Top Ten Cloves: Possible reasons Baby Doc returned to Haiti

By J. Thomas Duffy

News Item: Baby Doc's return to Haiti prompts fury, cheers

10. Just wanted to get some new pics for his Facebook Page

9. Just testing the reception and range of his new, 4G Cell Phone

8. Taking the Rex Ryan approach, and that all he needs to be is be better for one day

7. Inspired by Joe Lieberman to be an upstanding, and courageous politician

6. Making personal appeal to diplomats, to diss him, so he'd have a WikiLeaks file of his own

5. When leaving 25-years ago, forgot his American Express card

4. Part of a pitch, to the Kardashians, to get on their show, saying they need a "President-for-Life

3. Said it was the closest place the plane could land that didn't have any snow

2. Decided it was time to bring his talents to Port-au-Prince

1. Oh Shit! ... Screwed up at airport, was supposed to fly to Tunisia

Bonus Riffs

Tim Padgett: Who Let 'Baby Doc' Duvalier Back into Haiti?

Jonathan M. Katz (CP): With Baby Doc back in Haiti Aristide calls next; says he is ready now

CSM: 5 reasons why Haiti's Jean-Claude Duvalier is infamous

(Cross-posted at The Garlic.)

Did Bush wipe his hand on Clinton's shirt in Haiti?

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Watch the video below. At one point, after shaking hands with some Haitians, Bush appears to wipe his hand on Clinton's shirt.

TP: "Bush has a well-known aversion to germs -- and a tendency to use other people's clothing to clean himself off. He infamously used a woman's shirt to wipe off his glasses and reportedly had an aide give him "a big dollop of hand sanitizer" after shaking hands with Barack Obama.

I suppose it's not a big deal, unless there's more to it (like, say, a racial thing), but it's certainly rather odd.

UPDATE: At The Guardian, Richard Adams suggests that the video might be misleading: "The video clip... appears to have been selectively slowed at the point that Bush touches Clinton's shoulder, making his gesture seem worse than it was. In the full-speed BBC version – available here – Bush is seen tapping Clinton on the shoulder twice and then plucking at his sleeve. Clinton is notoriously unpunctual and an enthusiastic glad-hander, whereas Bush is known for keeping to a tight schedule. So it's just as likely that Bush was encouraging Clinton to hurry up."

Yes, perhaps.

Keith Olbermann on Limbaugh, Robertson, and Haiti

By Michael J.W. Stickings

I should have posted this the other day. It's brilliant.

And it reminds me how much I admire Olbermann. The man tells it like it is with extraordinary eloquence and conviction.

Mr. Robertson, Mr. Limbaugh, your lives are not worth those of the lowest, meanest, poorest of those victims still lying under that rubble in Haiti tonight. You serve no good, you serve no god, you inspire only stupidity and hatred...

(See my own takes on Limbaugh and Robertson. See also related posts by Carl, Capt. Fogg, and J. Thomas Duffy.)

One island, two nations

By Carl

Two households, both alike in dignity,
In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
-- Romeo and Juliet: Prologue

Occasionally, CNN.com does its job right and makes me think. Today was one of those moments:

We are all sick at heart to witness the unfathomable suffering in Haiti. Why do bad things happen to innocent people? Why Haiti, again? Even Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said recently, "It is biblical, the tragedy that continues to stalk Haiti and the Haitian people."

How we make meaning of this suffering will be crucial to how we respond, in the long term, as a global community.

Why, indeed?

McAlister goes on to explore Haitian faith and the Christian belief that Haiti is playing our the last chapter in the Bible, of famine and floods and earthquakes and war.

Perhaps. And yet, there's a side to this story that doesn't often get mentioned: the eastern half of the island of Hispaniola contains another country: not as poor, quite as Christian, and poised to absorb the nation of Haiti.

Quite the turnaround for a country that had to fight for independence from Haiti.

