was a gigantic Battle of Ventieries which the slaves won over the French and new Republic appeared in the western hemisphere when General Dessalines declared Saint Dominque a Republic on January 1, 1804 and changed the name from Saint Dominque to Haiti. In the meantime Dessalines had declared himself “Emperor” and two year later he was assassinated. It was at this point in this country’s history that turmoil began and it has not totally stopped yet. From 1807 to 1820 the country of Haiti was wracked by civil war between Henri Christophe capturing the northern part of Haiti and calling himself “King”, and Alexandre Petion establishing a republic in the southern half. Christophe discovered rebellion in his own army and committed suicide. This event paved the way for yet another strong man to step in and unify the country again and that was Jean-Pierre Boyer. In 1820 Haiti was whole again with Boyer as President. The next year Santo Domingo declared its independence from Spain and Haiti immediately successfully invaded and the whole island was under Haitian control until 1844. In 1838 France recognized Haiti as an independent nation upon the receipt of 150 million Francs that France felt Haiti owed them. For nearly 40 year the United States refused to recognize Haiti for fear of upsetting some slave-holding countries that were US allies. But in 1862 during the American Civil War the US did recognize Haiti and sent Frederick Douglass over a Counsel. In 1915 for reasons unknown US President Woodrow Wilson sent the Marines into Haiti to take control of the custom houses and port facilities. Not only that the ubiquitous Marines “conscripted” many peasants to build roads. This is a fancy name for slavery. The Marines also organized an effective Haitian police force. Eventually the Haitians got fed up with a US military presence in country and a small rebellion was started by Charlemagne Perault who was quickly assassinated by the Marines…end of rebellion. After 19 years in Haiti the Marines withdraw in 1934 leaving the Haitian National Police in charge. This was a giant error. Without supervision the Haitian National Police went on an orgy of stealing, rape and pillage unencumbered. Then in 1937 the Dominican strong man Trujillo orders the slaughter of thousands of Haitians living close to the Dominican border. There was no retaliation. In 1957 after several moves toward a democratically based Haitian government all of which failed, a military strongman named Dr. Francois “Papa Doc” Duvalier steps forward and takes control and what follows is year of horror and torture by Duvalier’s private army that operated like the “Gestapo”. They answered to no one except Duvalier who declared himself “President for life”. In 1971 Papa Doc dies in office and the power is handed over to his 19 year old son Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier who surpassed even his father is bloody repression of his own people. After several years of this nightmare, the United Nations sends “Baby Doc” and his family to exile in France along with the millions of dollars that were meant for his people but ended up in his bank account. From the downfall of the Duvalier family there had been at least 6 changes of leadership all of which were contested because of improper election processes and corruption which resulted in the expected military coups and even more bloodshed administered by the remnants of the Duvalier private army. During all this turmoil the regular Haitians are nothing but cannon fodder for the power and money seekers in their own land. Commercial fishing and agriculture is out of the question because the powers that be are more worried about their piece of the action than the success of the projects. I do not have the answers but I know that the greatest majority of the Haitians get their money from handouts from different governments and religions. They can’t have any self esteem knowing this. I do not have an answer to people feeding off their own and saying to hell with them….except the guillotine.

Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow