Looting toothpaste and flour in Haiti

Do you know what I heard on NPR the other day from one of the reporters 'in the field' in Haiti? Now I listen to NPR as it's the closest radio station to BBC Radio 4 so I expect fair non-bias reporting; the reporter said there was 'looting' in Haiti. Looting????


What kind of things were they 'looting?” The answer is flour.


That to me is not looting or even stealing – that is survival.


What did the reporter think that the so called looters were going to do with the flour – put it into packets and sell it as cocaine??


Shame on you NPR.


On that part of the island bodies are piled high and the stink of those bodies is unbearable so one of the other things that is being taken is toothpaste which they smear under their noses to prevent them from smelling the flesh of the decaying bodies.


Looting???


Of course there are criminals who live in Haiti just as there are criminals here and the criminals in the prisons in Haiti have, by some accounts, escaped from the damaged and demolished prisons – a lot of them killed too, I presume.


But why are some people so quick to look for the bad things; people like Rush Limbaugh for example?


Why does an arsehole like Rush Limbaugh say 'We have already contributed to Haiti – it's called US Income Tax'?


Answer me that – anybody! How can he be so evil?


The day after the earthquake people were coming up to reporters and journalists and asking for money because they were hungry; they wanted to join a queue where somebody was selling food.


Selling food in an emergency? Unbelievable.


Lots of people at the moment are leaving Port au Prince by buses as they are fed up of waiting for the rescuers to arrive and it is reported that the buses have doubled the fares - oh dear.


Now I don't want to come across here as mister angry from the comforts of my apartment in Los Angeles, as there is a lot of good being done to rescue people in Haiti, and if I was religious I would call some of the rescues miraculous, but from what I see and hear everything is arriving there too late.


The earthquake was six days ago and there are nurses who volunteered here in Los Angeles to go and the last I heard they were waiting for permission to go to Haiti; there may be a chance that they have to help from a ship in the bay.


That may be the best place for hospitalisation but to actually have to ask permission in the time of an emergency is ridiculous and who is going to get the victims – six days after the emergency and counting – to the ship?


I also detect, as well as in the news coverage, competition between the various countries and aid agencies to help; in fact a spokesman from France has accused the USA of actually occupying Haiti.


Just a short post for today – I'm off to Philippe's for lunch in down town LA – it's raining heavily so it will be an adventure.