Anyone who follows Jamaican and American politics will appreciate the similarities of current divisive paralysis. Neither government can achieve its aims because of deep, sour, personal differences between the die-hearted base of both parties. And the public interest suffers every time. Legislation and administration which advance national priorities, be it reducing the deficit in the US or effectively stanching crime in Jamaica become impossible. Compromise is seen as the ultimate political weakness.

There are so many more examples. Immigration reform is impossible in the American Congress just as the fulsome revamping of education and training is stymied locally. Reforming the electoral system there and bringing coherence to the public transportation system here, are cans which have to be kicked down the road because of a refusal to find common cause.

From now on in both countries, as the USA continues its run-up to presidential and congressional elections and as Jamaica anticipates local and national elections, everything will take on a partisan colour. Suspicion across the aisle and on many street corners will be like a corpse’s odour – so awful that you cannot escape its pervasiveness.

LISTENING ONLY TO THEMSELVES

Take last week’s crime issues in Jamaica. There are the horrible murders in St James. Following on the regular daily carnage, the slaughter of the two little boys causes the nation to retch. Holness draws the state of emergency (SOEs) card again. Most of us agree that it is justified in this instance. But he can’t help himself but to sling blame at the PNP for not collaborating in the perpetual SOEs which he desperately thinks would work in the hopelessly socially maladjusted St James reality.

He and the security leaders want everyone to cooperate but the Crime Monitoring Committee, set up precisely to foster jointure in anti-crime policy and action has been scorned by his own people. Clearly they want no help.

“Anytime a government resorts to blaming the Opposition for its failure to deliver on their mandate and their responsibilities to the people, it is a clear sign that they have accepted that they have outlived their usefulness.” Andrew, that’s our friend Dr Keith Rowley talking about you!

Perkins used to quote Yeats about the “centre not holding”– not realising that he was as much creating as observing the cracks in national purpose. What other road “less travelled” was ever suggested? Last week Stultz and Lloyd Smith, Observer columnists, both affirmed that no one side, however much armed with SOEs and the hangman’s priapism, can quell the rage, the anomie, the nihilism, the angst which fuels dog-hearted crime in Jamaica.

It could be so different both in Jamaica and the United States. There they have military might and the strength of their dollar to prop things up. We have wisdom, boldness and humour, what Jonathan Haidt calls “moral capital”, no less valuable, honed from generations of faith, struggle and sacrifice, the value of which we are squandering by elevating egotism, greed and lust for petty power. Check the effectiveness of the municipal corporations.

Daryl says it would be dangerous if his party is not re-elected. Who, beside himself and his kith, is he speaking for? The more pressing risk is that any other administration will trip over the same fault lines of corruption and tribal reflex that makes this one so distasteful.

May I recommend to him, and us, this quote from Bertrand Russell. “Every community is exposed to opposite dangers: ossification through too much discipline and reverence for tradition and on the other hand, dissolution through growth of an individualism and personal independence which makes cooperation impossible.”

The majority in both countries, who are alienated by divisiveness which haemorrhages national spirit, must now cohere around those political leaders and non-government actors who are prepared to rescue the holy arts of mutuality and cooperation from the bad vibes of “politics time”.

O FOR PEARNEL!

The gauche and convoluted attempts to shield the Auditor General’s and Integrity Commission’s reports from the public are only reinforcing public suspicion, now reaching the level of conviction, that this government has much to hide. All the pontificating about Standing Orders is counterproductive to the same guineagogs rabid to shield themselves from scrutiny. O for Pearnel, partisan and nationalist all in one, who as Speaker would never have tied up himself in last Tuesday’s smelly procedural sargassum.

Leggo all reports as soon as the drone delivers them to Gordon House!

And please, Prime Minister, for our honour and yours, don’t ask us to swallow that you are just too busy with national affairs to attend promptly to your integrity returns – over two years. Really sir?

Pressure bus’…

The European Union, just like the United States, is intent on foisting their understanding of ‘inclusivity’ on client countries like Jamaica as condition for aid and trade. That is the essence of the resolution at the ACP/EU meeting in Samoa which, under pressure from church and other groups, our government is pulling back from supporting. They are to be commended for being responsive.

However honoured in the breach, our nation subscribes to broad Judeo-Christian values which are quite distinct from the post-modern hyper-individualism of some governments with which we have to deal. Independence means little more than poppy show unless we defend, at whatever price, the moral and social principles relating to respectful personal relationships, the right to life, liberty and family integrity. There is plenty room for tolerance within those precepts but they are our birthright which cannot be sold for any mess of potage offered by modern-day colonial powers.

‘WOULD HAVE’

Public officials, from teachers to police persons, have lately adopted the habit of speaking about what they “would have done” instead of saying directly what they did. The “would have” tries to inject a cute subjunctive element in place of the stark indicative tense. Did you or did you not do what you say you “would have” done? It doesn’t work. Talk straight.