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Arabica Robusta

Pambazuka - Will Obama end up like Toussaint L'Ouverture? - 0 views

www.pambazuka.org/...69653

us economy haiti pambazuka intervention

shared by Arabica Robusta on 19 Dec 10 - No Cached
  • Toussaint L'Ouverture was one such revolutionary in Haiti who joined the revolution in 1793 and agreed that the old system of slavery must end. But Toussaint believed in the plantation model and wanted to restore the economic relations of the plantation where the former enslaved were supposed to work for a planter class.
  • While Toussaint is still celebrated as a great revolutionary, the tragedy of the bloodletting and stagnation of Haitian society cannot be separated from the fact that as a political leader he could not grasp the reality that the mass of the people wanted a new form of economic organisation.
  • One estimate of this tax handout for the richest Americans during the eight years of the presidency shows that the wealthiest 400 Americans increased their wealth by over US$380 billion. 400 families increased their wealth by US$380 billion. This translates into an average of a US$1 billion giveaway to each of the richest 400 Americans. Senator Bernie Sanders clearly spelt out the fact that during this period of enriching the top income earners, the top Fortune 400 companies and families were further strengthened to dominate the political and intellectual spaces. It was revealed that the 400 richest Americans have accumulated US$1.27 trillion in wealth.
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  • There are those from the progressive camp who argued that Obama did not do enough to mobilise the ordinary working people against the Republican position of tax cuts for the rich. However, Obama had surrounded himself with the ideologues from Wall Street so that he (like Toussaint) believed that supporting the super rich would be the way to recharge the US economy.
  • David Cay Johnson, explained in great detail the numerous subsidies granted to the capitalists. What David Cay Johnson did not elaborate on was that on top of the subsidies for insurance companies, banks, oil companies, telecommunications and pharmaceutical corporations, there was the major subsidy of the trillions of dollars spent on the military to protect this class.
  • As Barack Obama is trapped by the ideal of liberal economic theory, a major question is whether he can save capitalism. Even a more urgent question is, as Toussaint attempted to take Haitians back to the plantations, would Obama’s attempt to save capitalism not take ordinary people back to the era of ultra-Reagonomics along with the cowboy-like military adventures? What is the moral justification for trying to save a moribund system by pleasing the financial oligarchs at the expense of the working people and planet earth? A serious concern is that if Obama displeases the people to please the capitalists, and yet is unable to satisfactorily please them, he may end up like Toussaint L’Ouverture.
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