{"id":106836,"date":"2018-02-26T12:00:26","date_gmt":"2018-02-26T12:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=106836"},"modified":"2018-02-25T04:48:38","modified_gmt":"2018-02-25T04:48:38","slug":"disaster-capitalism-in-puerto-rico","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2018\/02\/disaster-capitalism-in-puerto-rico\/","title":{"rendered":"Disaster Capitalism in Puerto Rico"},"content":{"rendered":"

21 Feb 2018 – <\/em>The pattern is familiar, corporate predators profiting from natural and other disasters.<\/p>\n

Following Hurricane Katrina in 2005, upscale condos and other high-profit projects replaced affected communities, mostly at the expense of the city\u2019s most disadvantaged.<\/p>\n

Free-wheeling capitalism works this way, profiting from mass-privatizations, deregulation, unrestricted market access, along with deep cuts in social spending to help finance plunder.<\/p>\n

Public wealth transfers to private hands. Public debt increases exponentially. So does the disparity between super-wealth and exploited poor.<\/p>\n

Disasters create opportunities not available otherwise\u2014whether it\u2019s rebuilding war-shattered cities or others affected by natural disasters.<\/p>\n

They represent lucrative opportunities for disaster capitalism. Harsh crackdowns on nonbelievers enforce free market plunder.<\/p>\n

Last September, Hurricane Maria devastated Puerto Rico from severe gale-force winds, storm surge and flash flooding, causing enormous damage.<\/p>\n

Many thousands of islanders were affected. About 80% of Puerto Rico\u2019s agriculture was lost, its power grid completely destroyed, leaving all 3.4 million residents without electricity.<\/p>\n

Telecommunications were crippled, affecting 95% of cell networks, most land lines and Internet cables destroyed.<\/p>\n

A meteorological report said the island was literally blown away, vast devastation replacing it.<\/p>\n

Five months later, tens of thousands of residents still lack clean drinking water, hundreds of thousands without electricity.<\/p>\n

In late January, Governor Ricardo Rossello announced plans to privatize the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority (PREPA), calling the scheme a \u201cleap into . . . modernization.\u201d<\/p>\n

With it come higher electricity prices and poor service for maximum profits.<\/p>\n

San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulin Cruz blasted Rossello, tweeting: \u201cThe privatization of PREPA will put the economic development of the country in private hands. The authority will serve other interests.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rossello also intends transforming island public schools into quasi-public charter ones, a step toward privatization.<\/p>\n

Post-Katrina disaster capitalism in New Orleans worked the same way, part of a nationwide scheme to destroy public education in America, under-performing privatized schools replacing it.<\/p>\n

Six months after Katrina, New Orleans\u2019 public school infrastructure was largely gutted. A new framework replaced it, run by the state as charter or for-profit schools\u2014proper ones for poor Black children sacrificed for profit-making.<\/p>\n

At the time, Law Professor Bill Quigley called the transformation a scheme for \u201chaves (and) have-nots,\u201d defined by race, Louisiana enforcing separate and unequal education for children.<\/p>\n

Puerto Rico is following the same pattern, ignoring the welfare, rights and needs of its residents to benefit corporate predators\u2014media scoundrels ignoring what\u2019s going on.<\/p>\n

Weeks earlier, FEMA ended humanitarian aid for islanders, no longer providing food, clean water and other assistance to countless thousands in need.<\/p>\n

Humanitarian crisis conditions still affect countless numbers of Puerto Ricans months after Hurricane Maria.<\/p>\n

Colonized and exploited by Washington since the late 19th century, islanders have no control over their lives and welfare\u2014victimized by imperial rapaciousness.<\/p>\n

Mass exodus to the mainland, including by the island\u2019s best and brightest, complicated things further.<\/p>\n

Exploited by Washington, ill-served by corrupt island officials, Puerto Rico\u2019s poor, unemployed and most vulnerable are harmed most\u2014no end of it in prospect.<\/p>\n

___________________________________________<\/p>\n

Stephen Lendman<\/em><\/a> lives in Chicago. He can be reached at <\/em>lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net<\/em><\/a>. His new book as editor and contributor is titled <\/em>Flashpoint in Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks WW III<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 intrepidreport.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

21 Feb 2018 – The pattern is familiar, corporate predators profiting from natural and other disasters. Free-wheeling capitalism works this way, profiting from mass-privatizations, deregulation, unrestricted market access, along with deep cuts in social spending to help finance plunder.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":45461,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[55],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-106836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-capitalism"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106836","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106836"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106836\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45461"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106836"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106836"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106836"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}