The latest issue of TIME, on newsstands Friday, features our cover story by Bill Clinton, 'The Case for Optimism', which outlines fives ideas that are changing the world for the better.
Read the story here: http://ti.me/Ul36ZQ
(Photograph by Mark Seliger for TIME)
Following the report live from Haiti tonight on CNN by Anderson Cooper about the fabulous job Bill Clinton does of providing very realistic, extremely fair, nonjudgemental answers to concerns that the people have particularly in the need of reconstruction in Haiti, many Haitians of the Diaspora propose to return in their native country where, among other challenges, the possibilities of comfortable dwellings do not fail to be lacking. But one expects that this housing crisis becomes even more alarming as political stability in Haiti settled and that more significant waves of Haitians, and North-American tourists will flow towards that country.Without falling into a happy optimism concerning the near possibility from a durable social climate, economically and politically healthy, the housing market, which is hardly negligible, deserves as of now some attention.
Lucien BONNET
http://www.contat-canadahaiti.ca/
LETTER TO THE PRIME MINISTER OF QUÉBEC
MR. LUCIEN BOUCHARD
Montreal, January 21st 1998
The Right Honorable Lucien Bouchard
Prime Minister of Quebec
Building Hydro-Québec
75, boulevard René Lévesque Ouest
Montréal (Québec)
H2Z 1A4
Dear Mr. Prime Minister:
"It is in adversity", I was going to say in “darkness", that one recognizes true friends.
In this national test due to the shortage of electricity because of bad weather, each one of us, in Québec like elsewhere, recognizes in you the Statesman, the friend very sensitive to the needs of the Québécois.
In solidarity betwen us in this shortage, we are also in solidarity with your energy, your will to build and rebuild.
Energy of the Sixties tested, confronted by the Ice storm crisis, what does Science hold for us in this field at the crossroad of the third millennium?
Each of us should express solidarity, according to his means.
My contribution, apparently futuristic, refers, Mister Prime Minister, to an inexhaustible source of energy, which one should tame now.
In a book with limited publication, translated in English for the needs of the cause, entitled "BILL A RI And There Was Light", addressed during his last American election campaign to President Bill Clinton who acknowledged having received it, I dared to tackle this subject.
A second copy of that manuscript reached 24 Sussex at Ottawa, intended for the Prime Minister of Canada, the day before the visit of the Right Honourable Jean Chrétien at the White House.
As for the French original version which entitled then "Haïti ! Que La Lumière Soit !", it was given in person in care of the Canadian ambassador to Port-au-Prince, Mr. Hubert Feuillé, to President Jean Bertrand Aristide.
It's like to say to you, Mister Prime Minister, that in the exceptional circumstances in which Québec lives today - in the point of view of energy - no exploration in the mid or long term, by the expertise of Hydro-Québec, of an additional source of energy, at the same time safe and profitable, should not be ruled out. The Chairman and managing Director of the Hydro-Québec Company, who assists you so admirably, will assist you even more, I hope, vis-à-vis that new perspective.
In my letter to President Bill Clinton as well as in the one to your federal counterpart Mr. Jean Chrétien, I brought up that prospect to them. Who can guess, vis-à-vis this posssibility, which one of them would be the first to take advantage thereof.
There is no witchcraft at all involved in all that, Mister Prime Minister. In spite of my Haïtian ascent and my carefully phrased remarks. It is undoubtedly so when a taboo should be broken through; a taboo of magnitude, Mister Prime Minister, I admit it; a “scientific" taboo, seldom encountered.
Why did that happened to me, in such a way,
like an ice storm, camera in hand, in full darkness? -
" The taboo arises as a negative categorical imperative," affirms
Roger Caillois. It is not saying little. Especially when it is
a question of adequately correcting the theory of Newton on light
and colors.
What an ungrateful work, what an irony, what else? Above that, for more than twenty-five years. However, at the dawn of the twenty first century, to denounce this taboo, to reverse it, should I say, what an asset! Moreover, at the same time the multiple taboos grow blurred which surround another phenomenon of the highest scientific range, the well known phenomenon under the abusive name of "Black Holes", synthesis of light and colors. Indeed Newton, in good faith undoubtedly in his time, really reversed the interpretation of the phenomenon of light. He took the part for the whole ! So much and so well that today like yesterday, the visible appears so much more tempting. Physicists say it: "ninety to ninety nine percent of the matter of the universe is made up of a dark matter, invisible, which generates, propels and surrounds the visible, like the sea surrounds the continents". Scientists such as Stephen Hawking affirm it. The Hubble Telescope confirms it. But theoretical Optics is stagnant.
