Friday, April 08, 2005

Washington Post Says U.N. Sucks!

CaribPundit finds this little gem. If the United Nations can't handle a little problem like Haiti, what can they handle? Ms. CaribPundit also points to this article where we find this tidbit about the equality loving French:
Haiti's bicentenary as an independent state, the first in Latin America and the Caribbean, was celebrated last year. But it is hardly known that independence was paid for with burdensome debt. In 1825 France using the threat of invasion of Haiti and its exclusion from international trade, exacted from Haiti the payment of (calculated in current currency) US $21 billion to compensate the French slave owners for the slaves who had been freed. It took Haiti some 120 years to repay that debt. It is such indebtedness which may account in part for the absence in Haiti of social and economic infrastructure; there are no public schools, almost non-existent health services, dreadful roads and only occasional electricity in some areas.
This also touches on the other historical factor which may account for the current condition of Haiti - it was a French colony.

Haiti Democracy Project