Who Rising?

On the morning of the 2010 election results in Westminster, we have a hung Parliament for the first time since the 70's; people are using phrases like 'Minority Government' and the role of the 'Third Party' in balancing interests, and this has put the power right back where it belongs, with the people.

A beautiful illustration of the power 'We The People' could have had here if the politicians themselves were not so greedy for power.

A couple of nights ago I had an occasion to have a long discussion with a former UNC senator and he expressed grave concerns for the party.

We discussed at length the functioning of this coalition with or without power and in neither scenario did it appear sustainable.

As Political maturity does not tolerate the 'if you not with us you with the enemy' stupidity, I would rather not have to water this down to fit the absurdity passing for electoral debate, and focus on events and facts.

They were expecting a massive PNM fail like '86.

What they getting instead is a fully energized incumbent party on the warpath and an electorate asking questions that they don't seem to have an answer for.
People are already confused and Kamla still rising. ('Like is bread we making' someone posted.)

The entire world save for China and Trinidad went through a recession. If you have the balls to move the incumbent after that you better have damn good reasons, because that is a superman play.

Yet for all that currency, the PNM failed miserably at managing the people's concerns, and worse, mainly because of a weak and fractured Opposition, ignored the people altogether. The facts are there in the historical record as to how we find ourselves in a mid term election, but here we are.

Crime is the number one issue affecting everyone in this country. We want a Government capable of eradicating kidnapping and the reduction of murder rates back to the 'one-a-year' levels.

We would have thrown anything at the Prime Minister to get him to shut up and say "OK, We'll fix it". Instead we got platitudes and high rises and more blood.

The disenchantment with the PNM was so strong that twenty days before election we have assembled 'everyone else' to throw at him, with even the treasonous Daaga and the fringe NJAC getting play. (Every time i see daaga on a platform I cant get over the look in his eyes, like a child running amok in a toy store, he knows at some point he's going to get caught out and is going to have to put the toys back).

We expected fire and brimstone on the hustings.

"WAR"

'We taking our nation back' we wanted to scream, as we paraded our 'New' army for the bandits and murderers to see, to strike fear in their hearts and get them to play nice.

It has not worked out quite that way.

The coalition has not addressed the people's questions, all they are doing is preaching to the converted by continuously demonizing the incumbent, and have replaced plans and issues by inviting everyone on some kind of psychedelic head trip, where we all join hands and walk up the magic mountain together to sit at the mystic rainbow and eat magic jelly beans. (I am making fun of this because it is a stupid American electoral concept called misdirection and it is failing.) The UNC/COP are going to leave this dance with less than they came in with, and everyone is going to stand around, wondering when do we get the magic beans.

Assness of the highest order has trumped definitive plans for serious problems, and serious answers to searching questions, and more importantly, definitive leadership for a people tired of plastic politicians and their corruption, sick of bad news and weary of crime scene images.

I supported a removal from office based on the PNM's failure with crime and protection of the citizenry.

Basdeo Panday's UNC boasted Ramesh as AG and Theodore as Minister of national Security. This current coalition is populated by light weights, and I am wondering if the people have forgotten what we were fighting for.

Basdeo Panday made the same point i made last week on a talk show; tell Bernie Campbell you cannot just come to a country and run a political campaign, especially a campaign for a population with as many differences as ours(race, culture, class, religion). The cliche is what divides us is much, much more than what unites us. The Ganges will never reach the NIle, because the political PERSPECTIVES (read that word carefully) and needs are different.

This is the main reason I have written so many notes on the history and people behind the politics, so that people know. I keep stressing 'Get Informed' so you know, because an informed population will not be fooled.

I am very sorry, but unless these people can get their act together, I fear the show will start to die and the PNM will romp home to victory.

As an aside,I m willing to bet anybody anything that the last card the PNM are going to play is one massive tear filled one love moment between Rowley and Manning.

My predictions: Kamla is going to fail. the PNM is going to win, Jack Warner is going to fade away, and the Panday faction will rise to fill the vacuum that the ULF/UNC left, with Ramesh as political leader, and Bas as king maker/future President of the Republic

Today, we as a people find ourselves needing to pray for grace.