It's true, for much of its existence, Haiti has been out of favor of the United States and Europe, while the Dominican Republic has enjoyed the benefits of alliances with both. This despite the fact that the DR had engaged in what we would now call "ethnic cleansing," slaughtering Haitians within its borders by the tens of thousands, in an era marked by the spread of totalitarian fascism around the world and the rise of Nazi Germany.

Admittedly, Haiti has a long history of shackling from the West, first as a slave colony, and then with crushing debt incurred in the treaty for independence from France. Indeed, the national bank of Haiti has been looted, literally, no less than four times, including at least once by American troops.

Too, the political unrest in that nation since, well, independence can't have helped any, but riddle me this, Batman: why is American bankrolling uprisings or defending dictators, when we espouse policies of "sovereignty" and "freedom" and "popular choice" on our own people and are trying to cram these down the throats of Iraqis and Afghanis?

Is it any wonder people really don't trust us? They read history, the history we should read but do not. I mean, come on, we were supporting the Duvaliers with economic aid and development!

I don't know that I have the answer to this conundrum, and I expect people with far better knowledge of sociology and political science struggle with a question that seems infathomable to me.

But this simple truth cannot be denied: one island, two nations moving in diametrically opposite directions:
The which if you with patient ears attend,
What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.

(crossposted to Simply Left Behind)

Hating Haitians

By Carl

One of the joys of scuba diving is it offers the chance to take vacations in exotic locales off the beaten path (Bon-where, now?).

One of the embarrassments of scuba diving is having to explain Rush Limbaugh and Pat Robertson to people from more civilized and sophisticated societies like France, England, the Netherlands, and "Bon-where, now?"

Often, I'm tempted to shrug my shoulders and simply say they're snake oil salesmen who have entire swaths of morons bamboozled by both bilking them for tens of millions of dollars, all while off-putting the blame to someone else. Of course, there's much evidence that even the more mainstream Republican factions are con artists, which makes this not only a tempting trope to leave with, but a facile explanation to boot.

I mean, come on! When a dunderhead like Erick Erickson finally begins to see the light about the movement he's helped spawn and launch, it's like Capt. Renault finding gambling at Rick's Cafe Americain!

But that's nothing compared to the massive scam being pulled by Rush Limbaugh and Pat Robertson over Haiti. If Sarah Palin and Michael Steele are pulling in long money over a few books and a convention, you can rest assured that every time Rush Limbaugh or Pat Robertson open their mouths and say something blitheringly, blindingly idiotic, their accountants are grinning from ear to ear.

For example, when Robertson says that the earthquake was a "blessing in disguise," was he really referring to religious reform in Haiti? Well, sort of, but the blessings were not for Haitians and not for the afterlife, but for the hundreds of evangelicals and other Christian missionaries who would be getting beaucoup bucks to keep piling on the indigent population to attempt to convert them to a brand of Christianity that is both judgemental and better suited for people with little intelligence.

In other words, it benefits Robertson and other Christian Coalitionites.

And when Rush actually campaigns against giving to relief efforts (particularly those emanating on the White House website, like, you know, the American Red Cross?), cui bono? Who benefits?

As for his ridiculous comments that American taxes go to pay Haitian relief efforts, yes, to the extent that they pay the salaries of officials and soldiers on the ground there, it's true. Those salaries would be paid anyway, however so its not like no earthquake would have magically removed a line item from the budget.

Indeed, one could make the argument that Rush himself benefits from those same taxes, ergo he should not be allowed to charge for advertising on his radio program since the airwaves are free. So cui bono is now answered.

But now try explaining to some fellow diver who's Swiss or Italian the whole phenomenon of a man who rails against taxes or one who calls innocent people "devils" in a free society, not only with little repercussion (the tragedy having far outweighed the outrage, a tactic both Rush and Robertson rely upon) but with the full faith and credit of a significant percentage of Americans supporting them, and not conjure up images of Il Duce or worse.

I'm sure I got defensive when discussing them. For that, I apologize, just as I was forced to offer up simple puling of "well, there's a place for all beliefs in America" as explanation.

