T&T: Damn straight and high time!

Whoooo-hoo! Uncle Sam's voice in T&T is playing Santa Claus. He's keeping a list and checking it twice.

Well, as woman (the expression is "as man"), and a T&T woman at that, I have to say it is high time. Note to Trinis and the rest of the world: Sept. 11 did not happen on your soil. 3,000 of your people were not murdered by jihadists while they were going about their business. If you all don't like U.S. vigilance as deterrent to further terrorist attack, stay the hell home. We're not about to sacrifice our security here so other people will like us. Clinton is not president anymore, get used to it!

Here's an editorial piece from 2/16/03 Trinidad Guardian. I tell you, it frosted me. It really frosted me.

Last week, Ambassador Austin ... accused the T&T media of being joined in a conspiracy to defame his country.

He made this charge in the context of recounting the good things the US has been doing for Trinidad and Tobago, and the region.

Just the week before, he had handed over four vehicles and 11 computers to the Organised Crime and Narcotics Unit.

He cited Washington’s contribution to HIV/AIDS research, and other help to bring T&T’s business environment to international standards.

So his remarks to last Wednesday’s Rotary Club meeting bore the flavour of an Uncle Sam sorely hurt by the ingratitude of his beneficiaries.

The USA was never expected to admit keeping a list and checking it twice to see if recipients in T&T of crumbs of favour have been naughty or nice in their attitude to the hand that fed them.

It turns out, however, that Ambassador Austin’s office has been keeping a list, and assigning items on it to categories of pro-America or anti-America.

It's high time the U.S. does this. What's the mantra around the world? The U.S. bad; U.S. evil. Nobody points to the good that the U.S. does for countries all over the globe. Who went to Somalia to help starving Muslims? Saudi Arabia? Hell, no. The U.S. Who went to Bosnia to do the same? The Europeans? Nope. The U.S. Who reaches out every time some part of the world has a tragedy? The U.S. Who is giving $15B to fight AIDS in Africa and the Caribbean? The Arabs? The Europeans? No. The U.S. Who defended the Europeans against Soviet aggression in the post-WW II period? The U.S. Who rebuilt Japan after they attacked us at Pearl Harbor and the U.S. military bombed their country to smithereens? The U.S., and we didn't have to. Who did the same for Germany? The U.S. Who liberated millions of Iraqis, Kuwaitis, kept the Kurds safe from Saddam's chemical weapons? The Saudis? Nope. The U.S. What does the U.S. get in return? It sure as heck isn't gratitude. Nobody says the U.S. shouldn't be criticized, criticism is good especially when it's constructive. More often than not, though, the criticism is just plain old vindictiveness, and it is often made out of plain old jealousy of U.S. power and wealth.

Between January 2 and February 10 this year, the Ambassador reported, 20 opinions “unfavourable to America” had appeared in the local media. “Not one was favourable,” he noted.

Apparently, the US Embassy especially resented articles critical of the new US requirement for the fingerprinting of visitors.

Like Mr Manning, Mr Austin did not try to prove the existence of an unholy media alliance against his interest; it was sufficient just to allege it.

But he might have noted that the blanket requirement of fingerprinting of visitors has been criticised not only in T&T, but also in other countries, especially in Europe, where this has been seen as an excessively hassling security response to 9/11.

That the Europeans criticize a thing does not mean that the Caribbean ought to follow them. The Europeans are beset with their own problems with the jihadists in their midst, and they are managing that problem very badly. Remember Germany let a terrorist walk recently? Remember France and hijabs? If the Europeans wish to let every little Nayef, Saddam, Osama into their country, that is there choice. The U.S. government has a Constitution it must follow, according to which the primary task of the president is the defense of the nation from attacks from without and within. Fingerprinting has served to deter many a terrorist from legal entry into the country, and it is why Mexico, and its human smuggling, and the Muslim Triangle are so important.

Nor could the Ambassador be unaware of the fact that, within the US itself, much opposition has greeted the various illiberal overreachings of the security regime imposed by post-9/11 security-related legislation and edicts.

American librarians, normally quiescent, are up in arms against provisions of the USA Patriot Act that allow unprecedented invasions of the privacy of library users’ and bookstore customers’ records.

I suppose it is too much to ask The Guardian staff writers to stop siding with Democrat hyperventilation over DHS, cease watching CNN and the BBC, and pay attention to FoxNN so they actually get a fair and balanced view of what is really happening in the U.S. with regard to DHS and the laws that have been enacted. Furthermore, a little research at Google would help The Guardian to have a clue about that which they know nothing. A little research would have revealed that the American Librarian Association (ALA) is a leftist one that could not even stand in defense of Cuban house librarians, and that librarians have been asked to do nothing by DHS; they have received not one request.

Many aspects of the Bush administration’s response to 9/11 — from the Patriot Act, through the illegal and open-ended Guantanamo Bay detentions, to the war on Iraq — are being hotly questioned inside the US and elsewhere.

Iraq is in shambles in almost every respect. The US rationale for invasion, based on the fanciful allegation about weapons of mass destruction, is also in shambles.

Remember, this is an election year, and the Democrats, who usually say anything they want and get a free pass from the media, are being more mendacious than usual. Moreover, the claims made here are so specious that they must come from either the BBC or CNN. The writer needs to start doing serious research on the internet.

In the US election campaign, the personal credibility of President Bush — who appointed Mr Austin here — is the central issue of the moment.

While such issues are fair game for the media in the US and elsewhere, Ambassador Austin should not expect a free ride in the T&T media, even in return for US aid.

Opposition by T&T media and citizens to Bush Administration policy should not be equated with anti-Americanism.

And Mr Austin, if he tries, could probably find better media relations role models to follow than the T&T Prime Minister.

The personal credibility of Mr. Bush is an issue because both the American media and the DNC wish it to be in their bid to undermine the president on a perceived area of strength, the prosecution of the war. The fact of the matter is this, Mr. Bush acted on the same intelligence that the rest of the world had. His credibility is not at issue here; instead, the credibility of the rest of the world is, for they were willing to let a thug remain in power to oppress, murder, rape, and plunder his own people for his own profit.

The arguments put forward in this editorial in The Guardian amount to less than a hill of beans. Deflecting from local ingratitude to Mr. Bush's "credibility" is a nice ploy, but it won't work. The U.S. does not have the right to demand gratitude for its efforts around the world, but it will not hurt recipients of U.S. largesse to show it.