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Letters From Zimbabwe: Cathy Buckle
Letters ^ | April 17, 2010 | Cathy Buckle

Posted on 04/18/2010 9:27:39 AM PDT by greyfoxx39

Dig your own grave

Saturday 17th April 2010

Dear Family and Friends,
Three months before Zimbabwe's 30th anniversary of Independence I happened to get lost in the vast urban sprawl that characterises the outskirts of the capital city, Harare. A huge shanty town lay on both sides of the road and stretched as far as the eye could see. Shacks and shelters made of tin and plastic were surrounded by mounds of rotting garbage which had even been scraped into contours in an attempt to demarcate little vegetable plots. Stinking streams of sewage ran right outside people's shacks and children ran barefoot through the waste and the filth. Hand painted signs were everywhere, on pieces of battered, rusty tin and written in charcoal on strips of warped cardboard: 'Floor polish,' 'Cement,' 'Tyres,' 'Abattoir.' One sign said: 'Hot Recharge' and a line of people with cellphones in their hands stood waiting for their turn to plug onto a car battery and get a precious top up of electrical power into their telephones. A near naked man with no legs was dragging himself by his hands along the road and I looked away but his image has stayed with me. How can this be Zimbabwe 30 years after Independence, I keep asking myself.

Two months before Zimbabwe's 30th anniversary of Independence I went to the local electricity supply office to hand in an up to date reading of my electricity meter. I needed to bring accuracy to the wild guesstimates they kept making on my monthly bills and the even wilder amounts they were charging. The man at the desk was eating a sausage and when I told him I had a reading I would like entered into the computer record, he looked wildly around at the piles of papers covering every inch of his desk. Eventually he chose one pile and placed the sausage on top of the papers. He looked at his greasy fingers for a moment, picked up a piece of paper from another pile on his desk, wiped his fingers on the paper and entered my figures into his computer. Can this really be Zimbabwe 30 years after Independence?

Last month I went with a friend who needed to have fingerprints taken at a government office. One by one each finger is squashed into the black ink pad and the digit then rolled onto the paper record. 'Wait for your form,' the government official announces and you stare at the filth on your hands and look around - no taps, no water, no cloth, nowhere to remove the ink all over your hands. When you ask if there is a public toilet you can use, the official mutters angrily that they are locked, they don't work anymore. People wipe their inky hands in their hair or in the sand. Can this be Zimbabwe 30 years after Independence?

Last week a friend got a quote for a new garden tap but decided against installing it because they get stolen so regularly. Stolen to be melted down and made into coffin handles. Talking about coffins, I attended a funeral a few days ago and was reminded that you have to dig your own graves now as municipal workers don't, or won't do it anymore.

Can this really be Zimbabwe 30 years after Independence? Can this really be a free and independent country when unarmed women are arrested and held in Police custody for handing out yellow cards in protest over electricity prices. Happy birthday Zimbabwe.
Until next time, thanks for reading, love cathy



TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Crime/Corruption; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: itcanhappenhere; liberalfacism; socialism; zimbabwe
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To: greyfoxx39

Frankly, no one has the right to be surprised by socialist atrocities.

Mass death is the very PURPOSE of socialism.


21 posted on 04/18/2010 11:55:59 AM PDT by headsonpikes (Genocide is the highest sacrament of socialism - "Who-whom?")
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To: greyfoxx39

If current trends continue, S. Africa won’t be far behind.


22 posted on 04/18/2010 12:05:02 PM PDT by mapmaker77
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To: greyfoxx39
Zimbabwe is exhibit A of the total failure of the UN.

The UN led the charge to end the white regimes of South Africa and Southern Rhodesia and ended up with 2 more failed African countries.

23 posted on 04/18/2010 12:13:14 PM PDT by AU72
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To: AU72
Zimbabwe is exhibit A of the total failure of the UN.

And the US taxpayer has financed ALL the UN failures without our consent!

24 posted on 04/18/2010 12:15:51 PM PDT by greyfoxx39 (Through the annals of time, there has been the Judas kiss, the Brutus stab, and now, the Obama bow.)
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To: greyfoxx39

You’re welcome! It’s always a pleasure to rub Zimbabwe in the liberals’ faces!

BUMP


25 posted on 04/18/2010 3:33:18 PM PDT by Lancey Howard
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To: greyfoxx39

Great tagline, GreyFoxx!

Cathy BUMP!


26 posted on 04/18/2010 4:35:18 PM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin (Save the Earth. It's the only planet with Chocolate.)
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To: Diana in Wisconsin

Thanks...I found it somewhere and lifted it..;)


27 posted on 04/18/2010 4:38:06 PM PDT by greyfoxx39 (Through the annals of time, there has been the Judas kiss, the Brutus stab, and now, the Obama bow.)
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To: greyfoxx39

Mine is ‘lifted’ too...but it perfectly sums up my love of chocolate coupled with my loathing of EnviroWeenies, so it was a perfect fit, LOL!


