Earthquakes and Idiots

This posting is about the earthquake in Haiti. You might be wondering how a posting featuring a picture of Hollywood superstar Danny Glover and Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez could possibly be related to the largest tragedy currently on the world stage.

In a word: Stupidity. Both of these guys had unbelievably silly things to say about the cause of the earthquake.

First, let's review Mr. Glover's brilliant comments. Here's Glover's quote taken from a commentary piece on Fox News' website:

• "And I hope we seize this particular moment because the threat of what happens in Haiti is the threat that can happen anywhere in the Caribbean to these island nations, you know? They're all in peril because of global warming; they're all in peril because of climate change. When we see what we did at the climate summit in Copenhagen, this is the response, this is what happens, you know what I'm saying? But we have to act now."

If you can cut through the rambling, quasi-retarded language he used, then you come to the conclusion that he thinks that global warming caused the earthquake. Huh? This from a grown man?

There are two interpretations of this statement that come quickly to my mind, both of which are stupefying.

1. The warming of the atmosphere by a couple degrees has caused the movement of the tectonic plates to change in their behavior. Leaving the debate about climate change aside, I'm having a hard time with this one.

-OR-

2. The Earthquake was a divine act of retribution to pay us back for our bad behavior at Copenhagen. In other words, God decided the best way to punish the polluting, industrialized portions of Earth's population was to destroy the capital city of the poorest, most benighted country in the Western Hemisphere. It's the Angry Old-Testament style wrath, but with bad aim.

Why not just come out and blame America for the Earthquake?

Well, that's exactly what Hugo Chavez did. Fox News, once again, carried the story (read here). Yes folks, the US has an Earthquake Weapon. The earthquake was used a pretext to occupy Haiti. As if we didn't have enough money-pits already.

How do you respond to something like this? Incidentally, the only other major news source I observed to report on Chavez's comments was a state-owned Iranian English-language Press TV (read here). I guess Rupert Murdoch and Ahmadinejad have similar news agendas.

And if you wanted a less crazy, more erudite reason to blame the US for the debacle in Haiti, then check out this article by a Swedish intellectual from Al-Jazeera English. Sigh... Can we do nothing right?

As a citizen of the country who is by FAR contributing the most to the rebuilding of that poor shattered country, I'm a little annoyed with so many fingers pointing blame at us.


*Cartoon taken from cagle.com.