Which I shouldn't have had to. Your not allowed to shout fire in a crowded theater. It's about time we found some way to hold people responsible not only for their actions, but for their words.

(Cross-posted to Simply Left Behind.)

Campbell Brown and the human face of the devastation in Haiti

By Michael J.W. Stickings

An 11-year old girl who was pulled alive from the rubble of her house in Haiti has died:

The girl -- one of scores trapped beneath buildings that collapsed in Tuesday's 7.0-magnitude quake -- was rushed to a first aid station Thursday evening where doctors told her family they were not equipped to deal with her injuries. Her right leg had been pinned by a large piece of metal for two days.

She died before her relatives could drive her to a more sophisticated hospital outside Port-au-Prince.

Her last words, her uncle said, were, "Mother, don't let me die." She was buried Friday in her mother's hometown, her uncle said.

There are obviously so many stories like this in Haiti, with the death toll in the tens and tens of thousands, but the immediacy and intimacy of a single story like this can, in a way, be so much more powerful, and so much more devastating, than the detachment of a report of such a massive death toll, which is so overwhelming, so horrific, as to be virtually incomprehensible. Speaking personally, while I was strongly affected by 9/11, what ultimately led me to break down on numerous occasions -- and one time in particular, alone in my apartment, listening to the head of Cantor Fitzgerald talk about what happened to his firm, which lost 658 employees on 9/11 -- were those more immediate and intimate stories. It's just easier, I think, to relate to, and feel touched by, the loss of a single human being, or to such personal stories generally, than to the loss of countless people in a tragedy like 9/11 or the Haiti earthquake. It's not that we shouldn't try to understand a tragedy in full, just that the more immediate and intimate stories help us do that more than just those big-picture stories. They help us put a face on the suffering.

Reporting on the loss of that 11-year old girl in Haiti, CNN's Campbell Brown expressed the sort of humanity we don't see nearly enough of on the news -- see the video below. She held herself together, but she showed some emotion, and very nearly broke down, and for that I commend her. I realize that those in the news need to put shields up, but sometimes it's nice when those shields come down so that they, and we, can understand, and communicate, what is happening with greater authenticity. No, we don't need them all turning into emotive Glenn Becks -- Beck, after all, is quite possibly insane -- but it's good and refreshing to see them acting like human beings now and then.

As C&L's Nicole Belle put it earlier today: "If only more talking heads in this country could move past their own limited binary thought of politics to recognize that there is no Left/Right, no Democratic/Rebublican paradigm to this story. There is only humanity and more importantly, human suffering, to which we, as fellow humans, are obligated to respond."

There are some notable and despicable exceptions, like Beck and Rush Limbaugh, but much of humanity is responding with admirable feeling, as well as with concrete support, to the suffering in Haiti.

The dark soul of Glenn Beck

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Just consider what Beck said about Obama and Haiti:

I also believe this is dividing the nation…to where the nation sees him react so rapidly on Haiti and yet he couldn't react rapidly on Afghanistan. He couldn't react rapidly on Ft. Hood. He couldn't react rapidly on our own airplanes with an underwear bomber... it doesn't make sense... Three different events and Haiti is the only one. I think personally that it deepens he divide to see him react this rapidly to Haiti.

This is ridiculous, of course. What was Obama supposed to do about Ft. Hood? The killer was apprehended. What was he supposed to do about the underwear bomber? The would-be killer was apprehended. Sure, he could have acted more quickly on Afghanistan, calling for the Iraq-like surge sooner than he did, but divisions over the Afghan War have more to do with the policy than with the timing -- and mostly he has faced criticism from the left.

The quick response to the catastrophe in Haiti is hardly dividing the country. Rather, the country seems to be fully behind the president and the rest of the massive international effort to provide aid and relief to a country desperately in need.

Beck's comments are not as noxious as Rush Limbaugh's, but he nonetheless seems to be saying that Obama shouldn't have responded so quickly, that is, that America should have been slow to address the humanitarian crisis -- and presumably should have let more people suffer and die.

