A PERFECT STORM

 To say that I am worried is putting it mildly. The available evidence so far is that the Rowley led administration really doesn't have a clue how to mange the country's finances and has made to date a real mess of things. And as if their incompetence was not enough we put them in charge to manage the economy just when a 'perfect storm' of a crash in energy prices and a global pandemic combined to create a situation that would tax even the best and brightest minds. Unfortunately, they are neither the best nor the brightest so things are now worse than they might have been.

On top of their incompetence is the fact that they simply don't tell us the truth ... about anything! Take the pandemic, for example. Do you really believe that they handled this so well that we were number one in the world? Really? If you are that gullible I have a bridge in Brooklyn that I'd like to sell you ... cheap!

But what has really scared the living daylights out of me is a report from a man called Harry Dent who is the founder of Dent Research and editor of  the "Economy and Markets" newsletter. He says that stocks are nearing a day of reckoning and is predicting a stock market crash of somewhere between 80 to 90 percent early next year. His forecasts are predicated on several variables which include exorbitant debt, aging demographics,  lofty stock and real estate valuations, diminishing central bank control and uncontrolled monetary policy. (Sounds a little like T&T, doesn't? But that's another story.)

Dent said "when this happens, you don't get a 30 to 50 percent stock correction. You get 80 to 90." He went on to say that this type of correction occurs once every 90 years ... and that puts us (meaning the world) right on target. The last time this happened was in 1929 when the stock market crashed leading the whole world into the Great Depression ... which caused (amongst other things) the right conditions for the demagogue that was Adolf Hitler to rise.

Dent calls the Corona virus the "perfect trigger" for the coming economic storm.

So? Obviously there ain't a heck of a lot that we can do about a world wide depression if Dent is right. But we should be preparing ourselves for the coming economic storm in much the same way that we prepare for an approaching hurricane. If it passes us by, then that would be great. But we should be prepared to deal with it if it doesn't! And that's my problem. Because I don't think that this Government ... OUR Government ... has a clue how to deal with the present difficulties, much less Mr. Dent's "perfect storm."

WHY?

 

With the big news in the USA this morning being that President Trump deliberately downplayed the effects of the Corona virus way back in February/March of this year in order not to create a panic, the question here in good old T&T is did our 'favourite' Minister of Health, Terrance Deyalsingh do the same thing when he refused to cancel or postpone Carnival? Next, is what we are experiencing now really a 'second wave'? Or is it that now the election is over that the Government no longer feels it necessary to cover up the amount of cases that there are really in the country?

You see, there is the very reasonable suspicion that we were lied to by the erstwhile Minister and his cohorts from the very beginning about this virus and its effects. Look at what is happening now: we have had since the elections some 2,662 persons tested positive and the number of deaths is now at about 40. And all this is within the last month with the borders closed! I'm not even going to bother with the number of reported cases after Carnival. But do you remember the great Minister telling us that masks were not really necessary? Do you remember him telling us that we were ranked number one in the world for our handling of the virus?

If we were doing such a great job then why is there even this so-called 'second wave'? And why is the number of tests still less than what little Grenada did before we had our elections.

Look, there are a lot of other questions. For example, why is the mainstream media giving our 'favourite' minister such a free pass? Why isn't he being held to account and why is he not being asked the hard questions? 

Tell me, do you think that there was more 'social interaction' over the election period (when the borders were closed) than there was over Carnival (when the borders were open)? And that is why we have this 'second wave' now?

I have my own theories, all of which can be summed up by saying that I think that we have been lied to from the very beginning. I also have my own theories as to why we were lied to ... but its all irrelevant now. The election is over, isn't it? and Deyalsingh is back again back in the saddle!!  He has a job... and a well paid one at that too! Isn't that just great?!

