Ah, Yes..

UPDATE: From Beverley Mullings webpage at Queen's University:

"My research focuses generally on issues related to globalization, economic restructuring, gender transformations in work and social justice in developing countries. More specifically, my research focuses on the specific institutional configurations of capital, labor and the state that produce gendered forms of economic injustice. Two broad themes currently define my research:

1. how changes in the spatial organization of production and consumption are transforming the local institutions that regulate social relations;
2. how local institutions, in turn, are reconfiguring, contesting and disrupting the re-organization of production and consumption."

What???!!! Okay. Now we understand. She's aiming to be published in the Journal of the Blatantly Obvious.
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..the academic grievance huckstering has begun:

""My sense is the (Canadian) government in particular has dragged its feet," said Caribbean scholar Beverley Mullings, a Queen's University professor, who blamed Canada's "wait-and-see" posture early in the earthquake aftermath.

Mullings said there is growing concern that security is trumping disbursement of humanitarian aid."

[---]

"If you look at Canada's monetary contribution, our contribution in terms of personnel it is substantially greater than any other country on a per-capita basis ... our military presence the same thing," Immigration Minister Jason Kenney said.

He, too, called it "unfair" to suggest Canada isn't pulling its weight."

A fortress of political correctness, that. The greater the tragedy the most exploitable it is. Time for another spit in their general direction. So, Beverly, we'll put you on the back burner along with the French reporter, where you can whine all you want. Meanwhile, there's there's a monumental task ahead and there are far better men and women than you working long, exhausting hours to get it done:

Haitian Government to Relocate 400,000 Displaced by Quake

"The 7.0 magnitude quake left an estimated 1.5 million people homeless, and earthquake survivors have been living outside in overcrowded camps with little or no sanitation."

[---]

"Also on Thursday, U.S. military announced it had reopened the heavily damaged seaport in the Haitian capital to help improve the flow of aid to earthquake victims."

[---]

"Debris around the port, wrecked roads and congestion at the damaged main airport in the capital have made delivering relief to earthquake survivors difficult.

Fraser also said three new airports have opened in Haiti and the neighboring Dominican Republic for relief supplies."

[---]

"Meanwhile, U.S. aviation authorities say they have sent a temporary control tower to Haiti to help with the flights bringing in earthquake aid from around the world. The tower will come with two diesel-powered generators and supporting fuel tanks."

[---]

"Separately, aid workers on the ground in Haiti say they are making progress getting food and water to survivors, but the death toll could rise because of untreated injuries and disease. The aid group, Doctors Without Borders, says patients are dying of sepsis (an infection in the blood) from untreated wounds and that some of the group's surgical sites have 10- to 12-day backlogs of patients.

The January 12 quake killed an estimated 200,000 people and affected 3 million people -- about one-third of Haiti's population."

And what have you done to date, Ms Mullings? And what do you intend to do over the next several months, besides grievance huckstering, that is? I have a suggestion. Do something in the real world for a change. Climb down from your ivory tower, get your hands dirty, make your back sore, and go for days on end without adequate sleep like those rescue workers are doing. And how quickly could you respond if the entire population of Ontario, in a matter of a few seconds, was lying under rubble or became homeless on the streets. You wouldn't know where to begin. Oh, but you do no how to whine. That's very helpful.

More details from on the ground here.

• "The Port-au-Prince dock could not receive ships because it was badly damaged by last Tuesday's quake, which submerged the quay and smashed equipment, including the only container crane."
• With the port out of operation, the huge international relief operation has had to use Port-au-Prince's congested airport, which has delayed the arrival of urgently needed medical and food supplies.
• More than 30 countries have rushed relief to Haiti since the devastating earthquake, choking the airspace and the ramp at the small airfield, which has only one runway.
• ..American ships were moving into the seaport on Monday with sonar equipment to assess the damage and a crane to clear debris.

You see folks. That sort of stuff has to happen first, else a very bad situation becomes much, much worse.

A video of the issues involved at Haiti's port.