Born after the Earthquake in an IDP camp some of this new Haitian's first words are "Tet Kale! Tet Kale !" The opportunistic National Endowment of Democracy is busy force-feeding political deception into the post-Earthquake generation in Haiti. photos ©2011 Randall White

La Gavage: Obama helps Republican militarists take control in Haiti

by Randall White

"… you reap what you sow."

HaitiAction.net - Port au Prince, Haiti — After the most recent two years of the Obama Administration's "excessive meddling" in Haiti's electoral process, the fetid harvest was a victory for International Republican Institute (IRI) and, a fitting memorial to the life's work of Senator Jesse Helms. It is only proper that the 2012 Democratic National Convention will be held in the politically-progressive State of North Carolina and will feature a Helm's commemoration delivered by Randall Terry — a nostalgic eulogy pining for the return of Southern Democrats in his "concession" speech at the convention. President Obama's "victory speech" is expected to further extol the career of his own political mentor, Ronald Reagan.

Unfortunately, the opening paragraph was more prophetic than parody. It really is, "that bad."

It was widely reported that in the week leading up to President Aristide's return to his native country of Haiti, President Obama called President Jacob Zuma to dissuade him from returning Jean-Bertrand Aristide and family from Pretoria — where President Aristide has been living in exile as a guest of the Republic of South Africa. What wasn't reported was that President Barack Obama actually called President Zuma TWICE according to HaitiAction.net sources. Additionally, the President of the USA pressured President Sarkozy (France) and Ban Ki-moon (UN) to relay similar threats to the South Africa's president.

One would think that with all the nonsense, culminating with the Trump-hooey this last month, it would have made Barack Obama a bit more conscientious about heritage issues. President Obama would soon be riding a wave of overwhelming events and that the implementation of this Neocolonial Agenda would be important to the Washington "Powers That Be" may be obvious to some. However, the obvious is rarely addressed. Dr. Jean Bertrand Aristide is still a citizen of Haiti; the Constitution of the People of Haiti forbids the exile of any citizen; Barack Obama was a Professor of Constitutional Law and should be able to comprehend the most basic principles of any nation's constitution.

For all that, the mythomaniacal impulse of the Neocolonial Agenda to undermine popular democracy is hard to shake off.

With the world focus on the sweeping changes in North Africa; Japan reeling from an actual nuclear meltdown — an unnatural disaster on top of their own natural disaster — and, we now know, the final stages of planning for the Osama bin Laden raid in Pakistan, many are stunned that the Obama administration had made it a priority to spend a disproportionate amount of resources and political capital to subvert Haiti's elections while all of this was happening. How did this election in the small country of Haiti become so vital to the USA's "national security" interests?

"Democracy Enhancement" and the NED

Ronald Reagan's creation, the National Endowment of Democracy (NED), a quasi-private government funded organization has been busy for over 20 years in Haiti making it the training ground and laboratory for their private army of "Democracy Enhancement" agents. The NED and USAID funnel cash to other "Technical Assistance" (TA) organizations, having 501c(3) status — even though it can be demonstrated that most, if not almost all of these private nonprofit organizations are essentially involved in partisan politics, and are all about disrupting "civil society" to turn them against popular democratic movements.

While the proponents of the NED want you to think that their mandate is primarily empowering disenfranchised populations to political participation the opposite is true — this is well known to Washington DC insiders — that the NED exists to feed the Neurotic Pride of the US more than any stated objective to expand "democracy" but that lie has an undercurrent missed by many who think of themselves as politically progressive. Those progressive solidarity groups are kept engaged with "political struggle" while the NED/USAID objective is primarily to divert attention away from economic justice and poverty issues so that they can siphon off those resources to concentrate wealth for their patrons, deflecting inquiry to the "political corruption" of the poor communities for the blame.

If you eradicate poverty, the base communities will participate in governance.

The NED neocolonial agenda is Reaganomics on steroids. The Big Lie keeps the principal poverty reduction and healthcare activists out of electoral politics — convinced that they have to remain "balanced" and nonpartisan — while the NED, IRI and USAID trample over both the political and "neutral" human rights groups. The advocates allow themselves to be hobbled with the parasitic posturing of "technical assistance" in order to retain their standing and credentials.

When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint.
When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist.

~Dom Helder Câmara

The Ghosts of the NED are spooking up the World and — are likely — drawing up plans to "sell bonds" to capitalize their extortionate agenda. Political subversion is rather expensive and their growing budget — from the US Treasury — will not be enough to feed their avarice. When will the members of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) and the Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC) wake up to curtailing the blatant subversion agenda and budget of the NED? When will the CBC and the CPC call for an investigation to this 21st Century sanction of the Iran-Contra schema that has been reanimated in Haiti?