WAITING FOR THE NABARIMA TO SINK

 It is unbelievable that a maritime disaster worse than the infamous Exxon Valdez incident is happening right on our shores and there is little to NO reporting or comment in the main stream media. Take a look at this video:

https://www.facebook.com/593960978/posts/10158943650705979/

The FSO Nabarima has something like 5 times MORE oil in it's hold than the Exxon Valdez had ... and we all know how that ship wreck turned out! So? Why is this being played down? Why is nothing being done by anybody? And if something is indeed being done, then who is doing it (whatever 'it' might be) and why are we not being told about 'it'? Why are there no calls in the mainstream media for something to be done?

Look, I really hope that politics is not coming into play here, but I can't help but feel that is exactly what is happening. You see, the Nabarima is holding thousands of gallons of crude oil and has been parked up in Venezuelan waters in the Gulf of Paria ... the small body of water that separates Trinidad from the mainland. It seems that the Venezuelan authorities parked the ship there and virtually ignored it. Without maintenance the ship has slowly rusted away and is now listing heavily to one side as it takes on water and will probably sink very soon.

But don't we in T&T have the means ... any means of rescuing this situation? And if we don't, surely there are other countries that could help us? Notice I said 'us'. The oil and the ship belong to Venezuela, but if that ship and that oil is threatening OUR well being (as it is) then shouldn't we do something about it whether or not it means going into Venezuelan waters and taking over the ship? After all, if your neighbour's house is on fire and the neighbour doesn't have the means to put out the fire, but the fire is threatening your property, should you do nothing and just wait for your neighbour to ask you for help or do something about it himself? Or should you just wait for your house to catch fire?

Except for the names and a few other changes, this story about the Nabarima is the same one. Clearly, we need to do something, even if that means showing up the total and complete incompetence of the Maburro regime. But if we did that it might mean that we were wrong in the first place to support that terrible man and his cronies, and the present regime in T&T has never (to my knowledge) ever admitted that they were ever wrong about anything. I guess they feel that it is better that we simply have what will probably go down in history as the worst ecological disaster in the world! And our mainstream media will say nothing!

PLAYING WITH OUR LIVES BY REFUSING TO ASK THE HARD QUESTIONS

 It is unbelievable that there has been no real discussion in the mainstream media on the Corona virus. Oh! There have been some articles, but by and large the editorials in the papers and the (mainly pro-government) radio stations and the (again pro-government) television stations have seemingly conspired to keep any real discussion as to how to get out of this awful hole, or even how we got into it in the first place ... given that we were in lockdown since March!

For example, I have seen NO articles or heard any discussions at all about how all of a sudden we are being hit daily with the news that so many more deaths have occurred and there are so many more positive cases being reported. How in the name of heaven did all this happen? Were we told the truth before? 

On the 17th August I wrote a piece in this space which basically said that Mrs. Persad-Bissessar should go ... that she had passed her "sell by" date and it was better for her party as well as for the country that she should go. I still hold to that opinion and subsequent events have only served to strengthen me in that view.

However, this is not the point of this post. The point here is that a day or two later I received a telephone call from the host of CNC 3's   'Morning Brew' program inviting me to discuss why I said that Kamla should go. I said that I would, BUT I questioned why she thought that was more important to discuss than the sudden spike in the Corona virus cases and why her TV station was not holding the Government to account. She had said that she wanted to give me 15 minutes of air time to discuss why I thought that Kamla should go. I replied that we could discuss that in 2 minutes or less but that I thought that this COVID-19 crisis was much more important. Frankly, I accused her and her TV station as being biased in favour of the Government and being unwilling to ask the hard questions. I said that while I agreed that she and her station had every right to be biased they should at least acknowledge that they were. I said that I had formed this opinion because I had never seen them really ask any Government Ministers the really hard questions but instead tended to ask relatively easy questions that allowed the Government to get away with a lot at the expense of the population whom they (the mainstream media) were not informing properly.

She denied strongly that either she or her station was biased and even said that the Prime Minister referred to CNC3 as 'UNC 3'. My reply was that I had never heard him say that before and that in any case I did not think that (if he did indeed say it) was true.

