Bleakness Scrooges Christmas

There’s the thunderous roar for bailouts by US carmakers as conservative congressional representatives cringe at the thought of taxpayers paying for it. There are also the bankrupt state governments seeking billions to stay afloat. Here at home, a bleak picture of what lies ahead triggers the inevitable sinking feeling of helplessness.

You quiz how the President-elect would dispose of the combined national bankruptcies—government and private industries—as he heads to his new residence on Pennsylvania Avenue. After feeding off the hog’s back, labor unions must defray any and all restructuring costs of the big three automakers. If there’s nothing up that alley, then let bankruptcies take a free fall. Taxpayers across the country had nothing to do with the excesses of the auto industry and labor union bosses.

Closer to home, I’ve done critical review of the economic study commissioned by the Department of the Interior that also peeked into US policy out here over the last three decades. Two issues were prominent in this section of the report:

1). A critical note of studies done in years past that recommended against federalization of labor and immigration. 2). The lack of consistency in how the federal government has handled major economic policy issues, including the lack of representation on Capitol Hill and Pennsylvania Avenue for the NMI and other insular possessions.

It strongly recommended deletion of the two provisions now under federalization. It further recommended revisiting certain substantive provisions of the Covenant Agreement to ascertain non-unilateral disposition of the political and economic fate the NMI from the other side of the Pacific. These recommendations make sense but the question is: Are we sensible enough to grasp the essence of protecting the rights of indigenous governance for greater degree of self-government?

If we miss this critically substantive point, then it is equally an exercise in futility going through the democratic exercise of voting for titular heads and policymakers who fail to see their primary fiduciary responsibilities of building and strengthening our democratic institutions by protecting what’s rightfully the purview of local governance. How sad that the lights are on but nobody is home.

To retain the status quo presents a set of challenges that are still better than the unintended consequences of total economic devastation and annihilation under federalization. To say that the federal lawsuit isn’t the answer but a litigation on Compact impact funds is to demonstrate how one can sink into his crab hole questioning his own awareness and obvious failure to step up to the plate while in office. It’s sickening how our very own people have opted to don the role of white Trojan horses.

Get real people and take another look around you, especially the fate of our young scholars who will someday take over the helm, only to find a totally devastated playing field we left behind in negligence. I am not prepared to Scrooge the future of posterity and how gratifying the season of hope to quietly tread and revisit issues we’ve opted to ignore because we’re too busy working the pasture of white Trojan horses. Felis Noche Buena yan Ano Nuebo para todos!