Photo from AFP/Thony BelizaireI've let a lot of news slip by in the last ten days. I planned to spend today catching up but the big news in the Caribbean - in the world, in fact - is the devastating earthquake in Haiti. Haiti is the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere and hasn't recovered from flooding during the 2008 hurricane season. Now this tragedy, in a country that has almost no resources to cope. The Red Cross announced today it's out of medicine in Haiti. Drinking water is a huge need. Communications, which are not great in the best of times, are nearly nonexistent. There are many ways to help. The major relief agencies seem to agree right now the greatest need is money. The Red Cross has set up a "texting" program to raise money. According to news reports, they've raised over $800,000. Countries all over the world - including the U.S., which under G.W. Bush could not mobilize to help New Orleans - are mobilizing massive relief aid.
And then, like a breath of horror, there are those voices from the extremist-right wilderness: Rush Limbaugh, proclaiming the U.S. response to this tragedy is merely a vehicle to "burnish Obama's image among light- and dark-skinned blacks," and, god help us, Pat Robertson declaring the Haitians brought this disaster on themselves because of a mythical "pact with the devil." Perhaps we should be grateful for such god-fearing men who try to keep the rest of us misguided mortals on track. Instead, I am sickened by them and terrified that people actually believe and act on this nonsense. These same men demanded an America united behind the Bushies' warmongering. Yet theirs are the first, loudest voices trying to splinter and degrade the response to a tragedy affecting thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of people. Unconscionable, unforgivable, and very un-Christian.
And then, like a breath of horror, there are those voices from the extremist-right wilderness: Rush Limbaugh, proclaiming the U.S. response to this tragedy is merely a vehicle to "burnish Obama's image among light- and dark-skinned blacks," and, god help us, Pat Robertson declaring the Haitians brought this disaster on themselves because of a mythical "pact with the devil." Perhaps we should be grateful for such god-fearing men who try to keep the rest of us misguided mortals on track. Instead, I am sickened by them and terrified that people actually believe and act on this nonsense. These same men demanded an America united behind the Bushies' warmongering. Yet theirs are the first, loudest voices trying to splinter and degrade the response to a tragedy affecting thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of people. Unconscionable, unforgivable, and very un-Christian.
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