Some conservatives -- such as Joe Scarborough, Pat Buchanan, and Bill O'Reilly -- have generally avoided trying to capitalize on tragedy by attacking Obama and trying to score partisan political points over the Haiti earthquake. The notable exceptions thus far are Limbaugh, Beck, Pat Robertson, and Steve King, the last of whom suggested that undocumented Haitians in the U.S. be deported home.

As Steve Benen puts it, this is "a race to the bottom" -- though the right-wing reservoir of odiousness seems bottomless.

If anything, I'd say the situation in Haiti is dividing not the country but conservatives -- with some of the most prominent conservatives around actually arguing that the U.S. should give Haitians the middle finger. They've embarrassed themselves, and their movement, and their party, and everything they believe in, but, thankfully, they aren't in a position to dictate policy, or to stand in the way of Obama doing what's right and necessary.

The darkness of some people's souls, if they have souls at all, never fails to boggle the mind.

Somebody, please, help Tweety talk!

By J. Thomas Duffy

The past two nights, watching Tweety, on 'Hardball', has been, even more, excruciating, as to his reporting on the Haiti earthquake.

He has put on his "Super-Serious" suit, and looks, sternly, into the camera, with all his dramatic announcements.

And, biggest of all, he sounds like a total, Ted Baxter-like jackass, whenever he pronounces the name of Haiti's capital city, Port-au-Prince.



You can go out to 'Hardball' and pull up some of the videos, to check it out.

Even Atizine, on Twitter, noticed "Watching newscasters who pronounce almost nothing else properly, try their hardest 2 say 'Port Au Prince' like a local is absolutely weird..."

Almost overnight, Monty Python created a new "Ministry of Silly Talk", and Tweety is their first, gleaming star graduate.

Most normal people pronounce the name of Port-au-Prince, sounding as "Port-O-Prince".

Tweety has been pronouncing it, apparently, in the Francophile manner, as "Port-O-Prance" really dragging out the "Prance" part, making it sound like "Prawnce".

Much in the same behavior as being the only person, outside of the family secret bunker, that pronounces the name of the former Shadow President, as "Cheeny", versus the rest of the standing world, as "Cheney", or "Chay-ney"

Maybe the Darth Vader clan is okay with his mashing their name ...

But somebody needs to clue Tweety in, that he works for MSNBC, not Le Monde.

Bonus Tweety

Clooney: Wouldn’t Cast Matthews In A Daydream ,,,When Pressed, Matthews Admits Miffed Not Cast in Clooney Film ...“Forget This Zelig Mishmash, I Could Have Played McCarthy … And Played Him Damn Good”

MSNBC's Matthews Uninjured Pulling Head Out Of Judy Miller's Ass ...Hardball Host Fawns Over Former White House Stenographer; Stays Away From Tough Questions

Was Tweety Covering Morning Jokes' Back?




(Cross Posted at The Garlic)

Images of extraordinary suffering in Haiti

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Some conservatives, like Rush Limbaugh, just don't give a shit, preferring to expose their blatant racism, their callous cynicism, their bitter partisanship, at a time of extraordinary suffering in Haiti, at a time when the world should instead be pulling together to help, as much of it is (including this country).

Here are a few photos from The Globe and Mail. The first, it seems to me, is the human face of the tragedy in Haiti. The second... that's a girl who died when her school in Port-au-Prince collapsed. The third... well, that's just a tiny glimpse at the death toll from the earthquake, which the Red Cross now estimates at about 50,000.

The situation in Haiti is now being described as catastrophic.

Candidate for worst human being in the world: Rush Limbaugh

By Michael J.W. Stickings

So incensed am I, I'll let Think Progress explain what happened:

[On Wednesday], hate radio host Rush Limbaugh attempted to attack President Obama for responding to the devastation in Haiti. "This will play right into Obama's hands -- humanitarian, compassionate," Limbaugh argued. "They'll use this to burnish their, shall we say, credibility with the black community — the both the light-skinned and dark-skinned black community in this country. It's made to order for them."

