2013: THE MONEY CURSE, Pt.1 DIARY OF A POLITICAL ZOMBIE

 I used to be young and happy. This job sucks!

Budget was a bitch.

After the report of review was announced and threatened to send every member of the last government to jail, hardly anyone could remember there was a budget at all. But I took notes. And not to boast, but FLOGG notes are waaaaay better than the replays on NTN.

For the benefit of people who are interested but are allergic to boredom, here's the raw feed from THE FLOGG DIARIES. More on the actual budget to follow this week. (And then, we'll take apart the Report On Flambeau Corruption, or whatever it's called, I promise.)

BACK TO BUDGET, BACK TO BASICS, BACK TO BLACK

He started by reading some statutory instruments.  Lots of stuff about alien landholding licenses, something about finance and something about the St Lucia parliament. I knew what I was looking for so I wasn’t listening to those parts too well.

No Frederick yet, I noticed.

Pierre says something about motor vehicle whatever.

Emma says something about fiscal incentives for Baron Foods and price control. RKL. Dalson. Kenny does something with the appropriations bill. Fletcher walks in late looking well stuffed with ideas, notions and other things that result in a PhD in crop physiology. (Don’t bitch about it. It’s way better than a PhD in telecom penetration rates in the state of Maryland, which is the kind of thing that passes as doctoral thesis in the degree factory, nowadays.)

Procedural stuff.

Pip hi-fives Kenny. They confer and chuckle on something. I think I know what it is. I think everyone including Flambeau knows what it is. But over the next few days of April 2013, Labour will play their part so well, that I will forget that I know exactly what will happen and start to pay attention to what is actually happening. Imagine that. A higher up gave me a heads-up and like a fool, I sit there paying attention to what’s being said, rather than focusing of what’s important – what isn’t being said.

THE DEVELOPMENT CROSSROADS

T'ink ah lyin'. I was happier in opposition....King on vacation compared to me!

“Unprecedented era…new threats…globalization…natural disasters…recession…”

I’m quoting Kenny Anthony here. Hope I’m not taking anything out of context.

“EU coming apart at the seams…” I’m not sure that’s a quote. He said something like that.

“ECCU contributing to deficits, debts and contraction…” That’s a quote. That’s the true story of Kenny’s life right now. It’s basically the worst job in the country. You have to feel at least a little sympathy for the guy who has to clean up the mess left by the Lucian version of George W Bush. The economy is so messed up that the most optimistic message he has at his disposal is something like, “Well, we’re better off than we were then, we’re doing better than our friends in the neighbourhood, but to tell you the truth, we’re still totally screwed.”

He says something kind about the way Jamaica blew away a $1.27 billion loan and now has to open up wider to the economic pederasty of the IMF. (Don’t look it up. Basically, I’m saying that they have to let the IMF bull them.) Frederick saunters in. Kenny totally ignores him. But others in Labour are happy to see the King-maker.

“New loans were more painful,” he said. “St Kitts-Nevis and Antigua-Barbuda also turned to the IMF. Grenada defaulted on March interest payments on bonds, affecting everyone in the ECCU. We can no longer afford to ignore….”

And I think, “We could afford to ignore it before?” But that’s pedantic, hair-splitting bullshit, right now. Redundancy intended. Now is the most important crossroad in St Lucian history. Now matters in a way that people in the past could never have imagine.