Hti: Patterson heeds Randall Robinson's plea for Aristide

Next week, Aristide and his wife will head to Jamaica. It's astonishing that PM Patterson is going to allow Aristide into Jamaica to stay for at least 10 weeks. Does PM Patterson wish to help Aristide foster civil war in Haiti? One suspects that Aristide seeks to return to the Caribbean because his hosts in Bangui will no longer abide by his lies. His Caricom brethren are much more reckless and anti-American than the government of Bangui, and, in their much expressed reverence for constitutional process and the rule of law, are willing to entertain a failed dictator. If Aristide says he left Haiti to avoid bloodshed, what does he intend to achieve by returning? How is Haiti's best interests to be served by Aristide's return?

Since Caricom members are such pro-Aristide advocates, will they send their troops into Haiti with Aristide in order to protect him from his own countrymen? This is highly unlikely, especially since Caricom was so loath to put troops on the ground until after the civil strife had ended. Aristide's return to Haiti is guaranteed to bring about a renewal of the open warfar. This means that many Haitians will die so that Aristide's vanity might be assuaged. The sad thing is that Caricom, in a fit of pique over the U.S.'s failure to contact Caricom to talk when the crisis became worse, will attempt to stick mud in the U.S.'s eye just to get its own back. It's an absurd and dangerous game that Caricom is playing. The only one who will pay the price is the unfortunate Haitians themselves.