> What has been absent from most left reportage
> (except from Trots like the ISO, or Int'l. Viewpoint
> of the Usec Mandelites, NACLA or Wilentz in The
> Nation, which when posted on Portside of CCDS
> exciting a bunch of negative polemics, which I
> posted here, a week ago) was any recognition,
> along w/ the obvious Duvalierista death squadistra
> remnants leading the armed opposition) was ANY
> critique of the failures of Aristide, in governance,
> or the allegations of cocaine smuggling
The ISO's hemming-and-hawing about how there needed to be a third force against "both" Aristide and the macoutes was just one more example of why trots are so annoying. Amy Wilentz, The Nation, liberal assholes -- doubly so. Of COURSE Aristide has had some failures. It just so happened that he was brought back to power after the first coup only on the condition that he implement austerity measures. He therefore had constrained political space in which to work. The Haitian left, however -- e.g., http://www.haiti-progres.com -- which had plenty of criticisms of Aristide as well, recognized a vicious coup when they saw one. Only fools think that this is about individuals. It is about the constellation of political forces, and about the fact that a government democratically elected by the vast majority of the impoverished people of Haiti was in danger of being overthrown by the re-emergent macoutes. If anything, Aristide can be faulted for not being harsh ENOUGH with these scum -- though considering that his government was more or less militarily defenseless against the onslaught, it's hard to criticize him even on that, and I'm not about to second guess him from inside the belly of the beast, either.
> burning tires
Is this some kind of sick fucking joke?!?!! The macoutes have just overthrown the poor people's priest for a second time; Aristide himself is calling up Randall Robinson, Charles Rangel, and Maxine Waters, and saying that he was kidnapped by US troops; and Pugliese is yammering on about "necklacing" the way that Reaganite defenders of "constructive engagement" and "the Sullivan Principles" used to do in the 1980s? Who does he expect will take this seriously?
- - - - - John Lacny
People of the US, unite and defeat the Bush regime and all its running dogs!