28 posted on 04/18/2010 4:44:20 PM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin (Save the Earth. It's the only planet with Chocolate.)
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To: Diana in Wisconsin

;)


29 posted on 04/18/2010 4:46:41 PM PDT by greyfoxx39 (Through the annals of time, there has been the Judas kiss, the Brutus stab, and now, the Obama bow.)
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To: greyfoxx39

Add me to your list as well, please.


30 posted on 04/18/2010 5:19:19 PM PDT by happygrl (Continuing to predict that 0bama will resign)
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To: happygrl

You have been added to the ping list.


31 posted on 04/18/2010 5:21:00 PM PDT by greyfoxx39 (Through the annals of time, there has been the Judas kiss, the Brutus stab, and now, the Obama bow.)
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To: greyfoxx39

I lived in Zim some 30 years ago.

There were no shanties, just townships, fairly neat, with flush Turkish toilets out back.

There was still the pride of British Civil Service among government workers.

Excellent schools, first class roads, and a food exporting nation, one of the few in Africa. It was a clean and tidy country.

What a loss.


32 posted on 04/18/2010 5:24:31 PM PDT by happygrl (Continuing to predict that 0bama will resign)
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To: happygrl
Excellent schools, first class roads, and a food exporting nation, one of the few in Africa. It was a clean and tidy country.

You must mourn the loss.

33 posted on 04/18/2010 5:26:34 PM PDT by greyfoxx39 (Through the annals of time, there has been the Judas kiss, the Brutus stab, and now, the Obama bow.)
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To: greyfoxx39

All businesses are now to be black owned.

That will work out so well... lol


34 posted on 04/18/2010 6:39:27 PM PDT by GeronL (Cargo Cult Liberalism isn't going to work.)
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To: greyfoxx39; writer33

Zimbabwe is digging its own grave.


35 posted on 04/18/2010 6:41:49 PM PDT by GeronL (Cargo Cult Liberalism isn't going to work.)
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To: businessprofessor

This is California if it weren’t attached to the rest of the country.


36 posted on 04/18/2010 6:44:07 PM PDT by GeronL (Cargo Cult Liberalism isn't going to work.)
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To: happygrl

and the same Cargo Cult mentality is running Calipornia and now the country.


37 posted on 04/18/2010 6:47:26 PM PDT by GeronL (Cargo Cult Liberalism isn't going to work.)
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To: happygrl
why hasn't there been a rebellion?

I really don't understand this part. how can this guy hold power with the country continuing to go down hill?

38 posted on 04/19/2010 12:08:20 AM PDT by Steve Van Doorn (*in my best Eric cartman voice* 'I love you guys')
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To: headsonpikes
Mass death is the very PURPOSE of socialism statism.

You are correct only to the extent that the peddling of socialism/communism/Marxism has been a fairy-tale device to keep people's eyes off of the real goal of statism that is autocracy on steroids -- the system of government where every aspect of human life is utterly controlled by the state. The other forms all promise some paradise after they get a hold. Statism is power seeking for power's sake.

Maybe it will begin to dawn on people what Statism intends to do. However, one of the earliest proponents of the power state that would reduce the Earth's population, H.G.Wells, had his Eloi marching into the rendering factory totally oblivious to their fate. So far, his vision seems to be scary accurate!

My plea to you is try to use the word "Statism" more frequently. Do it for no other reason than to provoke inquiries such as "WTF are you talking about HOP?" ;^)

39 posted on 04/19/2010 12:05:43 PM PDT by Avoiding_Sulla (Yesterday's Left = today's status quo. Thus "CONSERVATIVE": a conflicted label for battling tyranny.)
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To: Avoiding_Sulla

“Statism” - well, yes.

Historically, it is always the empire-engorged State that finally kills and devours its host human society.

In the West’s 21st Century case, the rationale and justification of this engorgement is the belief that what is good for society as a whole can be determined and known by social scientists; and once that good is known then policies must be implemented to improve our society. That doctrine is ethical socialism - founding morality on what is believed to be good for society as a whole. This false belief is at the root of why such projects always result in mass death.

I do not think that such a belief is founded in either reality or reason, whereas the historical role of the state has often been humane and just, when it there is no attempt to morally or otherwise improve the population.

Pre-WWI modern states were about the appropriate size, consuming less than 10% of their society’s production.


40 posted on 04/19/2010 1:19:20 PM PDT by headsonpikes (Genocide is the highest sacrament of socialism - "Who-whom?")
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