South Florida TV host named premier of Haiti

BY JACQUELINE CHARLES AND DAN DEVISE

jcharles@herald.com


PORT-AU-PRINCE -- A former Haitian foreign minister and popular South Florida television talk-show host was selected Tuesday to become Haiti's next prime minister.

Gerard Latortue, a critic of exiled President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, was chosen after two days of painstaking deliberations by a U.S.-backed ''council of sages'' to fill the power vacuum created Feb. 29 when Aristide resigned. Latortue will lead a transitional government that will pave the way for presidential elections early next year.

''I am very excited to be able to do something for my country to bring together all Haitians,'' Latortue said in a telephone interview with The Herald. ``It is time for us to forget our differences and come together for the country in this bicentennial year.''

Latortue, 69, was one of three finalists for prime minister nominated by a council charged with replacing the government of the exiled Aristide. The council grilled Latortue by telephone for 2 ½ hours Monday afternoon as he sat in his Boca Raton home.

more: http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/8148674.htm

One day we weren't going to do anything with Haiti, and the next day we've installed a new govt. Imagine doing all that without any prior planning! Wow, I'm impressed. :eyes:

Apparently, the Bushistas subscribed to the old adage:

The difficult we do today; the impossible takes a little longer

...with Haiti being "the difficult" and Iraq, the "impossible."

Perhaps Haiti was just a warm-up for PNAC, like when a virtuoso pianist plays a few scales or arpeggios prior to performing a difficult piece, or maybe PNACers needed to DO something according to plan since Iraq is not going at all well. Think about it: the PNACers first real attempt at world domination and they stub their toe on the first country. Must be a real morale downer.

Haiti must give them SOME raison d'être...

"The illegal we do immediately. The unconstitutional takes longerÓ? :shrug:

,...fully engaged in its investigation, I guess.

Oh, that's right. Cuba doesn't have oil.

has lots of ex-pats in FLORIDA that Bush woudl LOVE to score points with in time for the election. From reports I saw on CNN they aren't too happy with him right now because he hasn't been aggressive enough with Castro.

This didn't sit well with Bushco. The new Bush puppet will probably expel all the Cuban medical personnel.

A puppet government appoints a premier--whoopee! The Romans would be so proud.

sounds like someone making a joke

can't you see them laughing as they decided to call themselves sages.

Apparently someone decided that was too obviously stereotyping the Haitians as African primitives.

The last one that Caricom worked out, that Aristide had accepted but the 'opposition' rejected, used the term 'council of wise men' to describe a group that would help put together a reconciliation government of power sharing.

Now, I think the US media likes to use it, and capitalize it no less, to make the Haitians appear more tribal. There is NO official 'Council of Wise Men'. In it's current form, it's a relatively ad-hoc group of Haitian elite that the US hired on to cook up a new government illegally and extra-constitutionally.

since the moment they kidnapped Aristide.

What about the UN?
How is this being portrayed in the global media?

Not sure about others.

Do you have any relevant links?

You're the next Prime Minister on "The Coup's Tonight"!

...we'll subvert democracy."

"Haitians". Amazingly misleading, isn't it?

Right up there with "Americans elected George Bush". Americans on the Supreme Court, that is.