Of, for, and by the people—CNMI impotency! (Part 2)
Second of a three-part series
The truth is we are seeing more taxes, fewer flights with arrivals continuing to decline we must ask, if we ask “are we better off now than before COVID, the answer will be a resounding no, as nothing has changed for the better for the people nor for the CNMI. The impotence in our economy for the people is obvious with no real improvements and nothing even planned to improve our economy other than crying to the feds and taxes. This is why I’ve been screaming and yelling for years to get a real economist on the Hill working with our executive and Legislature but instead we continue to suffer under what I see as picknick table discussions and decisions on our economy. Just because one may be smart, it by-no-means qualifies them as an economist—so who is really our economist!
We are still fooling around with the Casino Commission that should have been fired nearly two years ago for their impotency but that’s our politics for the people. Now they claim to be waiting for another member to appointed so they can make a decision for the people that only takes the governor to do. I have been warning the people for at least two years that this commission is not worth the paper and ink that put them in power. Heck, they didn’t even collect their own salaries so what makes anyone think they are going to do anything that will bring in revenues for the CNMI, which was their primary purpose. Yet, IPI owes the people of the CNMI over $164 million with no official claim filed in court by the Casino Commission for this money owed to the people. When are we the people going to be able to really turn the page and move on to better things, as the Casino Commission didn’t even try to get stock in the hotel/casino when I told them when COVID hit, as I knew it was over then. Only one representative (Marrisa Flores) spoke out trying to do something without success, as she didn’t have any real support from her counterparts.
Our justice system is also not working in the best interests of the people when it comes to prosecuting high-profile cases. No disrespect but, we have some of the smartest people in the CNMI in our justice system, yet their focus has been so much on the here and now that forecasting and preparing for the future is a lost art. For entirely too long we the people have been seeing all of our high-profile cases having to be adjudicated by a pro tempore judge. Well, after two decades or more, it’s time to change the law to allow our chief justice to appoint a judge from outside the CNMI every two years limiting their stay and ending the scenarios when all of our judges recuse themselves. If Herman Guerrero can get the Legislature to create a phony bill for education then I’m highly confident our chief justice can get the Legislature to fix this never-ending problem a pro tempore judge—it’s reform for the people.
Ambrose has always been of and for the people and what’s best for all of us and not just those political emissaries who want to capitalize on favoritism/nepotism for selfish reason, like we see is going on with the cannabis industry. But we can see this same phenomenon going on when the local people are even being squeezed out by big business “favoritism” over their own island, as any economist worth their title will tell you Managaha is too small and will never be suited for a big business operation, that kills the smaller operators, unless they make it a complete water/theme park. There is only so much to be made from the Managaha operation and giving most of it to only one is a virtual monopoly that kills the very people who own the island. It is clear example of the favoritism that exist within the confines of our government for a monopoly of one to be given virtual absolute control of Managaha and I’m the only one speaking up and fighting for these people, not their frivolous elected leader(s). Stop killing the smaller operators, which is why Garapan is a mess today, playing power games with Best Sunshine that has since road off into the sunset being way over $100-million richer, as I warned them when it switched to IPI but no one listened. We need a real economist and fighters for the people on the Hill. If we don’t get better independent and Democrat politicians and stop electing the same old GOP gang then we voters are doomed to keep down the same path to nowhere—and that’s a fact jack!
Ambrose M. Bennett is an economist who minored in sociology, political scientist, a retired teacher, and former CNMI Board of Education member, a James Madison Fellow (U.S. constitutional scholar), a Fulbright-Hays and lifetime humanities scholar who resides in Kagman III in the CNMI.