Dear Leader Rush also said the U.S. shouldn't support Haiti, or send any humanitarian relief:

We've already donated to Haiti. It's called the U.S. income tax.

Yes, he's anti-Obama, but he's also deeply racist. Do you really think he would have said the same things had such a natural disaster befallen a predominantly white country?

Steve Benen is right:

While the remarks have generated some criticism, including some pushback from the White House, no one seems especially surprised by Limbaugh's callousness. Limbaugh spews bile on a daily basis, and is richly rewarded. This is just who he is.

But Kevin Drum asked the same question I always ponder every time the right-wing, drug-addled radio host crosses the decency line: "I wonder what it takes to get the conservative movement to disown this guy?"

I wonder the same thing, but it simply never happens. On the other side of the ideological divide, when a Democratic lawmaker works with MoveOn.org or appears at Netroots Nation, there's ample criticism from the right about Dems associating with "liberal extremists."

And yet, no matter how loathsome a figure Limbaugh becomes, top Republican officials not only reach out to the right-wing talk-show host, but effectively treat him as the de facto head of their political party. Indeed, in the rare instances in which a Republican actually offers subtle disapproval of Limbaugh, they invariably apologize to him and kiss his proverbial ring.

The GOP effectively lets Rush Limbaugh call the shots, and when he says disgusting things, Republicans don't dare disagree with their boss.

And so Rush gets away with being... what?... what's the right word for him? Let's just say that, like Pat Robertson, on whom we focused yesterday, he's a leading candidate for Worst Human Being in the World.

He was that already, of course, but he significantly bolstered his candidacy with these comments. Even some conservatives pushed back:

-- Joe Scarborough: "The insensitivity is stunning, the words are deplorable... [It's] indefensible."

-- Pat Buchanan: "They're deeply insensitive, no doubt about it. I think the President of the U.S. speaks for the country when he stands up there... I think Rush's comments were cynical."

No, they were far worse than cynical, but they did, once more, expose Rush -- along with his supporters and admirers, and what he stands for -- in all his naked inhumanity.

Candidate for worst human being in the world: Pat Robertson

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Maybe this should be a new ongoing series here at The Reaction. We'll see.

For my initial post on the disaster in Haiti, see here. For J. Thomas Duffy's post on Robertson and Haiti, see here.)

**********

No natural disaster is complete without some insane Christian fundamentalist coming out and saying something unfathomably insane.

(Although, come to think of it, it's all quite fathomable when this happens, given that it happens all the time.)

I've called Pat Robertson a number of things before, including "dangerous idiot" here, here, and here, but I just can't think of the appropriate word or words to use in response to what he said today on his show The 700 Club about the earthquake in Haiti:

The Rev. Pat Robertson, on his CBN broadcast today, offered his own explanation of the earthquake in Haiti:

"Something happened a long time ago in Haiti, and people might not want to talk about it," he said. "They were under the heel of the French... and they got together and swore a pact to the devil. They said, 'We will serve you if you'll get us free from the French.'

"True story. And the devil said, 'OK, it's a deal,'" Robertson said. "Ever since, they have been cursed by one thing after another."

That's right, Robertson said that the earthquake happened because the Haitians are "cursed" as a result of a long-ago pact with the devil to free themselves from French oppression.

Insane? You betcha, even by the extreme standards of fundamentalist Christianity, even by the standards of Robertson's own insanity, which would seem to include admiration of French (i.e., white European) tyranny and a desire for non-white peoples to be subjected to such godly bondage.

Now, Robertson also said that "right now we're helping the suffering people and the suffering is unimaginable," which is fine, but also, rather disturbingly, that "we need to pray for them a great turning to God and out of this tragedy I'm optimistic something good may come."

Sure, over 100,000 people are dead, sure, the country lies in ruins, sure, it's a humanitarian catastrophe, but if those "cursed" Haitians turn to Jesus and accept the Christian yoke, then, hey, it was all for the best, right?

