Monday, July 13, 2009

CARICOM at war on three FRONTS!

CARICOM which includes Belize, IS AT WAR ON THREE FRONTS!

Caricom which includes our country of Belize is at WAR on THREE fronts. Unfortunately the leaders of CARICOM countries, what is left of them, as the size of CARICOM membership shrinks, are at heart, country folks, provincial in outlook and nature. For the most part, country Prime Minister’s are not even aware that they are at WAR on three fronts. They have vague conceptions of something going awry with their desires and ambitions, but haven’t really put it into some sort of focus. CARICOM countries for the most part are always on the edge of the struggle for SURVIVAL. That SURVIVAL is intrinsically wound up with the three FRONT WAR, they only vaguely are uneasy about, but can only see by the individual guerrilla actions and small scale battles. Most of which we are losing.

The FIRST WAR FRONT is being waged by the G 7 countries, against CARICOM, through the G 20 group. This is the stripping away of the right to be sovereign in financial matters and compete on a fair level playing field with the G 7 countries for a market share in the financial services industry. The TAX HAVEN status of most of the Caricom countries is pretty much stripped away now and the advantages of offering competitive financial services will ultimately DESTROY the financial services TAX HAVEN status of CARICOM countries. We are losing an industry and revenue income stream. This WAR is commercial in nature, in the cutthroat competitive world of business. G 7 governments are running this war over market share. It is not even that the allegations are true, that they make and their treaties and obligations have any modicum of fairness. There is no fairness in WAR. Only winning and destroying your enemy who is competing with you for commercial business. The fact that all the things they slur and claim CARICOM TAX HAVENS of doing, they themselves do in their own countries, but just under different names and jargon does not matter. The problem for CARICOM is that the weapons in this particular war are the banking system, the need for us to go through their clearing centers, use their financial exchanges, use their wire transfer systems and so on. The answer is to use some other financial center system. Bigger and more richer countries than the small CARICOM countries are struggling with this world wide war.

It is probably time that CARICOM put up their own telecommunications satellite. The Chinese built and put up one for Venezuela. Even Central America should put up their own satellite.



The SECOND FRONT WAR for CARICOM is with the European Union. This war on the part of the European Union does not involve armies, tanks and soldiers. The war uses as weapons, treaties, contracts, memorandum of understandings. The weapons and battles are fought with paper. Essentially the European Union wishes to keep small ex-colonial countries as MARKETS for their finished products. They also wish to keep small countries of CARICOM as suppliers of bulk commodities. The raw materials they need to process for value added products THEY can export to us. Ultimately the WAR is about tax revenues and jobs for growing populations. The war is fought with carrot and stick approach. We get some GRANTS for needed improvements in our struggle for SURVIVAL as populations, which will be taken away if we do not sign on the dotted line by the EU.

We must diversify our marketing and make more export products in competition with the EU, to win this war on our small one country scale for ourselves.



The THIRD FRONT WAR for CARICOM is ALBA, the socialist promised paradise of the CUBAN system of the totalitarian state. This is more the traditional war, more reminiscent of the COLD WAR of recent history. Here we have an egomaniac who lusts for ABSOLUTE POWER in the leader of Venezuela . In the countries currently belonging to ALBA, are subsidiary KINGS who are in charge of their own little fiefdom. Their small kingdoms of which they in turn, lust for ABSOLUTE POWER in their small kingdoms. On the surface, the battle is with WORDS, and CONCEPTS. The jargon keeps changing. We do not call it communism any more, it is now called SOCIALISM and NEO-LIBERALISM. The fight against POVERTY. If one studies history, serving the POOR and DOWNTRODDEN has always been the battle cry of olden Feudal Kings who enjoyed ABSOLUTE POWER. It doesn’t matter whether the title EMPEROR, or senior KING, or an absolute ruler had the title of PASHA, AMIR, AYATOLLAH, Prime Minister for Life, or President for Life. Absolute Power is about absolute power. Certain people are born TYRANTS. This war is being waged by EMPEROR Hugo Chavez of Venezuela with the oil billions available to him. He is also winning this war in the Americas . STALIN, MAO, the CASTRO brothers all killed massive amounts of their opponents and sacrificed the poverty stricken in the domination requirements of ABSOLUTE POWER. We are talking HUNDREDS of millions of people murdered and sacrificed over the fight on poverty allegedly. Again right now, the WAR is like that being waged by the EU and is using the CARROT and the STICK approach. In a time of this new century in which energy sources are changing. The world oil production peaked scientists say in 2008. The USA transportation trucking fleet will be mostly NATURAL GAS driven in fifteen years, substituting for oil imports due to a new BILL now in the USA SENATE. For example Belize is in dire straits and many of the other CARICOM smaller island countries worse off. The price of gasoline in Belize is almost the same as a year ago when oil was $120 a barrel, but right now is in the mid $70 a barrel range. ENERGY is the big weapon in this war. Replacing a nucleur arsenal and aircraft carriers to fight idealogical battles over supremacy. While this WAR on this front with ALBA is using the poverty fighting jargon, of the past, no one should ever mistake the SOCIALIST TOTALITARIAN STATE for freedom. It is SLAVERY in a new disguise. This WAR will ultimately involve secret police, torture, killings, jailing perceived opposition, exile and the real cruelties of WAR, which we can understand and see and feel. Even as I write; the internet chatter says the EMPEROR IN HIS STRONGHOLD OF VENEZEULA is building up his army and acquiring military planes and new weapons to enforce control in his new dominion of the AMERICAS .

Already ALBA now counts 11 controlled votes for the United Nations, the OAS and other conferences and meetings, versus the shrinking CARICOM number of votes which at last count was only 10. This is alarming because most CARICOM countries are mismanaged and many are simply supplying labor and brain drain workers for the G 7 countries. This is a form of island country population control. Nearly all CARICOM countries have perpetual DEBT. Even our own Belizean Prime Minister of Belize believes in perpetual DEBT as an operating system. DEBT of course is lost revenues for development and self sufficiency requirements. You also lose the freedom to make choices and choose the courses you wish are best for Belize . This latter sentence is more profound in performance and implication, than all the various philosophical arguments about whether government debt is good or bad.

To my personal view, Belize at least inside CARICOM has to get rid of the debt to be truly FREE and INDEPENDENT without obligations to anyone outside. Leaving our choices open to choose. We have to also provide ourselves with everything possible we can need. This is easier in Belize and Guyana than other countries of CARICOM. Commercially our future is more with Central America , Mexico and the USA in Belize . Though putting all your eggs in one basket is wrong. We do need more economic diversification. The world right now is our market, not just traditional places. We must be able to shift markets with changing times, to remain fluid in our small niche, brand name way. We need to slide under the G 7 world radar in our small scale, like Marie Sharpe Products, or Grace Kennedy Ltd.

I could probably go on writing for a long time, but you get the essence of this article. Which is that CARICOM leaders and our Belizean Prime Ministers of the present and future, need to think differently, less selfishly and be more self sufficient in attitudes and policies. The system or one political party wins the government attitude has to change and adapt to think more about being a sovereign independent, self sufficient state. That is our REAL CHALLENGE for Belize . We need Prime Ministers with a wider vision, less bureaucratic minds, less regulation and more innovation and experimentation. This is a tough balancing act, when revenues are shrinking currently, oil prices rising and we wait for the next world BULL MARKET. When things get tough, the tough get going should be our attitude in Belize .

No comments: