On the Rachel Maddow show last night, the Haitian ambassador to the U.S. made a startling statement about the connection between the Haitian Revolution and the sale of the Louisiana Territory to the U.S.  Not knowing that Pat Robertson had mumbled something about Haiti’s “deal with the devil” earlier in the day, I was taken aback by the ambassador’s angry rebuttal.   When Rachel apologized to the ambassador for the “odious” comments made by some Americans, I realized something nasty was going on.  I figured out what had happened later in the evening.

The polite thing to call Pat Robertson is senile. Given my utter contempt for those who use religion to build walls of hatred between groups of people, I could come up with some more descriptive words than senile.  But, instead, I went online to learn more about the Haitian Revolution looking for some decision or event that could be construed as a “pact with the devil.”  

The Haitian Revolution (1791-1804) is the period of violent conflict in the French colony of Saint-Domingue, leading to the elimination of slavery and the establishment of Haiti as the first republic ruled by blacks. Although hundreds of rebellions occurred during the slave era, only the revolt on Saint-Domingue, beginning in 1791, was successful in permanently abolishing slavery. The Haitian Revolution is the only successful slave revolt in human history, [1] and, as such, is regarded as a defining moment in the history of Africans in the new world.

Conditions were so horrible for slaves on the island that the birth rate did not keep up with the death rate which meant bringing in a continual supply of Africans to work the sugar cane fields.  Anyone who has visited tropical countries can imagine how inhumane the life of these innocent people must have been.

Small groups of slaves who could escape into wooded areas combined to raid plantations in an attempt to cut into French profits.

Although the numbers in these bands grew large (sometimes into the thousands), they generally lacked the leadership and strategy to accomplish large-scale objectives. The first effective leader to emerge was the charismatic François Mackandal, who succeeded in unifying the black resistance.

Mackandal was captured by the French and burned at the stake in 1758.  Other captured black leaders were tortured to death.

Fast forward to the French Revolution era.  Napoleon was beginning to question whether his holdings in the Western Hemisphere were worth the cost in blood and treasure.  His war with Great Britain being his top priority, he sold off his territories in Canada and the United States.

So the Haitian ambassador was right last night on the Rachel Maddow show when he linked the rebellions by Haitian slaves and the incredibly cheap deal America got by purchasing the Louisiana Territory from the French.

I certainly didn’t find anything in this story that could be called a “pact with the devil.”  Maybe Robertson will expand on his theory today or sometime soon.  Meanwhile, I’m afraid the viewers of his TV show will believe him and use his nonsense as one more confirmation of their racist view of Haiti and its people.  Quel dommage.

As Michael Bersin’s last posting points out, Ike Skelton refuses to be drawn into the game of He’s a hateful extremist/She’s a hateful extremist.  Skelton is trying to be a grownup, trying to avoid tit for tat childishness.  Good for him.  I guess.

Except that, much as yhe progressive community desires such adult behavior, it’s difficult for us to contain our outrage when MoveOn gets slapped in the face by our own people. 

Our adult patience has worn as thin as wet tissue because we know that if Congress started censuring Rush for his phony soldiers comment or Rep. Peter Stark (D-CA) for saying that our troops have been sent to Iraq for the president’s amusement, it wouldn’t be a matter of tit for tat.  If all the provocative statements from both sides were brought into the accounting, it would be tit for tat tat tat tat tat tat tat tat tat tat tat tat…. 

William Rivers Pitt took the trouble to list some of the right’s most egregious “tats”.  Here’s a sampling:

“I tell people don’t kill all the liberals. Leave enough so we can have two on every campus – living fossils – so we will never forget what these people stood for.”

  – Rush Limbaugh, Denver Post, 12-29-95

“I would warn Orlando that you’re right in the way of some serious hurricanes, and I don’t think I’d be waving those flags in God’s face if I were you. This is not a message of hate; this is a message of redemption. But a condition like this will bring about the destruction of your nation. It’ll bring about terrorist bombs; it’ll bring earthquakes, tornadoes and possibly a meteor.”

  – Pat Robertson, speaking of organizers putting rainbow flags up around Orlando to support sexual diversity, Washington Post, 06-10-98. For the record, Orlando remains undestroyed by meteors.

“Environmentalists are a socialist group of individuals that are the tool of the Democrat Party. I’m proud to say that they are my enemy. They are not Americans, never have been Americans, never will be Americans.”

  – Rep. Don Young (R-AK), Alaska Public Radio, 08-19-96

  “Get rid of the guy. Impeach him, censure him, assassinate him.”

  – Rep. James Hansen (R-UT), talking about President Clinton, as reported by journalist Steve Miner of KSUB radio who overheard his conversation, 11-01-98

  “We’re going to keep building the party until we’re hunting Democrats with dogs.”

  – Senator Phil Gramm (R-TX), Mother Jones, 08-95

  “My only regret with Timothy McVeigh is he did not go to the New York Times building.”

  – Ann Coulter, New York Observer, 08-26-02

  “Chelsea is a Clinton. She bears the taint; and though not prosecutable in law, in custom and nature the taint cannot be ignored. All the great despotisms of the past – I’m not arguing for despotism as a principle, but they sure knew how to deal with potential trouble – recognized that the families of objectionable citizens were a continuing threat. In Stalin’s penal code it was a crime to be the wife or child of an ‘enemy of the people.’ The Nazis used the same principle, which they called Sippenhaft, ‘clan liability.’ In Imperial China, enemies of the state were punished ‘to the ninth degree’: that is, everyone in the offender’s own generation would be killed and everyone related via four generations up, to the great-great-grandparents, and four generations down, to the great-great-grandchildren, would also be killed.”

  – John Derbyshire, National Review, 02-15-01

  “I know this is painful for the ladies to hear, but if you get married, you have accepted the headship of a man, your husband. Christ is the head of the household and the husband is the head of the wife, and that’s the way it is, period.”

  – Pat Robertson again, The 700 Club, 01-08-92

This is a sampling of Pitts’ list, and his list is itself only a sampling.  I’d feel easier about Ike acting like a grownup if he would acknowledge that Democrats may not be sweetness and light every minute of the day, but that’s because they’re provoked beyond all reason by the outrages that the media winks at from Limbaugh, Coulter, Robertson, and the whole host of right wing hatefuls.