You know what? Fuck you, Pat Robertson, you fucking piece of shit.

You're one of the worst human beings in the world, a shameful embarrassment to humanity, to America, even to Christianity. You're a disgusting, despicable man with disgusting, despicable beliefs.

And you, dear reader, if you believe this nonsense, you're fucking insane as well.

**********

If you want to watch Robertson in action, here's the clip:

Pat Robertson goes all Angel Heart on Haiti

By J. Thomas Duffy

Quite the awful, terrible, horrific disaster going on in Haiti.

Good thing The Commander Guy is out-of-office, otherwise there'd probably be a massive airlift bringing the Haitians to the New Orleans Convention Center so they could wait for some help.

And we come to expect things.

Like chest-thumping network news anchors "dropping in" to do live stand-ups of repeating their bleatings over-and-over, punctuated by "that's absolutely correct." Brian Williams and the NBC Survivor Team all were throwing around the word "absolutely" so much, I half expected to find out they were sponsored by the vodka company.

Another expectation is for former Republican candidate for president, and raving lunatic, Pat Robertson, to go off the rails and start spouting the events of the alternate universe playing inside his head.



Take it away Pat, courtesy of Think Progress:

Today on his 700 Club television show, Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson highlighted the tragedy and said that his network will be there “to help the people.” However, he then tried to offer an explanation for the earthquake, blaming Haiti’s own people for once making a “pact to the devil”:

ROBERTSON: [S]omething happened a long time ago in Haiti and people might not want to talk about it. They were under the heel of the French. Napoleon the Third and whatever. And they got together and swore a pact to the devil. They said, “We will serve you if you get us free from the prince.” True story. And so the devil said, “OK, it’s a deal.” They kicked the French out, the Haitians revolted and got themselves free.

But ever since, they have been cursed by one thing after the other, desperately poor. That island of Hispaniola is one island. It’s cut down the middle, on the one side is Haiti, on the other side is the Dominican Republic. The Dominican Republic is prosperous, healthy, full of resorts, etc. Haiti is in desperate poverty. Same island.

They need to have, and we need to pray for them, a great turning to God. And out of this tragedy I’m optimistic something good may come. But right now, we’re helping the suffering people and the suffering is unimaginable.

(GottaLaff, over at The Political Carnival, has the video.)

Now, you think he would have been happy with just the earthquake.

He's been wishing earthquakes, tsunamis, tornadoes, hurricanes, mixing in trying to hire assassins, calling on God to "smite" this one or that one, on so many people who have different points of view than his, that when one comes along, he could have just left it with an "I told you so."

Ahhh, but that "Louis Cyphre," he's a tricky fellow.

I think something else was going on here.

This is what must have happened:

Netflix screwed up and sent Robertson Angel Heart, rather than Angels With Dirty Faces , and once the scene with Epiphany Proudfoot, played by the steamy, sultry Lisa Bonet, came to the "racy nude and sex scenes," well, Robertson got all hopped up and happy-in-the-pants, and went to bed thinking, actually, dreaming, hoping, that he was Johnny Favorite.



Naturally, he woke up, how should we say, at attention, popped in the DVD for another view of his beloved Epiphany Proudfoot just before showtime and, Ta-Da, he pays his dues by giving old Louis Cyphre his star turn.

If not, get this man on lots, and lots, of Seroquel.


Bonus Pat Robertson Loony Tunes

Wonkette: Pat Robertson Does Usual Pat Robertson Thing Following Natural Disaster

Juan Cole: Pat Robertson's Racist Blaming of Haitian Victims; and the Televangelist Misuse of History

John Cook: Thousands Dying Because Haitian Slaves 'Swore a Pact with the Devil' for Their Freedom

Steve M: THE COMPANY REPUBLICAN OFFICEHOLDERS KEEP

Amanda Terkel: Shep Smith hits Robertson’s ‘devil’ comments: The people of Haiti ‘don’t need that’ at a time like this


Bonus Bonus

Breaking News! Robertson Held For Questioning In Falwell Death ... Threats Against Chavez, Sharon Make 700 Club Founder 'Person of Interest'

Robertson May Have, Inadvertently, Caused Hajj Stampede Deaths ...Was Working On New Material For Bush Video Blitz, Testing New Curses and Condemnations

White House Meets With Robertson; Plan Video Blitz ...Controversial Minister To Produce Al Qaeda-type Videos, Promising Death and Destruction, To Counter Bin Laden's




(Cross-posted at The Garlic.)