But I have not seen (either on CNC 3 nor on TV 6 nor anywhere else) any criticisms of the Government's handling of this COVID crisis, either before, during or after the elections. To give one example: testing. It was clear from a long time ago that the testing being done by the Health authorities was woefully inadequate. But I haven't seen nor heard any real or sustained criticism of this fact from anybody in the mainstream media. I haven't seen or heard any reporter hold the Minister of Health's feet to the proverbial fire on this very crucial matter of testing. Why? This is our lives that are being played with!  And why do I say 'sustained'? Because this point (as well as others) needs to be hammered home.

Even now, testing at various private institutions while available, is horribly expensive and out of reach of the pockets of the average man. Yet nobody has seen fit to ask Mr. Deyalsingh why? And also, what is he doing about it? In any case, the test results often take 4 days or more making the testing virtually useless. (As an aside, I would ask do you really believe that Mr. Deyalsingh has told us the whole truth about what is going on? And if your answer is 'no', do you believe that the mainstream media has held him to account?)

What about contact tracing? To my belief there is very little going on. (I say 'belief' because I really don't know; certainly it appears to me that in this regard there is a lot of information missing.) If there is, then how come we are getting this sudden spike? It doesn't make sense.

But CNC3 thought it more important to highlight dissension in the UNC rather than how we as a nation are dealing with this pandemic. The host did say that she would have to call me back to discuss the points that I had raised. You will not be surprised to learn that I expect that invitation around the same time that snow falls in Trinidad.

I could go on, but hopefully you have got the point. These guys and gals are leading us all up the garden path. And the tragedy ... the real tragedy ... is that it is our lives that are being played with.

HAVE WE ASKED THE HARD QUESTIONS?

 

Do you think that the Rowley Government told us the truth about Covid-19 way back in February and March of this year? Do you think that they have been doing a good job in containing the virus? Do you believe that this "second wave" of Covid reported infections is just that ... a second wave? Do you believe that the Government has done a good job in handling this crisis? Do you think that the mainstream media have reported accurately on the pandemic in T&T?

If you answered 'yes' to any of theses questions then don't bother to read any further because you definitely are not going to agree with anything that I will be saying here. Let's take the first question about the Government telling us the truth: if they were telling us the truth from 'Day One' then why is it that we are seeing such a spike now when the country has been on a virtual lockdown since the 23rd March?  Where are these "new" cases coming from? And if they didn't tell us the truth from the beginning then was there an agenda (winning the elections?)?

And as to the second question, do you remember how they used to boast about what a great job they were doing and how low the numbers of infections were? But they weren't doing any significant testing. In the same period that we had tested a little over 4,000 cases little Grenada had done some 48,000 tests! But some quack organization claiming to be out of Oxford University is reported to have ranked us number one in the world for our handling of the pandemic. How could they say that they were doing a good job when there was very little testing? More importantly, why was there so little testing?

As for the "second wave", did you notice that the reports started coming of an increase in Covid-19 infections literally just before the elections? And now it is obviously out of control. On the one hand the Government's erstwhile Minister of Health is reported as saying that masks are ineffective and on the other hand you have the same Government passing emergency laws fining people for not wearing a mask! Really? And where did this so-called "second wave" come from if the borders were closed? From the illegal Venezuelans? But they come in mainly through Cedros in the South and all the first "new" cases came from the north! What's wrong with this picture?

Do you still think that the Government has done a good job in managing the pandemic? Do you think that children are less likely or more likely to practice social distancing? In this regard then, should the schools be re-opened or should they re-open only with virtual classrooms? What should be done with those poor people who can't afford internet in their homes ... much less laptops! Do you think therefore that the government has shown the required leadership in dealing with this crisis?

And as for the mainstream media, do you think that they were "asleep at the wheel" in their reporting ... or lack of it? Or did they have an agenda which was (and still is) not to criticize the Government or make it look bad.

The election is over, but we are not going to get out of this obvious mess anytime soon if we refuse to ask the hard questions or hold the Government's proverbial feet to the proverbial fire.