Loewenstein travels to the ends of the earth to get the story

The Australian writer Antony Loewenstein is no stranger to this site. His incisive, courageous questioning of pro-Israel orthodoxy got our attention back in 2007, and he has published two well received books on the subject: My Israel Question, and After Zionism, (which he co-edited with Ahmed Moor, another close friend of this site).

Loewenstein is a bold, energetic journalist, who will go anywhere to report first-hand. His latest book, just out from Verso, is entitled Disaster Capitalism: Making a Killing Out of a Catastrophe, and even experienced world travelers will be impressed by his explorations. Among other places, he visits a remote part of Papua New Guinea, to chronicle a long, little-known struggle between the local people and a big, polluting copper mine, and he spends time in Pakistan and Afghanistan, to explain how Private Military Companies, better known as mercenaries, are making millions off war and misery.

His great strength is that he gets telling details to make stories come alive. Most people know in general that Greece has been suffering under German-imposed austerity, but the truth is more compelling when you read that, “In the heart of Europe, malnutrition was rampant among schoolchildren; a cabbage-based diet was now a reality for many middle-class Greeks.” Even more chilling, a few pages later he describes a 54-year-old man who was lying in the operating room, waiting to have a heart pace-maker installed — until an accountant said he had not provided the necessary documents. (Fortunately, after pressure, the man did have the life-saving surgery the next day.)

Loewenstein’s look at post-earthquake relief in Haiti is particularly useful. Bill Clinton, who co-chaired the international relief effort while reporting to his wife, the secretary of state at the time, promised “to build back better” but characteristically did not follow through. The hundreds of millions of aid went mostly to U.S. and other corporations of doubtful competence, which were “spending too much of their resources on salaries, accommodation, and transport for foreign aid workers.”

Antony Loewenstein travels up to the Caracol Industrial Park in northern Haiti, a cherished pet project of Bill and Hillary Clinton. He discovers, as have other reporters, that the project had evicted 300 small farmers but is years behind schedule, and, as he quotes the Haiti expert Alex Dupuy, even if it is ever finished it “has absolutely nothing to do with creating a sustainable growth economy in Haiti.”

The Haiti Relief Debacle should become an issue in the 2016 U.S. presidential campaign, raising serious doubts about the competence of both Clintons. The first-hand evidence in Antony Loewenstein’s important new book is part of the indictment.