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Now that Puerto Rico has gone more than six months without full power being restored to the island after Hurricane Maria (some residents have gone without longer than that, having lost power after Hurricane Irma), there has been a spate of media coverage during the past week. All of a sudden—at least for a brief moment—Puerto Rico is again “newsworthy” here on the mainland.
Just google “six months Puerto Rico” and you will find stories on the sad state of affairs for Puerto Ricans, and not only on the island. Those who fled to the mainland are facing challenges, as well.
For those on the island living sin luz (without light) the days and weeks and months are simply passing by, to be struggled and coped with, one day at a time, and benchmarks observed by mainland media make no difference to the sorry state of affairs that is our fault.
Yes, our fault.
We have the ability to vote. Frankly, had we elected Hillary Clinton and booted Republicans out of power in the House, this wouldn’t be happening. Now we have to face the consequences, and Puerto Ricans are taking the full brunt.
We have the capacity to march and demonstrate. Our Democrats who are elected officials in Washington could all just get up and walk out of the House and the Senate in protest. That hasn’t happened.
Make no mistake: the racist Republicans co-signed by the racist-in-chief in the White House are the cause. However, we aren’t doing very much to be part of the solution.
Democratic Illinois Congressman Luis V. Gutiérrez, who is Puerto Rican, called out Trump after his State of the Union address (emphasis added):
I was hoping for some sort of apology on Puerto Rico, but I heard nothing. Puerto Rico is a metaphor for how this President sees all Latinos and people of color: he does not see us as his equals and he does not see us as fellow human beings. If you look at how the President has treated Puerto Rico, you have to conclude that he just doesn’t care and probably thinks of Puerto Rico as just another shithole country.
I was born in 1953 in the U.S. when separate but equal was the law of the land. I am proud of the progress the United States has made as a nation on issues of race, gender, sexual orientation, disabilities, and many other areas where we have advanced. I was hoping to get through my life without having to witness an outwardly, explicitly racist American President, but my luck ran out.
Gutiérrez and Puerto Rican Congresswoman Nydia Velázquez of New York have been tireless in addressing the racism and failures of Trump and his administrative flunkies. However, they shouldn’t have to be taking the lead. I’ve followed every tweet, every press statement, every photo op from other elected Democrats, and far too few are willing to tell it like it is and keep at it.
Eliminating racism isn’t simply about solving income inequality. Proposing bills that don’t see a snowflake’s chance in hell of getting out of committee—no matter how well-intentioned—didn’t turn the lights on. Don’t get me wrong: I support a Marshall Plan for Puerto Rico. However, unless we face the fact that far too many mainlanders could care less about Puerto Rico, nothing is going to happen anytime soon. I applaud Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut and New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who have actually provided meaningful aid for both island and mainland Puerto Ricans. You can dismiss their efforts as simply politics or pandering to a large Puerto Rican constituency. However, folks don’t give a damn about pandering if it provides light and water and shelter.
I am angry, and I get angry every damned day—not just in commemoration of six months. Six weeks without power and potable water was far too long. Hell, six days anywhere without power and drinkable water is excruciating.
And yet, here we are. Heading into the next hurricane season (which starts June 1), knowing that some people on the island have been told they won’t have power till 2019, and we go about our business as if this isn’t happening.
Why?
Because it isn’t happening to us.
Out of sight, out of mind, and only a handful of people who are not Puerto Rican or who don’t have ties of family and friendship to the island give a damn.
It makes no difference that Puerto Ricans are American citizens. They are—but they aren’t the right color or ethnicity.
I read through this rant so far and realized I’ve use the word “racist” several times already. Let me pile it on:
Racist Racist Racist Racist Racist Racist … racist racist racist racist … RACIST.
That word, and the meaning and intent behind it, has allowed Flint, Michigan, to go without clean water since 2014. It allowed Hurricane Katrina to kill a lot of people in New Orleans, many of whom were smeared as ravaging looters. And now, it allows us to forget and ignore the longest and largest blackout in U.S. history.
As of March 20, 7 percent of utility customers still couldn’t turn on the lights, refrigerate food, or run water pumps. And remember, “customer” refers to a power meter, and each meter can represent multiple people living in the same house. The total number of people without electricity in Puerto Rico is more than 120,000, and there remain municipalities where 45 percent of residents don’t have power.
