We Can Help Haiti

    Haiti -- nay, there is hardly a poorer nation in all the Americas. And, if we are to help them, we must do more than take in their immigrants. We must do more than send them a dash of foreign aide. 

  And, we can help them. 

   They suffer from lack of skilled employees. They suffer from lack of electricity. They suffer from lack of medical facilities. 

    Could we not provide scholarships, or help their universities supply the workforce that comes with upper education? Could we not go in and help them create an adequate electric system? Could we not open medical facilities in the places where they are lacking?

    Haiti has a free-market economy, yet greater than 90 percent of its government's budget comes from Petrocaribe, which is a Venezuela-directed oil alliance. Let us not begrudge this too much, for we should want all countries to thrive -- including Venezuela. Still, we should be concerned that they are so reliant on a communist nation to pay their government bills. Tying them closer to us, in revenue sources, would be worthy. Perhaps, in becoming a supplier of electricity, we could help make that a tie to us.

   When we see a nation in need, we should look for the needs, and step in and help.

(Index -- Climate change info)

Toss Them Right Back into the Devil's Dominion

    A year and a half ago, kidnappings, car-jackings, robberies and armed crime in Haiti led the U.S. government to raise its travel advisory to Level 4 -- Do not travel here.

   Haiti -- one of the poorest countries in the Americas. Three-quarters of the people live on $2.50 or less a day. Less than a quarter of the country has electricity. Less than half the country has clean drinking water. Only 8 percent of the rural areas have health care facilities. An estimate 30,000 children live in orphanages. That is a crisis amount and the care provided in the orphanages much deepens the crisis. 

   Some countries turn to tourism for help. Haiti tried that, and sex tourism became part of it. That led to an epidemic that began in the 1980s. Today, each year an estimate 5,000 babies are born infected with AIDS.

   There was the 7.0 earthquake in 2010, with its 52 aftershocks, claiming somewhere between 92.000 and 230,000 lives. An estimate 250,000 homes and 30,000 commercial buildings came down or were severely damaged. Nearly 900,000 were displaced -- many left on the streets.

   There was Hurricane Matthew in 2016 with flood waters up to 40 inches and storm surges of up to 10 feet. No less than 580 were killed and an estimate 35,000 left homeless.

   There was Hurricane Laura in 2020.

   Then, the 7.2 earthquake Aug. 14 -- the strongest earthquake to tear at the island in 179 years. An estimated 2,207 died. Others were left missing, and an estimated 12,000 were injured. 

   Haiti -- a nation savaged by poverty, crime, natural disasters, and political upheaval. If you live there, you pray for the day you won't, perhaps. 

    This is the country we sent them back to, when we round them up at our southern border and deport them directly back to their homes. The kindness of a free airline ticket is not exactly kindness. Talk of the devil's dominion and curse them right back into the depths of it. 

 You count something as truth only when you've measured it.

(Index: Quotes) 

More is learned from the journey, than the race to get there.

(Index: Quotes) 

The race is not always won, but the journey is often still successful.

(Index: Quotes)

We Should be Concerned for the Welfare of Mexican Laborers

    The closing of the entry bridge at Del Rio had its adverse effect on the city. Workers who live in Mexico but work in Texas were locked out right along with all the migrants.  

   We should be concerned about them. We should be concerned about their livelihoods. These are not rich people. When they go without work for a couple few days, we have to imagine that makes it difficult for them to put food on the table. We should care. We should be concerned about them. 

   We should also be concerned about the employers on this side of the border. Lacking the workers who live in Mexico, how did they survive? Would be nice to have seen a story on this, but we don't give them much thought. We should. We should care about them. 

Deporting Them for Covid Concerns Lacks Good Reasoning

    President Trump's policy of deporting people due to Covid-19 concerns -- still being enforced by President Biden -- is hardly the best of policies, and one that does not help in the fight against Covid.

   If you are concerned about Covid, vaccinate them. If you are not doing that, but rather just packing them on a plane and sending them back to their home countries while they still have Covid, you are only acerbating the Covid problem. And, if you are sending them packing home when they don't even have Covid, you are expelling them without cause. 

   I hope this is not too harsh a comment, but sometimes our leaders show no wisdom, at all.