Haiti, or how to make a disaster

I found this quite fascinating, as a rebuttal of a -lot- of racist cant making the rounds at the moment, about how 'black culture' and 'voodoo' are what makes Haiti so poor:

Why did the political, economic and ecological histories of these two countries — the Dominican Republic and Haiti — sharing the same island unfold so differently?
Part of the answer involves environmental differences. The island of Hispaniola’s rains come mainly from the east. Hence the Dominican (eastern) part of the island receives more rain and thus supports higher rates of plant growth.

Hispaniola’s highest mountains (over 10,000 feet high) are on the Dominican side, and the rivers from those high mountains mainly flow eastwards into the Dominican side.

The Dominican side has broad valleys, plains and plateaus and much thicker soils. In particular, the Cibao Valley in the north is one of the richest agricultural areas in the world.

In contrast, the Haitian side is drier because of that barrier of high mountains blocking rains from the east.

Compared to the Dominican Republic, the area of flat land good for intensive agriculture in Haiti is much smaller, as a higher percentage of Haiti’s area is mountainous. There is more limestone terrain, and the soils are thinner and less fertile and have a lower capacity for recovery.
Note the paradox: The Haitian side of the island was less well endowed environmentally but developed a rich agricultural economy before the Dominican side. The explanation of this paradox is that Haiti’s burst of agricultural wealth came at the expense of its environmental capital of forests and soils. [...]
While those environmental differences did contribute to the different economic trajectories of the two countries, a larger part of the explanation involved social and political differences — of which there were many that eventually penalized the Haitian economy relative to the Dominican economy.

In that sense, the differing developments of the two countries were over-determined. Numerous separate factors coincided in tipping the result in the same direction.
One of those social and political differences involved the accident that Haiti was a colony of rich France and became the most valuable colony in France’s overseas empire. The Dominican Republic was a colony of Spain, which by the late 1500s was neglecting Hispaniola and was in economic and political decline itself.

Hence, France was able to invest in developing intensive slave-based plantation agriculture in Haiti, which the Spanish could not or chose not to develop in their side of the island. France imported far more slaves into its colony than did Spain.
As a result, Haiti had a population seven times higher than its neighbor during colonial times — and it still has a somewhat larger population today, about ten million versus 8.8 million.
But Haiti’s area is only slightly more than half of that of the Dominican Republic. As a result, Haiti, with a larger population and smaller area, has double the Republic’s population density.

The combination of that higher population density and lower rainfall was the main factor behind the more rapid deforestation and loss of soil fertility on the Haitian side.

In addition, all of those French ships that brought slaves to Haiti returned to Europe with cargos of Haitian timber, so that Haiti’s lowlands and mid- mountain slopes had been largely stripped of timber by the mid-19th century.

 This is from Jared Diamond (of Guns, Germ and Steel fame)

A brief historical discursion

From Nathan Newman:

What we should honor and remember by honoring Ulysses Grant is that his vision of racial justice was the will of the American people-- all its people -- and that the following hundred years of segregation was an illegitimate betrayal of that democratic will. In that, Grant was the true founder and implementor of the modern American nation of equal rights and if the flowering of that nation was delayed for a century with his departure from office, that's all the more reason to remember his original vision and courage-- and defy those who try to bury that memory.

It's hard - and bitter - to read of such an opportunity missed, after the Civil War and the spectacularly useless Andew Johnston. Grant is pretty universally dismissed as an idle, corrupt (and drunken) President, on fairly much no evidence at all: whereas, he truly took up the murdered Lincoln's cause and ideals, and strove hard to put them into effect.

Instead, his acts and laws were overthrown, ignored, or judicially murdered, and in their stead an enormous artifice of support for the Robber Barons that still rule this country was constructed.

Militarily, I'd always considered Grant as a fairly 2nd rate general compared to the bold and dazzling Lee (or the demented Jackson), whose primary virtue was sheer bloody determination. After reading the article above, I put myself in his shoes and had to re-evaluate: if all I had was a shaky militia-quality army of enormous size and resource, but little resilience or skill, against a smaller, more agile and motivated opponent, then ... well all of a sudden, the idea of a war of manouevre seems ludicrous, playing directly into the enemy hands.

Given the Union limitations, of course Grant resorted to massive sledge-hammer attacks, brutal unrelenting pressure and a total absence of subtlety. To do otherwise was to invite defeat, whereas this approach, however expensive in lives it might seems, actually gets the war finished and won.

Plus, of course, the whole (flank) March through Georgia thing was his idea, even if executed by Slender Billy Sherman: made easier to be sure by Jeff Davis' command blunders, but still, essentially irresistible.

more medical

Well it's been a bit of a grim time of recent. This last week or so I've been going insane from itching alllllll over my skin, shifting and maddening and unignorable.