Once again, Israel's Mossad has been implicated in brokering weapon shipments to meet NED objectives. The US Embassy in Haiti could, very well, be the most expensive US Embassy Compound in the world. See for yourself if it is easy to compile ALL of the "cost overruns" and extra considerations for this expensive project. Where is the budget investigation into this expenditus irregularis?

The US Intelligence Budget is $80 billion. The work of the NED was the work of US Intelligence Community before Ronald Reagan. US-funded "soft-side" operations have cost a lot to our own economic sustainability, eroded our credibility and have countermanded the rationale used to justify their existence; they are simply ineffective. On the other hand, "democracy enhancement" spending for Egypt was cut in half by Obama, recently, giving birth to a massive popular democracy movement in the region. Without the outside interference, Egyptians were able to advance their own vision of democracy by over 50 years. The new interim Egyptian democracy has been influential in unifying Hamas and Fatah in Palestine. The Agents of Change are in North Africa, not in Washington DC.

In short, if we need to cut spending on federal programs, best to start on the ones that are not working. If the Intelligence Community believes that "democracy enhancement" is vital to national security, then they should wrap it up into their own swollen budget instead of outsourcing it. Similarly, if the corporate intelligence cabal — which is regularly employed to sidestep Congressional oversight and federal accountability — wants to continue their global agenda they can make world governance a subsidy of their own privately-funded "Free Market." Which actually, it already is; only now we're capitalizing this ruse with our own national treasury while education and health care funding is starved.

Of course, with the promise of a real popular movement in North Africa and the Middle East, we're not allowed to play "The Glad Game" for too long. The Empire Machine has awoken from its nap and is actively trying to put The Bunny back in the box.

Libya sat between the Tunisia and Egypt; while most hacks assume that the NATO is simply being opportunistic about going in after Colonel Gaddafi and his grand kids so they can update the meaning of the Marines Hymn, the real objective is — more likely — to "disrupt, dismantle and defeat" the nascent popular movement from unifying in the North of Africa. The Africa Union (AU) is now even more suspicious about the motives of the developing U.S. Africa Command (Africom). The AU sent a delegation, early on, to meet with Libya and arrange for a ceasefire and talks. At the Lybia talks in Rome — just like They did in Haiti — Hillary shows up on the scene and "disrupts" jus cogen norms, usurping the AU. Brokering a deal to bring more death. When in Rome do as the Romans did…

Now with the incessant NATO bombing and a sudden influx of cash to dissuade democracy movement leaders, the USA's Foreign Policy is back is on its familiar footing.

"… chickens come home to roost."

In this case, the domesticated bird serving the trope is duck or geese. La Gavage is the French inspired torture of force-feeding the bird to induce a pathologically fat liver (foie gras), so much favored by "international community" gluttons like the NED-agenda apologist Anthony Bourdain — who recently enhanced the INSCOM TV-lineup with an episode on Haiti featuring boutiquey pro-military apologist Sean Penn (who acquired a new set of "advisors" during the filming of "Fair Game").

The Haiti "No Reservations" episode was typical Bourdain/Agency fare; getting a few things right — to establish "humanitarian" credibility — but ultimately, missing the point. It was no surprise that they intentionally scrubbed any mention of Aristide — which occurred during filming frequently — even though Martelly's mishpokhe, Richard Morse, was launching into his usual anti-Aristide narrative during his segment. Bourdain keeps up the same Agency-excreted offal as he tramples through Nicaragua, Cambodia and Vietnam.

One can get lost in the metaphor of La Gavage but, more and more, this presidential election in Haiti was similarly force-fed to the country by the Obama Administration and the Clinton Dynasty. La Gavage 2011 produced the IRI's "October Surprise," President Michel Martelly, when the Obama "selection" was Mirlande Manigat. Now that the president-elect is Mr. Martelly, he's well aware of "who brung him to the Dance." Much of his own brand of "Change" seems to reflect the will of the USA's desire to have an expanded client state. It's quite incredible that a "patriotic" presidential hopeful would propose to merge with a neighboring country as part of his presidential platform, but that is exactly what the president-elect did.

Just as ominous for the population — but sure to please the Neocolonialists — is his other proposal to undo Aristide-era changes. It's the same old saw: Martelly want's bring back his old cronies, The Haitian Military, IRI will divert money intended to reduce poverty to their own cronies who will outfit the death-squad peacekeepers — pseudologia fantastica!

The exclusion of the Majority

Since the US-sponsored Coup d'État of February 29th 2004, Haitians have not seen a fair election. The Fanmi Lavalas political organization — representing the majority of Haiti's electorate — has been excluded from participation in the electoral and political process. In the odium polemic for this injustice, the People of Haiti have taken to referring to Haiti's elections as a "Selection" in place of the word "election." One point that they are trying to make — which is more than obvious to the average Haitian — is that the office holders aren't elected by Haitians, but selected by the US Embassy.

