Letter to the Editor:

On September 9, at the Dallas, TX mid-term Republican convention, our president pledged to send every American adult a check for $5,000 if voting retains MAGA control of both houses of Congress. (I did the math: $5,000 per U.S. adult comes to $1,384,000,000.) Memories of a challenging yet rich experience working in Haiti in the 80s from years ago came flooding back. There are similarities, both comical and appalling, between the U.S. and that island dictatorship.

In 1985, my wife Katherine took a job with a college that sends students to a developing country for a Study Service Trimester. As her spouse, I was hired as support. We would lead 24 American students in Haiti. We found host families, scheduled experts to teach Haitian language, history, politics, and culture (art, music, religion, sport), for the first half of the trimester, and then we placed students in service placements (clinics, schools, re-forestation projects) for the second half. The program aimed to broaden students’ perception of our own country’s role and its obligations to the world. We were eager for a foreign adventure; we arrived in July, 1985.

Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier, was named Haiti’s president-for-life at 19, a successor to his father, Francois “Papa Doc” Duvalier. Papa Doc had been cruel and repressive, torturing and murdering his perceived opponents. Baby Doc, though not as wickedly intelligent as his father, still maintained a rule allowing no dissent. He and his family lived in obscene luxury in the presidential palace while his people labored and starved.

Hoping to legitimize his weak and corrupt office, Baby Doc had declared a presidential referendum in July of 1985. We witnessed his campaign from our house in Petionville, a suburb of Port-au-Prince. His black limousine with heavily tinted windows sped through the streets. A backseat window was rolled down. We could see only a presidential arm, clothed in a dark suit sleeve and white shirt cuff, scattering paper money (Haitian gourdes) to the impoverished Haitians hoping to catch some currency.

Georges, our employee, was disappointed. He’d only snagged one gourde, then worth about 20 cents. He complained about what a pittance that was because in the last presidential election, Baby Doc had tossed him three gourdes. Katherine and I laughed, remarking that Haitian politicians were much more efficient than our American ones; the bribes and payoffs came directly and openly.

A polling place was directly across the street from our house. On referendum day, the usually bustling streets were empty because Haitians did not want to be snatched up and forced to vote. We witnessed truckloads of union workers being driven to the polls; we were told they were taken to several polling places, repeatedly registering support for Baby Doc. At the polls, armed paramilitary monitored whether voters chose a “yes” or “no” ballot.

The next day we listened to “The Voice of America” which reported that U.S. Ambassador Clayton McManaway had publicly praised the referendum as a “progressive step.”  Baby Doc, president for life, the Haitian government claimed, had won a nearly unanimous 99.9% approval rate. At last, the following February, a popular uprising drove the 33-year-old despot into exile.  

To me, no limousine with darkened windows can hide the similarities between our would-be American president-for-life today and the disgraced Baby Doc then.

Russell Binkley
Haywood County