The Mini Stress Of Fine Ants

It is no secret that I hold all local politicians in high contempt, but the mouthings of  our current  finance minister have from day one of her tenure put her at the top of my list. 

Along such lines I am here to tell you that some fed up person wrote to and was published in today's local media expressing his or her amazement at the "brazenness with which the Finance Minister tries to pull the wool over the citizen's eyes", in reference to that person's rationale in stating that the CLF meltdown has nothing to do with the global one.

I couldn't agree with the writer more. I too am fed up, and I don't understand. You see, I'm told by some who have known the person referred to of the qualities and the academic achievements and the potential which they saw; and comparing that to what I see and hear is cocoa and zabrico. 

I view the person as a subservient servant of her boss the PM, who has had words put into her mouth concerning a subject of which she displays little knowledge and certainly no experience, and who does not seem to realize just how synchophantic she comes across. Something is wrong.

Which brings me to the question: when one goes to work for a people or a company or an army, can the policies of the leader be sustained ultimately? Or, more to the point, when the question of obey the boss or do the right thing arises, how should one choose? Is blind allegiance an option? Remember Nazi Germany?

Anybody who knows me knows my answer to such a question. 

As for those I talked to who knew her, I wonder what their current opinion of the mini stress of fine ants is.

Something To Remember

The pomp and ceremony of today's US Presidential Inauguration and the attendant inaugural address is something to remember, and so stirred me that I got to comparing big and small: how big they are in the US and how small we seem to make ourselves in T&T. Not just in size but in spirit, and in our ability and willingness to be able to decide right from wrong and do the right thing at all times in all circumstances.

Comparisons from Obama's address to Manning's words escape me, as I have none of our Prime Minister's speeches. But I can compare the cheering hundreds of thousands who braved cold weather and other inconveniences to go and take genuine joy in the election of what many believe to be a true leader, to the  five thousand or so people in Woodford Square some of whom are paid to go, or get a free t-shirt (PNM, of course), or free rum to drink to celebrate putting a man to do a job which he seems incapable of doing.

They really love and respect our PM. I'm certain that any of them would be willing to sacrifice a kidney for the man should he need one.

The formula in infantile politics such as we endure in T&T is simple: give the grassroots exactly what they want and retain power at any cost without regard to what is right or wrong, what is moral or immoral. The bottom line is to stay in charge, so sell out everything in order to do so.

Such people will go to great lengths to preserve the status quo. They are the enemies of change who offer little hope for a better future for their people through the old system of patronage and greed, increasing every day.

Those who lose their piece of the pie at election time done vex. Look at comparative concession speeches in recent elections, Panday's losing rant versus McCain's endorsement in defeat. Doesn't that comparison sum it all up? 

So we suffer, on and on without an end in sight, and we struggle, and we hope for leadership unforthcoming to take us to where we aspire to be.

Yet we take it because as the man say, we like it so.

To Die For

I wonder just how many of us Trinbagonians would be willing to make the ultimate sacrifice and die for our country? Not many I suspect, for in this land of rum and roti there are many who talk the talk about how proud they are of our country, especially when our various representatives in the sporting arena (less so in the literary and artistic fields) achieve international recognition. Yet such talk is only that. In reality, none of our citizens seem to be truly proud of Trinidad & Tobago.  

Pride in our country is not only about athletic or aesthetic or artistic achievement of a few individuals. Rather, it is more about our achievements as a people, which can perhaps be brought about by adherence to our national motto - discipline, production and tolerance. We can be proud of how clean our country is by having the discipline to not litter, as many of us continue to do sans conscience. We can be proud of our country's economic status by working strenuously and diligently to produce world class goods and services instead of having a ten days laziness mentality towards labor and a civil servant's nonchalance towards service. My old friend Brian reminds me that in Trinidad & Tobago there is no such thing as a civil servant; they are all uncivil.

Having pride in our country means that we can observe the final watchword of our national motto and tolerate each other, on the roads and in the killing grounds of the crime hotspots, and that we can tolerate those we perceive to be invaders and usurpers, the visitors who come here for hospitality but more often end up hospitalized or terrorized. Perhaps we tolerate the things that are wrong overly, thus the substandard levels of service in all strata of our society.

We really have no pride in our country, and thus no patriots, for patriotism necessarily entails pride in one's country. When was the last time you heard a Trinidadian described as a patriot?

Given the foregoing, the concept of the ultimate sacrifice applied to the Trinbagonian mentality is laughable. The Roman thinker and philosopher commonly known as Horace coined the term Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori - "it is sweet and honorable to die for one's country", and although such high thought is today largely dismissed as folly by the pacifists (Owen as early as 1917 referred to it as "the old lie" in his haunting poem of the same title - you can read it here: www.warpoetry.co.uk/owen1.html) yet the idea resonates with many, especially in this time of extremism and expansionism.

Where do our current leaders fit into this scenario? Martin Daly is rightly fond of describing the current crop of leaders as "kings" because of their attitudes toward leadership, and as we know, in olden times, the kings fought all battles from the front, and the captains went down with their ships. So, would Manning and Panday make that ultimate sacrifice for Trinidad & Tobago? 

I don't believe so, yet in the context of the next election, there may be an opportunity for one of them to do just that, for given the fact that a unified opposition is required to oust the current administration (a fact proven by the results of our most recent election), and given the fact that such unity is impossible as long as Panday is alive, then all Panday has to do to ensure that we rid ourselves of the current administration (and thus save our country, hopefully) is die.

So come on Panday, be a patriot and hurry up and die.

Obama And Orenthal

Much speculation has surrounded the recent ascendency of Barack Obama in the landscape of US politics and what his eventual fate will be should he succeed in his bid for the Presidency. Some have predicted that he may suffer the fate of others who before him aspired to or achieved that office only to be denied by death in the form of an assassin's bullet, and while Obama is certainly no JFK or RFK, the possibility remains real to many.

History shows us that the track record of black men involved in social and political change in the USA does not lend itself to longevity. MLK and Malcolm X come easily to mind. So what's to prevent another fanatic white supremacist from taking a bullet to Obama? Has the psyche of such extremists changed sufficiently since the sixties to allow a black President?

There are differences besides the passage of time which make for a more optimistic outlook as far as Obama is concerned, not least of which is the fact that he is only half-black. Or perhaps he is half-white. This puzzles me: it seems that when a man has a touch of the tar brush that he is white with it, yet when he has a touch of the whitewash brush he remains black. Thus Obama, half-white as he is, is still considered black. Yet he of the black mother and the white father with the straight hair and the tan skin is considered very much white.

Color prejudice runs deep in some circles, just as class prejudice is perpetuated in certain countries and societies. The English hold onto such traditions: low class, middle class, upper middle, lower middle, high class. Class as category, just as in other societies race counts to categorize people, to put them in their place.

So Obama, in spite of being half-white, is black, and I, with perhaps a touch of the tar brush remain white. Strange.

To return to the speculation surrounding the eventual fate of Barack Obama and the possibility of the bullet, I remain optimistic that things have changed sufficiently since the sixties to ensure the fulfillment of his potential. 

After all, Orenthal Simpson is still alive.