Who Will Cry for the Little Boy?
Who will cry for the little boy?
Lost and all alone.
Who will cry for the little boy?
Abandoned without his own?
Who will cry for the little boy?
He cried himself to sleep.
Who will cry for the little boy?
He never had for keeps.
Who will cry for the little boy?
He walked the burning sand
Who will cry for the little boy?
The boy inside the man.
Who will cry for the little boy?
Who knows well hurt and pain
Who will cry for the little boy?
He died again and again.
Who will cry for the little boy?
A good boy he tried to be
Who will cry for the little boy?
Who cries inside of me
Written by: Antwone Fisher
The PNP’s Challenge
Recent revelations by the government regarding housing and education has caused alarm among members of the opposition PNP. The nation was shocked to learn that nearly one million citizens of this country are squatters. The former Minister of Finance, Dr. Omar Davies has expressed surprise at the revelation in housing. There have been other damning revelations in sectors such as education and health, which seemingly have stunned the PNP. One cannot help but wonder who governed the country for the preceding 18 years. Are we to believe that the sad state of affairs which this country has found itself in should be attributed to the current JLP administration? To this day the PNP hasn’t seem to come to terms with the reason for their late election defeats.
The party continues to stand before the electorate of this country touting the same failed economic policies, the same failed social policies and the same leaders responsible for the problems we face. The party leader, Mrs. Simpson Miller, has expressed her desire to adopt what she terms “The Progressive Agenda”. How can the electorate see this as ‘progressive’, when the people who failed, and failed miserably, at creating progress in this country, are the ones piloting her agenda? The nation still associates the party with an enormous debt and failed fiscal policies, there are memories of Netscape, Soultrea and the list goes on, we watched as Air Jamaica and JUTC lost billions of dollars. The party leader cannot expect the people of this country to take her seriously when she proposes to have a vision for development. What have we been doing while this country careened out of control? What was being done when the rest of the world was recording growth? Where was the progressive agenda? These are questions the Opposition Leader will have to answer seriously if she expects to move back into her old office at Jamaica House.
We see where she has made progress in harnessing young fresh minds such as Lisa Hanna and Senator Basil Waite. However, for the most part, the same faces of the past still stand before us, standing in the mess of their failures. A drastic change of the guard has become necessary. The PNP has to arise and renew itself, realising that a progressive agenda cannot be achieved by those who have proven themselves un-progressive. The people of this country deserve more from the PNP, they are no longer immature voters voting along party lines, there has been a realisation in this country that rejects incompetence and opts for progress. The Opposition Leader has the agenda, what she needs is the will to carry it out, even if this means putting country first and party second; something the current leadership of the party has failed to understand.
Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell
The policy has long been if you weren’t asked, then you shouldn’t tell. President Bill Clinton, citing the blatant discrimination which existed against homosexuals wanting to serve in the United States military and considering that any legislation which advocated gays serving openly in the military was almost certainly doomed to fail after ideological battles had been waged by Republicans and Democrats and Liberals and Conservatives, devised the best solution to suit the need; “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”. In effect what this policy did was to endorse the “downlow” lifestyle. Gay rights groups across America launched scathing attacks on the policy for its requirement that homosexuals lie about their sexuality in order to serve their country. The campaigns for repeal did not gather momentum in the Bush years, as the socially conservative President was unlikely to sign any such legislation into law. And then came Obama.
From as early as 2007, then Senator Obama made it clear that he felt “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” was a fundamental wrong, he bemoaned the denial of the right to homosexuals to actively express their sexuality and serve their country, as far as the President presumptive was concerned; the two were not mutually exclusive. This post isn’t about the effectiveness or ineffectiveness of the policy. No. This is about America standing up and doing what is right, it is about being true to the words of the Declaration of Independence which state that all men are indeed created equal and endowed with inalienable rights; fundamental among these is the right to the pursuit of happiness. It was therefore an extraordinary feat when on December 18, 2010, the United States Senate voted 65-31 to repeal the policy which former Harvard Law Dean and current Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, Elena Kagan called “abhorrent”. The historic nature of that vote is not to be missed. It is more that a vote to repeal a legislation and policy that had long outlived its usefulness. It was a vote which reinforced the ideals of America as a country of freedom, it declared to the world that America is still a place where liberty and rights are respected and most importantly, it brought that great republic one step closer to what President Obama describes as “a more perfect union.” It is unfortunate and deeply troubling that veteran Senators such as former Presidential nominee John McCain would seek to use fear and prejudice to block the repeal. By positing that deaths could occur because of the repeal, the opponents of the repeal tried to set America back two steps, they tried to bring that country back to a place where fear was used to justify inaction. President Obama and the supporters of the repeal have opted to be hopeful rather than fearful and as he said in his campaign for the White House, “there has never been anything false about hope.” This writer applauds the Democratic party, Senator Joe Lieberman, the brave Republicans who did what was right and voted for repeal, President Obama, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs Admiral Mullen and Defence Secretary Robert Gates for sheer bravery and courage, for standing up and siding with the 77% of Americans and overwhelming majority of army personnel who see nothing wrong with gays serving openly in the military. We await the certification of the repeal by Secretary Gates and President Obama and then for the 60 day period to elapse. And then finally if someone is asked, they can tell.
Mr. Editor
