I have sort of a superstition. When I find myself thinking things can't get worse, I stop myself immediately. "Don't tempt the Fates!", I remind myself. Because almost always, things really can get worse.

"Things can't get any worse" is probably just what many Haitian people were thinking even before the earthquake hit. This is a country of tremendous poverty, where somehow the people have managed to be unable to cash in on the Caribbean tourism that fuels the economies of so many other tiny islands. It is a country in which political corruption has reached all new lows, and crime is a way of life. I once saw a network news program on Haiti's child slavery business. Within an hour and a half after flying into Haiti, a reporter was able to purchase a little girl for $150. That just boggles my mind on so many different levels.

For the most part, we have all turned a blind eye to Haiti. They have no nuclear weapons, no international terrorists targeting America. Like the genocide in Darfur and other tiny countries, as long as the Haitian people are content to victimize each other, we will leave them to it. Certainly many would say that we can't save the world, we can't fix every broken society, our resources must be directed at the bigger domestic and international problems.

Suddenly, however, Haiti has become one of those bigger problems. The devastation of the earthquake has brought the country to the forefront of our TV screens. Millions -- if not billions -- of dollars will be donated from around the globe.

Suddenly, beneath the rubble of the worst of the worst, there has appeared -- as often happens when things can't get worse -- a glimmer of hope, of opportunity, of those blessings in disguise that we see only in hindsight. There is a chance for a prosperous Haiti, where children are cherished and educated, and people have jobs and health care, and roads are paved and buildings are safely built.

Hopefully the Haitians will see that sometimes when things can't get worse, they most definitely can get better.