My intervention, here, Mister Prime Minister, would mean that. It is possible to use another form of energy. By decoding the Black Matter. By the expertise of Hydro-Québec which has proven itself in many occasions. Without a play on words. Theoretically initially. While “returning the elevator to Newton”. Because, today, Hydro-Québec is well informed and with full power ! Forgive, this time, this very small play on words, intended to pay homage to you. For the Act which consists in making an AMENDMENT TO THE LAW OF NEWTON ON LIGHT AND COLORS.
Presently, why should we take the result instead of the cause?
— Objectively and in a pragmatic way, by a new synthesis; consequently, what a liberation ! At the threshold of the third millennium, let light live, invisible by synthesis, visible by analysis.
"Synthesis and analysis are two wings of the same bird, the rythm of the universe`s heartbeat, tamed inside the infinitely small having mass. Successively contracted and deployed. In the benefit of humanity." One small step for Man, one giant leap for Mankind - I also said myself - in “ BILL A RI and there was light !... "
What an unfortunate ice storm, certainly ! Versus illumination. Versus vivifying heat. Unfortunate, yes, but how much a convenient storm if I dare say, which invites us to explore other avenues, other concepts and, therefore, other resources so far neglected. Invitation to go from the invisible to the visible and vice versa. Taking advantage of the sequence of colorless and colored luminous speeds. In order to better understand the Universe. Where Law and Order prevail. Just like in Democracy !
Energetic formula with a unique character !
In the name of Science and Technology, vapor is being reverse !
A winning formula !
In Québec !
By Hydro-Québec !
As for the concept which enabled me to carry out this research, to draw certain conclusions and thus to propose its application, allow me, Mister Prime Minister, in spite of your many obligations and concerns, a small and fast digression.
1972. A young talented lawyer. I consult him on the royalties, the intellectual property, and the legal protection. He collects data, consults his fellow-members, at the Bar. Days, months pass. I call and I recall. One year, two years. I insist. I persist, as a condition to pay his fee, in obtaining an answer. He proposes, in private, a verbal report. I tell him the importance which I attach to a written report. Obviously not at ease, reluctantly, he gives me, on August 16, 1974, a letter! You are, Mister Prime Minister, the very first one to receive today, here included, a copy of it.
As for the verbal report mentioned in the letter which I address to you today, it was around a glass of beer – from the well-known MOLSON Brewery , I still remember, that the young and talented lawyer, well in spite of himself but in all respect and friendship, delivered to me the verdict of his elders, his fellow-members of the Bar:
"You are", they say, "an illuminated Black person !"
Pretending to be under the effect of a certain euphoria to which the famous beer MOLSON gets one discreetly, I told him on a hardly exalted but sincerely happy tone:
"I, Lucien, from the Latin Lucianus which, from the root Lux, Lucis and any other variation reminds me FIAT!, then FIAT Lux! Let us raise our glass to your Bar and Let there be light ! "
"An Illuminated Black person !", I suddenly told him again, "in the white ceremony where the snow and the wind intermingle, in this country of blowing snow..." sung by Gilles Vigneault, what a spectacle !
Homage to you, Mister Prime Minister, because today like yesterday, in the Country sung by Gilles Vigneault, thanks to you, to your collaborators, to all the people of Québec, and to the "Father" who had house built, "the guest room, it is beautiful! "
How not to think of René Lévesque, during a meeting before the first "Parti Québécois referendum " on a Saturday, in company of Doctor Camille Laurin, of Doctor Denis Lazure, of Father Jacques Couture, of Gérald Godin of venerated memory, without forgetting the former deputy Pierre de Bellefeuille. Facing him that Saturday, illuminated by I do not know which obscure clearness, I gave to him in person a summery of this subject which I have a chance to entertain with you today. One sentence condensed its content. He promised me to read it all in his limousine, on the way back from Montréal to Québec. The following day, on Sunday morning, I knew that he had read it.
With you today, Mister Prime Minister, I repeat this sentence, more than twenty-five years old, but always, in my opinion, carrying the same message that I wish more and more positive for the years to come, in the third millennium...
"On the cosmic scale as on the terrestrial scale, darkness or blackness forms an integral, sine qua non part, of color and light pocess".
Is it still broad daylight
in the shadow of the black sun?
Yours truly,
Lucien BONNET