posted on March 2, 2004 10:36:29 AM new
I think this WSJ op-ed summed Kerry's position up pretty well:
begin:
The Tardy, French-Looking Massachusetts Democrat . . .
Kerry was also asked about the situation in Haiti, where the Bush administration ended a crisis yesterday by forcing the resignation of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who illegitimately held on to power after his elected term ended.
Here's the exchange between Kerry and Dan Rather:
Rather: Senator Kerry, President Bush has made it clear that the United States will be part of an international force going to Haiti. You've been critical of that action. Tell me what your beef is with what the president is doing.
Kerry: He's late, as usual. This president always makes decisions late after things have happened that could have been different had the president made a different decision earlier.
Bumiller: Senator Kerry, what would you have done in this situation?
Kerry: Well, first of all, I never would have allowed it to get out of control the way it did.
The New York Daily News reports that Kerry told the paper's editorial board, "I would intervene with the international community, and absent an international force, I'd do it unilaterally." This is in contrast to the Bush administration's multilateral approach; last night the U.N. Security Council unanimously approved Resolution 1529, authorizing an international force, including Americans and Frenchmen, to keep the peace in Haiti.
Now, this is the same John Kerry who has spent the past year carping about President Bush's "failed diplomacy" and "rush to war" in Iraq. Now suddenly in Haiti he's Mr. Unilateral Pre-emption.
Or is he? We searched Kerry's campaign Web site for statements on Haiti. There were 32 hits, most of which were false positives (Haiti is listed in a pull-down "country" menu on forms for contributing or subscribing).
One was to an article from The Nation that cites something Kerry said about Haiti in the 1980s. Here's a complete list of Kerry's own statements about Haiti that appear on his Web site:
A Dec. 16, 2003, foreign-policy speech whose sole mention of Haiti was in this sentence: "And from Haiti to Bosnia, Bill Clinton placed America's might on the side of America's values while he expanded our circle of allies at the same time."
An undated AIDS plan that observes, "Programs in Haiti demonstrate that individuals from the community who are trained to recognize the symptoms of AIDS, TB, and malaria, can help support patients and administer drugs." (You have to click on "U.S. Leadership in the Battle Against HIV/AIDS" to see the Haiti reference.)
A Feb. 24, 2004, statement faulting the Bush administration: "The Administration has now finally realized that it must work multilaterally to broker a power sharing agreement between the parties--the only question is why they didn't do this sooner."
A Feb. 26 statement calling on President Bush to appoint failed Democratic presidential candidate Bob Graham as a "special envoy" to Haiti.
Kerry claims that if he were president, he never would have let things get to this point, yet he had nothing to say about the crisis in Haiti--which, as CBS News notes, dates back at least to 2000, when Clinton was president and Aristide stole an election--until a mere five days before President Bush sent in the Marines.
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Yep that's Kerry....wouldn't go in alone [ without the UN]...would go in alone.
posted on March 2, 2004 10:37:57 AM new
PEEEEEWWWW, What rotten garbage was posted.
(above reamons)
Hey reamon still no sources, eh.
And I thought that ole billy was his friend.
Report: Aid cutoff leaves Haiti faltering
September 19, 2000
Web posted at: 1:57 PM EDT (1757 GMT)
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Congressional investigators said Tuesday Haiti's government is largely to blame for a cutoff after $97 million in U.S. police and judicial aid has left that Caribbean country with an ineffective system of justice.
"Haiti's judicial system is exceedingly weak and subject to manipulation," said Rep. Benjamin Gilman, International Relations Committee chairman at a hearing.
posted on March 2, 2004 12:46:35 PM new
I know Haiti is very rich in some essential oils. Bergamont, Cassia, etc. I temped for an importer and I remember they imported some of these oils from Haiti. Some were thousands of dollars a half ounce back in the 80ties. I forget which ones were the most expensive ones, though, but they were very sought after as they were supposedly the purest form they came in.