Not sure of the cause, it seems to have arrived a bit after the cold extremely arid weather shift since the new year (under 10% humidity and subzero temperatures even at 3 pm). This has caused extreme static issues for everyone - which the cats, being longhair, particularly hated, and as a result, Cat started using an anti-static fabric softener.

So I'm not sure whether the itching is a reaction to the fabric softener, or simply from my skin drying out too much. However, she's stopped using it & rewashed everything that had it, we've bought a humidifier to run at home, and I'm rubbing moisturiser into all my skin twice a day, and one or more of those seems to have resolved the issue, as it's more or less gone away now, thanks be - it was quite maddening, and also fairly dangerous - all too easy to scratch a hole, and with my lamentable healing rate, infection & a festering ulcer is all too likely then.

I've also just been back to the Vein Centre who operated on my leg at the end of last year, as my foot is still every bit as swollen as it was (altho my calf and knee have had their swelling reduce enormously). He's sending me off to a Lymphedema clinic (man they have specialist clinics for everything!*) to get additional treatment but he did observe that he wouldn't expect what he'd done to effect much change on the foot in less than 3 months, so maybe I'm being a bit previous.

I've thought about that since the visit an hour ago and I'm really not sure that I believe him about that 3 month thing - given the circulatory systems working that seems a little specious (if very convenient for putting people off/blurring their memories) ... but not a lot I can do about that anyway.

Oh well, another round of medical joy


*Of course, in a strictly-for-profit medical system, this makes sense, for the doctors, if not for anyone else involved or for society at large .... but Americans dont really do society.

Ooh la la

From one of my favourite songs:

Poor old Grandad, I laughed at all his words

I thought he was a bitter man

he spoke of women's ways

They'll trap you and they'll use you

before you even know

for love is blind and you're far too kind

Don't ever let it show

I wish that I knew what I know now

when I was younger

I wish that I knew what I know now

when I was stronger

Well, who doesn't ?... in the end, our lives are the sum of the mistakes we've made and left behind us, and I can't even imagine anyone who can look back at their lives without regrets: but it's a crummy way to live your life, too.

And thinking about it, I had to reflect, thank god for feminism: that sort of bleak, self-serving evaluation of women is so much more false to fact than it used to be, and mercifully a lot rarer, too, I think (well, I hope ... perhaps I'm just deluding myself). After 50 years (well, more), I can still look at the idea that women just trap and use you, and shake my head: what a terrible idea to have to live with, and a terrible way to live your life.

I guess you can make a coherent argument that women, and men, just use eachother to get what they want, but it still seems an oppressive, unrelenting view, and I can't see that it gains you any understanding, or any happiness, or satisfaction in your life, but rather constricts and makes you more selfish and self-serving.


I still like the song, mind you.


----------------------------------

I should perhaps tack on, that the Granddad referred to in the song is nothing at all to do with mine, or any of the fond memories I have of him. 

Oh and the song is by Ronnie Lane (ex-Faces), 'Oh la la' alternately known as 'I wish that I knew what I know now' (this version by Rod Stewart is actually prettier, astonishingly)

Politics

But as a friend of mine likes to say, "Republicans are evil and Democrats are idiots."

I'm starting to wonder if this isn't right. Man, I need to disengage from the minutiae of political ... well debate is the wrong word for it, more like drunken pub arguing, but on TV & the Internet. It seems to hothouse everything, and contribute ... well, nothing

Slow week

Sorry for the absence of postings, I've been really struggling this last week with ... eh, life, really. The support hose thing on my left leg really didn't help with that at all - thank god I'm free of that now, although I haven't seen any visible improvement in the foot/calf from the operation at all - fairly frustrating.

Otherwise, it's just winter, we're kinda huddling at home a lot - the weather is dry but bitterly cold, with a wind that bites to the bone some days. Still nice to see blue skies and sunshine in winter, I must say, compared to Englands endless soggy grey winters.

Baby its cold outside!

Well so much for the hot-weather south! We got snowed on Monday, enough that there was ground-cover most of the day, which the locals were saying hadn't happened in 50 years*, and it's still bitterly cold: I think yesterday's high was 2 or 3, and the forecast for Thursday & Friday is a high of -5 or so.**

It's not actually as chilly as Wellington winters outside tho, as there is little moisture and almost no wind, so no windchill or drenching effects .... just the slow seeping cold inside, if you dont crank up the central heating or dress warm.

It does make the driving on concrete bridges terribly treacherous though, as the overnight dew freezes into ice sheets and streaks and renders tire grip negligible - and of course, Arkansas isn't coping with it very well, not being used to it, so we're trying to stay at home as much as we can & I've been working from home all week.

Which is not terrible, as I've got this stupid support-hose to wear on my left leg til next monday, and it is a collossal pain in the posterior: pinching, uncomfortable, keeps riding down my leg & needing adjustment, and makes me walk funny, so I'm not sorry to NOT be hobbling around work looking even more peculiar than usual.


*which is about as reliable as spring sunshine really
** Apparently caused by an Arctic Oscillation