Inspiring report from Haiti: The power of song amid earthquake misery

Thanks to WLRN news staff for finding the wonderful recording of music and hope rising from the crowd of badly injured people after the earthquake in Haiti six months ago. Listen and be touched.


http://wlrnunderthesun.org/2010/07/after-the-quake-patients-and-healers/

Your blogger has heard this several times today and is grateful for public radio. Is there anything like this on our commercial broadcast media?

Kendrick Meek video'd a rescue in Haiti. Thanks to Miami Dade rescue team!

This just in. Though I'm a week late with this, it still moves me.



Kendrick Meek, now running for US Senator, represents District 17 in the US House, and has the largest number of Haitian people in any congressional district, I've heard.

What to do on Facebook: Be with the Little Haiti Cultural Center

Over on Facebook I'm suggesting that people become fans of the Little Haiti Cultural Center. Solidarity, you know. Plus it looks like a terrific new place.

The Clinton Bush Haiti Fund

Support the Earthquake Recovery Efforts in Haiti
The Clinton Bush Haiti Fund: http://clintonbushhaitifund.org/
On January 12, a magnitude 7.0 earthquake struck Haiti just outside the capital city of Port-au-Prince. The devastation – in lives lost, property destroyed, and families displaced – is immense.
At the request of President Obama, we are partnering to help the Haitian people reclaim their country and rebuild their lives.
Our immediate priority is to save lives. The critical needs in Haiti are great, but they are also simple: food, water, shelter, and first-aid supplies. The best way concerned citizens can help is to donate funds that will go directly to supplying these material needs.
Through the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund, we will work to provide immediate relief and long-term support to earthquake survivors. We will channel the collective goodwill around the globe to help the people of Haiti rebuild their cities, their neighborhoods, and their families.
We ask each of you to give what you can to help ensure the people of Haiti can build back stronger and better than ever.
Both of us have personally witnessed the tremendous generosity and goodwill of the American people and of our friends around the world to help in times of great need. There is no greater rallying cry for our common humanity than witnessing our neighbors in distress. And, like any good neighbor, we have an obligation and desire to come to their aid.
Thank you for taking the time to visit, and we hope you will donate to this worthwhile cause. The people of Haiti now need our assistance more than ever.
President William J. Clinton 
President George W. Bush

ABOUT THE FUND
The earthquake that rocked the coast of Haiti killed or injured a devastating number of people. Even more were left in need of aid, making this is one of the great humanitarian emergencies in the history of the Americas. In the aftermath of the disaster, President Barack Obama asked President Bill Clinton and President George W. Bush to raise funds for immediate relief and long-term recovery efforts to help those who are most in need of food, water, shelter, medical care, and support. In response, the two Presidents established the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund (CBHF) to identify and fulfill unmet needs in the region, foster economic opportunity, improve the quality of life of those affected over the long term, and assist the people of Haiti as they rebuild their lives and country. Presidents Clinton and Bush oversee the CBHF through their respective nonprofit organizations, the William J. Clinton Foundation and Communities Foundation of Texas. One hundred percent of the donations made to the Clinton Foundation go directly to relief efforts. Ninety-nine percent of the donations made to the Communities Foundation of Texas go directly to relief efforts.
You can contribute in any of three ways:
Web: visit our secure online donation page: https://re.clintonbushhaitifund.org/
Mobile Giving: Text the word "QUAKE" to 20222 to donate $10 to the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund, charged to your cell phone bill.
Mail: The Clinton Bush Haiti Fund 
c/o William J. Clinton Foundation 
Donations Department 
610 President Clinton Avenue 
Little Rock, AR 72201 
OR
The Clinton Bush Haiti Fund 
c/o Communities Foundation of Texas 
5500 Caruth Haven Lane 
Dallas, TX 75225

Haiti aid: More volunteers needed to handle relief supplies

The call is being issued even more loudly: More volunteers needed.

“This is the time to answer Dr. King’s call to service,” said Brad Schenck, field director for Organizing for America. He’s working out of a modest donated warehouse in Little Haiti where donated goods are collected from around Miami.

It’s at 7220 N. Miami Ave., and that’s where volunteers are needed.

In three hours I spent there Friday morning there were traffic jams of City of Miami pickups full of water, groceries, tons of rice, clothes and other donations that had been left at fire stations and elsewhere around the city.

Schenck expertly drove a fork-lift – “One of my secret talents,” he said – to move pallets of goods to where they will be taken for shipment to Haiti.

When? Hard to say immediately, but one of the volunteers was a pilot with a twin-engine plane he’s willing to lend to the delivery effort. Things are happening, and everyone is conscious of the dire conditions faced by millions in Haiti, as aid workers try to put vital goods in the pipeline.

This link takes you to the Miami Herald roundup of aid efforts in South Florida.

This short video shows a collection point at a Walmart on 163rd Street in North Miami Beach, as well as the central warehouse on the 7200 block of North Miami Avenue.



Please note my earlier short posts on the kind of goods that are high on the list of priorities now. That is, don’t send your old clothes – send fresh medical supplies, baby formula, water, big bags of rice. Canned goods are better kept for your own hurricane reserve. Money to help rebuild is a good idea.

Helping Haiti: OFA in action

Brad Schenk, left, of Organizing for America with Miami city workers at warehouse assembling relief supplies for Haiti on Friday.

Haiti in Miami Beach -- party time at Tap Tap

The Haitian restaurant Tap Tap is a gem in South Beach, and a resource for Democratic campaigners -- not only during the Obama campaign but continuing. A good place to have a little meeting or bigger ones. And Friday night it was party time for the restaurant's 15th birthday, coinciding roughly with the big Haitian holidays of Brav Gede -- corresponding to All Souls Day and All Saints Day, if I got it right. If not, try me again anytime. Wow, was the music loud and good! For that we thank Manno Charlemagne and the band, and for the party thanks to Gary the boss.

Sen. Bill Nelson still waffling on health care

We’re getting through to him, at least in the sense that he has heard the phones ringing off the hook. Sen. Bill Nelson, whose former job as state insurance commissioner makes us suspect him of being too close to the insurance business (definitely not a problem in his earlier career as astronaut), is listed as “unknown” on this chart at Open Left. Dear me, unknown is further from the goal than the maybes.

Come on, Senator. We who put you in office are in a big majority for strong health care reform with a strong public option. Why waffle? We like leaders better than those who tinker at the edge.

Here’s what’s up on his Twitter page, dated June 18.

Lotta folks asking me about health-care reform. We really need it. I'm working on it. But we need a viable plan for how to pay for it.4:43 PM Jun 18th from web