Imperialism
United States
Haiti
Fig. 1. “US Marine Corps (USMC) Marines, Lima Company, 3rd Battalion (BN), 8th Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Division (Mar DIV), patrol through the Bel Air area of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, after distributing donated school supplies to students in a Port-au-Prince, Haiti, school. This effort is known as “Operation Homework,” which is part of Operation SECURE TOMORROW.” Kevin McCall, April 14, 2004, via Wikimedia Commons, public domain.
I have a problem with situations like Haiti, for which I’ve now set up a new page. This is a country that has been cursed since it declared independence from the French empire. The disasters are both natural and human in origin. The problems seem intractable, in part because somehow every outsider intervening in the country discounts the people who actually live there.[1] That makes the problem larger than I can possibly capture on the page I’ve now created and one I’m reluctant to wade into because to do so—and to do so properly—is a larger project than I can presently take on.
Adam Taylor’s piece captures a lot of the history,[2] but there’s more, and what I’ve pieced together so far barely, if at all, scratches the surface.
Adam Taylor, “The history of foreign intervention in Haiti is ugly,” Washington Post, March 7, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com//world/2024/03/07/haiti-foreign-intervention-history-peacekeeper/
Neoliberalism
Banking
Commercial real estate
Fig. 1. The confluence of the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers, with the “Golden Triangle” and downtown Pittsburgh. Photograph by author, October 15, 2023.
Mark Belko, “As foreclosure risks rise, nearly half of Downtown Pittsburgh office space could be empty in 4 years, report shows,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, March 7, 2024, https://www.post-gazette.com/business/development/2024/03/06/pittsburgh-downtown-council-bobby-wilson-office-buildings-conversions-gulf-tower/stories/202403060118
Illiberalism
Gilead
Donald Trump
Coup attempt
Fig. 1. Cartoon by Ben Jennings, January 24, 2024, via the Guardian,[3] fair use.
The lead of any story about the decision in Trump v. Anderson should be that the Court has unanimously ruled that an insurrectionist who attempted to overthrow a presidential election will remain on the presidential ballot. As far as it goes, that statement is accurate. But the brazenness with which the majority exercised its power to reach a decision in flagrant contradiction of the Constitution’s plain meaning has deeper significance. It offers final proof, if any more were needed, that textualism and originalism, the doctrines on which conservatives have long based their judicial philosophy, are nothing but instruments of right-wing activism to produce prearranged outcomes. On Monday, the Court severely weakened an essential constitutional barrier to violent despotism that had been erected in the aftermath of the Civil War. That the minority decided to issue what might be called a dissenting concurrence—quickly agreeing on a particular point while demolishing the majority’s main argument—only underscores how corrupt the Court’s majority has become.[4]
Ann E. Marimow, “Supreme Court keeps Trump on ballot, rejects Colorado voter challenge,” Washington Post, March 4, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/03/04/supreme-court-trump-ballot-decision/
George T. Conway, III, “The Court’s Colorado Decision Wasn’t About the Law,” Atlantic, March 5, 2024, https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2024/03/supreme-court-colorado-opinion-trump-disqualify/677646/
Jennifer Rubin, “The Supreme Court did Trump no favors. He’ll be facing a fall trial,” Washington Post, March 5, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/03/05/supreme-court-timing-trump-trial/
Matt Ford, “Everybody Hates the Supreme Court’s Disqualification Ruling,” New Republic, March 6, 2024, https://newrepublic.com/article/179576/supreme-court-disqualification-ruling-criticism
Sean Wilentz, “The Constitution Turned Upside Down,” New York Review of Books, March 6, 2024, https://www.nybooks.com/online/2024/03/06/the-constitution-turned-upside-down/
- [1]Adam Taylor, “The history of foreign intervention in Haiti is ugly,” Washington Post, March 7, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com//world/2024/03/07/haiti-foreign-intervention-history-peacekeeper/↩
- [2]Adam Taylor, “The history of foreign intervention in Haiti is ugly,” Washington Post, March 7, 2024, https://www.washingtonpost.com//world/2024/03/07/haiti-foreign-intervention-history-peacekeeper/↩
- [3]Ben Jennings, “Ben Jennings on Donald Trump’s progress along the Republican nomination trail – cartoon,” Guardian, January 24, 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/picture/2024/jan/24/ben-jennings-on-donald-trumps-progress-along-the-republican-nomination-trail-cartoon↩
- [4]Sean Wilentz, “The Constitution Turned Upside Down,” New York Review of Books, March 6, 2024, https://www.nybooks.com/online/2024/03/06/the-constitution-turned-upside-down/↩