Over 100,000 dead in Haiti earthquake

By Michael J.W. Stickings

(Updated with images and video.)

It is being reported that over 100,000 people have died as a result of yesterday's massive 7.0-magnitude earthquake in Haiti:

The capital, Port-au-Prince, "is flattened," said Haiti's consul general to the U.N., Felix Augustin, who said he believed more than 100,000 people were dead. Hospitals are gone, and medical supplies and heavy equipment are desperately needed, he said.

The country's prime minister said the death toll could be in the hundreds of thousands.

"I hope that is not true, because I hope the people had the time to get out," Prime Minister Jean-Max Bellerive told CNN.

President Rene Preval said he heard reports of death tolls ranging from 30,000 to 100,000 -- but he said the true toll is not yet known.

What more can one say? It's a catastrophe of such enormity that it's hard even to process what happened. I can only hope that aid and support are getting to the right places and that everything possible is being done to help the Haitian people.

**********

Michaelle Jean, Canada's governor general (our head of state), is a native Haitian, and she spoke today about the devastation:

Jean directly addressed Haitians in Creole, urging them to have "courage" as her voice broke.

In Creole, she explained later that she said "men and women of Haiti, we shall not lose hope. We are known for our strength and resilience and we need to stand courageously before this challenge that is affecting us again."

An aide handed her a tissue as Jean read out her statements in English and French, and spoke of the "the long terrible night, that long day yesterday and that long day today."

"We know that every hour and every day can make a difference between life and death."

Asked if she'd heard from members of her own family, the governor general said she was able to get word that an uncle is safe, but was still unsure of news of other loved ones, but quickly added that "it's not about me today."

"I am only one of many" Haitians worried about their loved ones, she said.

I found her comments deeply moving. (You can see her make them here. She said "it's as if an atomic bomb has fallen over Port-au-Prince," the country's capital city.)

Let me post the clip here:

**********

It bothers me that our (or, rather, our news media's) primary focus -- as reflected in what is reported first -- is on Canadians who have died or otherwise been affected in Haiti. (And this is no doubt the same in other countries, where nationals of those countries are given primacy over the Haitians.)

I understand why this is, and I do not want to make light of Canadian casualties or to disregard the suffering of the friends and families of those Canadians casualties (an Ontario nurse, Yvonne Martin, was the first confirmed Canadian death in Haiti), and Canadians are understandably concerned about and interested in the impact of the earthquake specifically on Canada and Canadians, but the unfortunate implication is that Canadians are more important than Haitians, that a single Canadian death deserves greater attention, is sadder, and is more tragic than the deaths of countless Haitians.

This is to take nothing away from what Canada is doing. Like other countries around the world, Canada has already committed a great deal of support for disaster relief in Haiti. And I certainly do not mean to suggest that Canadians are insensitive to the suffering of the Haitian people. I just find the focus on Canadians -- and the similar focus of other countries on their own nationals -- distasteful, disrespectful, and, at a time like this, rather disgusting.

In contrast, Governor General Jean's statement, which addressed the Haitian people and the enormity of the suffering in human, as opposed to national, terms, was not just moving but the right response, in terms of both tone and content, to a tragedy of this magnitude.

**********

The BBC has images of the devastation -- and of the very human side of it -- here and here. Canada's Globe and Mail has a lot more here. 

Here are two images from the Globe. The first is Petionville, a neighbourhood in Port-au-Prince. The second is the presidential place in Port-au-Prince.