Even areas that managed to get power restored suffered subsequent blackouts, and this week, the island’s bankrupt power utility, the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority, suffered a cyber attack.
The New York Daily News decided to post an interactive timer that keeps track of Puerto Rico’s days without power.
Other media outlets are revisiting the disaster. Here are two stories:
'I think they lost their way here': Puerto Rico six months after Hurricane Maria
“Government statistics indicate that the Puerto Rico recovery process is nearly complete. That's not what I saw in my hometown battered by Hurricane Maria”
‘We are the forgotten people': It's been almost six months since Hurricane Maria, and Puerto Ricans are still dying
Maunabo, Puerto Rico (CNN)
Lourdes Rodriguez heard the scream early on the morning of January 6, before the sun rose and before the frogs began their chorus.
"Lourdes! Lourdes!"
She instantly recognized the voice of her father, Natalio Rodriguez Lebron, 77, a former nurse who cared for the mentally ill, people he believed society had forgotten.
She darted up the stairs.
Her father's health had long been troubled. He had diabetes, lung disease, sleep apnea and congestive heart failure. And in the months since Hurricane Maria battered this coastal town, Lourdes watched his condition worsen. The sleep apnea machine he needed to help him breathe was useless for months because their hilltop neighborhood in Maunabo was entirely without electric power. In December, a business had donated a generator to power the machine at night, but the family struggled to afford the gasoline needed to keep it running.
As Lourdes reached the top of the stairs, she felt an uneasy stillness in the air. The sky was thick and black. No moon was visible. And the electric generator, a machine that sometimes rumbled like a car engine, had fallen eerily silent.
She swung open the living room door to find her father clutching his chest.
The machine was off. Her father appeared unable to breathe.
Power. Power runs machines. Fuel is needed for those lucky enough to have back-up generators—which cannot be run 24/7. That fuel costs money. And the government isn’t giving a fuel/gasoline allowance.
I dutifully write post after post about Puerto Rico. I call the island almost daily. I try to imagine living in a big city like San Juan, where most of the traffic lights are still not working. I applaud the efforts of people like Chef Bobby, who has gotten a generator for Don Feliberto in Utuado, thanks to contributions from Daily Kos readers. But I also worry about how he is scraping together money for fuel to keep that generator running, when he barely has money to feed himself. I retweet the words of elected Democrats, some of whom are sincerely attempting to do something to help.
I just got back from a four-day trip to Miami, and had non stop conversations with young Cuban-Americans and Dominican-Americans and Puerto Rican-Americans about Puerto Rico. This was not a political gathering. It was religious, and I had been cautioned not to bring up politics due to the conservative stance of many older Miami Cubans. But I did it anyway. The first words out of young people’s mouths was “racist” coupled with “Republicans.” They see you, Marco Rubio.
One young Cuban-American woman explained to me how she has convinced her mom to vote for Democrats—a mom who has never been political, who had told her, “We are Cuban. All Cubans are Republicans. So I am a Republican.”
She told her mom, “I get to go to college because of Democrats. You get health care because of Democrats. Democrats support your social services and Social Security. Democrats made it possible for me to marry my wife ...” Her mom now votes for Democrats.
The young woman told me that Democrats need to do better. They need to pay more attention to young black voters. They need to be out in front in the fight against the planned deportation of Haitians. They need to champion Puerto Ricans. And they need to target racism—which is not simply a matter of white vs. black.
I am angry. And I am privileged. I have light, and power, and water. Folks here in my Hudson Valley, New York, community have recently seen multiple power outages due to the four back-to-back Nor’easters. They have raised holy hell about it, burning up the phone lines to elected officials.
I am angry. And I am going to stay angry. I am going to channel that anger into voter registration. Meanwhile, what is going on in Puerto Rico ain’t acceptable to me—and shouldn’t be acceptable to you.
Please don’t try to tell me statehood is the solution, even if that was what a majority of Puerto Ricans want. If you think that racist Republicans are going to embrace an island full of Puerto Ricans who could possibly affect their carefully-gerrymandered balance of power (even though they have their Republican puppets in place like Gov. Ricardo Rosselló and Jenniffer González), I got a bridge to sell you in Brooklyn. And don’t tell me independence or Puerto Rico joining Cuba or Canada will do the trick. That ain’t gonna happen, either.
I am angry.
I hope you will get angry, too.
Tell me what you plan to do for Puerto Rico.