It was Robin over at Overcoming Bias that rubbed me the wrong way about confirmation bias a year or so ago. It is now only in the context of Popper and Taleb that I can see how my style of presentation may disturb academic thinkers. You see, I am constantly putting falsifiable statements out there in a provocative fashion. It is my way of being Socratic. I am just as happy with a 'no' as a 'yes' so long as I can understand the POV of the person disagreeing. It is in this way that I am epistemologically modest - and I use my Cobbian attitude as a lightning rod. I draw people to disagree or agree tangentially.
I make these qualifications because I probably believe a great number of falsifiable things about Haiti, but that given the limited amount of good information available in blogs, there is no good way to falsify them. And so in being provocative with a bold set of statements which may exhibit confirmation bias, I sound like I'm taking a hostile party line. In fact, I'm trying to find out who screwed up so that certain things went wrong in such a way that someone whom I would find responsible would never screw up.
What I believe about Haiti is that its legacy as a violent and romanticized revolutionary ex-slave colony is so deeply embedded in its form of government that it will take enormous changes for its political culture to align itself with Western norms.
I believe that Haiti's agriculture is ruined, and that they basically don't have any natural resources worthy of supporting an export economy. So that basically leaves them with only human capital, and that's basically ruined in the aftermath of the quake. So there's basically one way out for Haiti and that is tourism. Quite frankly I'm not sure if the law of the land is sufficient to support a bank haven, but with some work, that might be possible. Except that it would still take many years to make that happen.
I've often considered the idea of a making certain areas a US Protectorate, and as a failed state in our Hemisphere, that might not be a bad idea for Haiti. The problem is, of course, that most upper middle class Americans aren't very keen on imperial service. So it's not likely that we're going to get many Americans interested in running things down that way. Haitian Americans probably would, but on the whole, the only real light at the end of the tunnel I see would be gentrification.
But let me ask you. Would you buy a dirt cheap timeshare in Haiti? Hmm. I didn't think so.
So I believe that Haiti is not going to change until the Caribbean on the whole changes. That's not going to happen until Cuba changes hands and Americans start spending money there. It could happen in our lifetimes, but I wouldn't hold my breath.
I believe that Aristide was not 'kidnapped' by American forces and for the same simple reason that nobody is in any great hurry to move there. There is nothing in Haiti that Americans care about, and so there is nothing political to gain by doing dirt to the Haitian government. There would be great embarrassment, however, if we stood by while Aristide was assassinated by an immanent coup. I've seen all sorts of conspiracy theories about this around the net, well three or four, and I'm not inclined to believe any of them, considering that Aristide was in quick and direct contact with black American politicians Maxine Waters and Charlie Rangel back in March of 2004.
I wonder. Now that I think about it. How bad it must be for Haiti considering that I don't even think they can play in the drug trade.
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