Why we are quite capable of going back to 1983 and can show much of the USA's Democracy Enchantment program in Haiti, what is most relevant to this article is the last two election cycles — primaries and run-offs. After five years of oppression, Coup governance, deadly political brutality and betrayal; the core of Fanmi Lavalas political organization maintained its key leadership, vision and support. The storm had passed but not the treachery. In 2009 Fanmi Lavalas was ready to fairly participate in Haiti's electoral process.

The record is fairly well established:

Haiti's Senate elections for 12 seats was scheduled after President Rene Preval was inaugurated in May of 2006 went through many fits and starts and was scheduled for March of 2008.
On August 12, 2007 — soon after he announced that he intended to run for the Senate — Lovinsky Pierre Antoine was kidnapped near his home in Delmas and was "disappeared." He has not been heard from since and the government has not been active in any real investigation into the disappearance.
The Senate elections were postponed until 2009. In time for the filing deadline Fanmi Lavalas announced that it would present 12 candidates for all open seats the Senatorial elections.
February 5, 2009 Hillary Clinton met with President Preval in Washington DC the very next day Haiti's Provisional Electoral Council (CEP) announced that ALL Fanmi Lavalas candidates would be disqualified. Fanmi Lavalas sues the CEP.
Judge Jean-Claude Douyon rules on March 9, 2009 that the political rights of Fanmi Lavalas were violated and the CEP could not disqualify the Fanmi Lavalas candidates from the April 19 elections. He ordered their reintegration back into the election provided each candidate met legal standards. On April 3rd, Judge Douyon was removed from the court.
Bill Clinton and Ban Ki-Moon visit Haiti, there were initial plans to meet with Fanmi Lavalas — with the addition of Jimmy Carter — on March 4th but that meeting "evaporated." When Clinton and Moon arrived later, Fanmi Lavalas tries to meet them but were rebuffed.
On April 16 Hillary Clinton flies to Haiti to show US support. The US put $17 million into the primary election, but Fanmi Lavals calls for "Operation Closed Doors, Empty Streets" a general boycott of the April 19 election. Less than 5% of the electorate participate in the sham elections.
Fanmi Lavalas' Permanent Mobilization Committee organizes demonstrations, demanding that the Senatorial elections be annulled until November when wider Parliamentary elections will be held.
Fanmi Lavalas calls for a boycott of the run-off June elections. June 19 saw less than 2% of the electorate participating.
In 2009 the Parliamentary elections scheduled for November are delayed to March of 2010 and in November the CEP, once again excludes Fanmi Lavalas from participation for the election that would decide over one third of the Parliament to the protest of many Haiti supporters.
The Earthquake of January 12, 2010 causes another delay and it is decided that the Parliamentary election will be combined into the Presidential race in November of 2010. Many in the "International Community" call for the CEP to be disbanded.
In the Summer of 2010 the corporate press narrative to pump up the visibility profile of Neo-Duvalierist presidential candidate, Mirlande Manigat, begins. Most of the airtime is taken up by conjecture and entertainment about Rap music celebrity Wyclef Jean's suitability as a president that can't speak Kreyol.
In November of 2010, even though Fanmi Lavalas has announced that it would not participate in the elections and would not be supporting any presidential candidate, Fanmi Lavalas does not call for a boycott.
Before the polls open on Sunday, November 28, it's obvious that the illegitimate election will see polling place disruption, unrest and fraud. Many names of potential voters can't be found on the voter lists, many polling places don't have ballots to hand out but their empty ballot boxes get stuffed anyways. Many polling places see fraud and irregularities on a massive scale. Before noon of election day, 12 of the 18 — including Michel Martelly and Mirlande Manigat — presidential candidates call a press conference to condemn the fraudulent elections and call for them to be annulled before any counting can be started.
Somehow the UN is able to know what the "results" will be — even before the polls are closed — and are able to convince Martelly and Manigat to pull their participation from the group of candidates calling for annulment.
At the main IDP relocation camp, Corail, over 75% of the residents were planning on voting for Jean-Henri Ceant, most had been able to change their voter registration with all of the assistance of USAID since Corial was a "model" camp — as they were trying to use Sean Penn to help them dismantle Lavalas neighborhoods to move the poorer populations into isolation. Over 5,000 of the residents showed up to vote but there were only 39 names on the approved voter list.
The US Embassy claimed that the election was a success and that the results should be honored regardless of the numerous irregularities.

That was La Gavage — Part I — of November 28, 2010. The preliminary result of untold millions of our tax dollars fed through the National Endowment of Democracy and shoved down the throats of the besieged People of Haiti as a string of fraudulent elections since the Coup d'État of February 29, 2004. The deadly USA agenda before the Earthquake is the same agenda since. While it is good that we are now calling for an assessment of our ineffective relief with Congresswoman Barbara Lee's "Assessing Progress in Haiti Act" (H.R. 1016), we could do much more for Haiti and the rest of the World if we simply dismantled the NED.

Share this story with your networks

| More

click button above