Posted on 01/19/2011 5:24:32 AM PST by JoeProBono
It seems that Jean-Claude (Baby Doc) Duvalier got it into his head that Haiti would welcome him home and - who knows? - summon him to lead the country in its hour of need, much as the Roman Senate once prevailed on Cincinnatus to come back from retirement to fight the barbarians.
You want delusional, egomaniacal craziness? The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders will have to be expanded with an entry for a syndrome to be known as Duvalierism.
This thug reigned over Haiti for a brutal decade and a half, from 1971 to 1986, after inheriting the presidency from his father, Francois (Papa Doc) Duvalier. His crimes are so heinous, they almost resist cataloguing.
Among them are murder, torture and plunder of the public treasury. He lived in the splendor of a king, his lifestyle financed in part by the sale of drugs and, most horrifically, human body parts.
After being overthrown in a popular uprising, Duvalier fled to France
..he ran out of money, heard there was a bundle being cut up amongst thieves, and only thought he was eligible....
He’s probably the best hope that country has. The Haitians might hold off on prosecuting him.
As opposed to the thug the U.S. supported -- that deranged, defrocked priest, Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
The fact is that his father was the tyrant and that he took over at the age of 19, but was really a puppet of his fathers' older and more experienced generals as well as of his well-connected wife and father-in-law.
It was his father-in-law who got rich selling the body parts and the drugs, for example.
It's rather ridiculous to believe that a teenager was running Haiti with an iron fist and ordering around a crew of hardened military advisors who had been running their own private army since before he was born.
What's particularly telling is that he has been living in a small apartment by himself since 1993, when his wife left him and took all the money that she and her family had looted from Haiti with her.
I think he is terminally ill and returned home to die
He looks ill
The voodoo will fix him right up.
Almost sounds like we're talking about Hamid Karzai, here. BTW... the Chinese have an active human body parts trade happening as well.
IMHO, he had already paid off the judiciary and political/ gangster power players to make sure he could buy an acquittal,
he is there to go through a mock trial and be found not guilty...
I know and am in contact with Haitians in Haiti who were glad to see him return.
True. Gotta peel that onion skin back to get a clearer picture. Baby Doc, while no angel, was slowly trying to tamp down corruption and oppression. If I remember correctly, was it not during his regime that a free press came into being?
As for the Ton Tons Macoutes, Baby Doc had begun the process of reigning them in by the early 1980s. In a 4th-world hellhole like Haiti, leaders don't suddenly and precipitously expunge organizations like that... not if they wish to see the next day.
Not making excuses for the man... but there is more than meets the eye about the younger Duvalier.
Exactly. He is going to use the trial to make his campaign speech.
Not making excuses for the man... but there is more than meets the eye about the younger Duvalier.
As there usually is in life.
He smells money and came back for his share...
The Haitians I know in this country are totally preoccupied with politics. Not that it’s done their country any good.
...its always about the money...there is so much being thrown at Haiti these days with virtually NONE going to the people..
...it is being stolen right before everyone's eyes...and a desperate baby doc figures he can get some of it and slink back to France.
...he needs to be in the dankest Haiti prison for the rest of his miserable life...not even dead, he needs to have some time for reflection and assessment of his life choices.
If some are correct that Baby Doc is terminally ill, when he dies his voodoo followers will bring him back as a zombie to reign as President For Life. What could possibly go wrong?
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