A Comment On BBC’s WEBSITE that they edited!!!

As it goes the BBC on the Caribbean had a question of readers, it was something to the effect of… what are your disappointments with the Caribbean / Caricom or your country in 2009 etc? My reply was editted to cut out OBAMA’s part and I think it is a deliberate effort to subvert opinions against Obama…

 

The regions institutions have opened up travel & work for grauates of tertiary institutions but much more needs to be done in terms of regional cooperation. We need a common media, a Uber national/ regional, newspaper, radio, television and unified and system access to Internet, a common portal, and uniform standards. The reality and necessity of a functional and economic union and market and strong fairer trade.

Tourism has proven how fickle it can be and is subject now to realities such as gas prices, travel security, economic recession, crime, and markets that wax and wane. Also the tourism industry itself has failed to endorse newer markets, niche markets, the European and Asian markets, failed to employ strategies like Eco-tourism,civic tourism, heritage tourism, medical and health/therapy tourism. The industry itself failed to diversify and re-invent itself into a more far reaching and sustainable model of business. We also relied so much on tourism while neglecting possible advance in the field and industry of technology and computers. We neglected to harness our intellectual capacity.

In terms of sports, as much as individuals excelled, governments and governing bodies failed to hone, foster and harness it. Regionally I personally wanted to see sports integrate and crossover and merge a little more! I would like to see even football reach to a level where there are inter-regional cups for categories like, D1 and D2 leagues etc.

I definitely believe the media has been used to dumb down the nations and given an undue fascination to celebrities lives and delved to far into the voyeuristic fetish of reality tv. Has no one heard of the Hawthorne's effect or Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle. The fact of observation itself affects the thing observed... Sure art reflects life, yet it also impacts it... I do believe the musicians can do more to pass on information to the public and help to paint a different picture of the world and lend vision to the people, not that they should stop showing us the gritty reality but they should try to show us an alternate future than the one we are heading to... The society and the heads of it especially need to be honest about their shortcomings and the inequity in the social order. So maybe the artistes and icons have a different reality to muse on.

The most moving moment is waking up to the reality that a black president doesn't translate into a global black agenda, and has thus far not panned out well for the Caribbean, we have been neglected and slighted by the Obama administration, they have also seemingly perpetuated the illegal stance on Cuba, used the G20 to muscle us into some horrible tax contracts and continue to perpetuate the inequity in global trade, they take our preferential treatment whilst subsidizing their farmers and using GM and chemicals... OH the inequity and injustice... some revolutionary leader... he might have "seemingly" changed the color of the presidency, but his relations with the Caribbean seem colored by the history and biases of the US international relational stance  policies and edicts handed out by the CFR.

As Obama “Tax-ifies” the Caribbean and We Grovel to the IMF

 

By the end of last year, 195 countries had signed tax-information exchange agreements, prompted by increased scrutiny from the G-20, the head of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Develop-ment's Tax Center announced Jan. 19. Among the countries to have 'substantially implemented' the anti-tax haven standards were Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina and Mexico.
Read more: http://www.poder360.com/article_detail.php?id_article=3541#ixzz0h9KpjdHb

 

Real income in the Caricom area is less today than it was 10 years ago; unemployment is higher in 2009 than it was in 1999; poverty has expanded in many countries; and many Caricom countries now experience debt levels of over 100 per cent of their GDP
~Ronald Sanders

The picture for international financial services is just as bleak. Having fought off the so-called 'Harmful Tax Competition Initiative' (HTCI) of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) -- the club of the rich countries -- in 2002, Caribbean governments allowed themselves to be threatened by the newly formed G20 countries in 2009 into signing up to 12 Tax Information Exchange Agreements (TIEAs) with OECD countries. New members of the G20 -- Brazil, China, India and South Africa -- who Caribbean countries might have expected to fight in their corner, simply endorsed the OECD agenda.

The cost of compliance with these agreements will place an unreasonable burden of cost on regulatory bodies and financial institutions in the Caribbean.

I hope Mr. Bruce Golding and Mr. Audley Shaw read that last sentence…

Rasta Church

TAKEN FROM: http://www.bbc.co.uk/caribbean/news/story/2010/03/100301_rastachurch.shtml

Rastafarian church has been seeking recognition for 14 years

A Rastafarian church in Jamaica is continuing its 14-year fight for legal recognition by the country's lawmakers.

The Church of Haile Selassie I the first submitted its petition for incorporation in October 1996.

But despite pleas by the church and its legal representatives, the organisation is yet to receive parliamentary approval.

At issue is the Church of Haile Selassie I's use of certain herbs in its religious sacraments, which it says has been misinterpreted by some as promoting the use of marijuana during worship.

Misconceptions

The Church's spokesman Abuna Foxe told BBC Caribbean that misconceptions about the use of herbs during workship have contributed to the delay in being granted legal status.

"For the average Jamaican a chalice is a ganja pipe, that's wrong. A chalice is a sensor that's used to burn frankincense and myrrh," Mr Foxe said.

He also said that at no time will his organisation ask parliament to legalise the use of 'herbs'.

The Church of Halie Selassie met with lawmakers last December where it stressed the use of the herb cassias, but not marijuana, in it's rituals.

Review

Their request has been reviewed by the parliament's joint select committee.

The Committee Chairman Senator Hyacinth Bennett told members there was a need to clarify the concept of the word 'herb'.

But Opposition Senator Mark Golding told BBC Caribbean the church had made it clear it did not use marijuana and too much emphasis was being put on the legislation that aimed to define the organisation's sacrament.

"The concern of some of the members of the committee is that they don't want, by passing the bill, to appear to be condoning the use of ganja," Mr Golding said.

"Every time the committee sits, the issue of whether they use herb or not, and what herb means in their liturgy has come up.

"But I think that after (the) sitting the members present were minded to accept that there's really no basis for the committee to use that as a basis for denying the church the desired recommendation that their petition be allowed."

If approved the Church of Haile Selassie I would have the legal rights to property ownership, open schools as well as tax benefits.