Our Mr. Nader

Last week, the CNMI’s very own version of Ralph Nader–an anti-business fanatic–wrote a highly inflammatory, polemical letter to the Marianas Variety (slogan: “favoring a Federal takeover since 1992”). Now I should probably point out that I didn’t actually read the letter, because, quite frankly, I don’t bother to read the Marianas Variety, which does not even have a website. Instead, I read a news summary on Bruce Lloyd’s website.

According to Mr. Lloyd, the gist of the letter was: Don’t hire Preston Gates. Don’t spend $700,000 on Preston Gates. Don’t bother defending the CNMI against dastardly smears and unwarranted Federal encroachments.

Coming from our very own Mr. Nader, this should not be the least bit surprising. You see, our Mr. Nader is fanatically anti-garment, anti-tourism, anti-development, anti-business. He apparently thinks that all of our businessmen are evil, all of our local politicians are corrupt, and only the omniscient, omnipotent Federal government can save us from ourselves. Which is exactly the view espoused by our friends at the U.S. Department of

Interior–as exposed by Congressman Don Young’s investigation.

You see, there is a pattern here: Those who support a U.S. Federal takeover uniformly oppose our hiring of Preston Gates. They want to portray it in the most sordid way possible.
They want to cast aspersions at the whole idea. Quite frankly, they want to make it look sick, filthy, corrupt. They want to make it look as bad as politically possible, regardless of the truth.

Our detractors want to discredit our relationship with Preston Gates precisely because they are afraid, because they know it has proven effective in the past–and might well prove itself further in the future.
Naturally, our detractors don’t like this. They don’t want Preston Gates to undermine their zealous federal takeover agenda. Thus the continuing smears.

The proof is well documented. OIA Field Rep. Jeff Schorr passed on confidential internal CNMI-Preston Gates correspondence to his superiors, which was manipulated to taint us. George Miller, Interior, US labor unions and the anti-Tom DeLay, liberal U.S. media all made hay of the “congressional junkets” and “corrupt lobbying” of 1997.

So the next time you encounter some Preston Gates bashing, look at where it is coming from, because the chances are, nine times out of ten, you are probably looking at someone who hates the CNMI and desperately wants a totally unjustified U.S. Federal takeover of our islands.