One of the bigger hypocritical postures Western Nations took to perpetuate the imperialism they claim to be the sin of Nations not Western, was the establishment of their own philosophical monitors to tell them whose politics is at variance with theirs.
So we got these things called Think Tanks – an alternative intellectual infrastructure fueled by a superior entitlement bias that would categorize my politics as an ideology, theirs as the softer term philosophy, which, after political manipulation, concludes that mine is so dangerous that it would have to be eradicated to preserve ‘western democracy’.
They are typically reverse engineering academia outfits that defend entrenched positions via carefully pruned research that supports the opinions of the body that funds the tank and pays the thinkers.
Developing policy, they claim, is their mission but being already one-sided, the policy development can sometimes look like stark political bias, if not slugging political combat.
The recent Opinion by Tank Thinker Evan Ellis of Center for Strategic and International Studies titled ‘GUYANA Opportunities and Challenges for the United States and Caribbean Basin’ , brought all this to mind.
His organization’s tag-line ‘Ranked # 1 in US by Global Go to think Tank Index’, intended to convey some gravitas, did amuse somewhat.
Brand- US is now involuntarily associated with Trump with whom no one associates the word ‘think’…but the boundless confidence that these self- contained think tanks flaunt can rob them of knowing what it is to know things.
The Overview angered, more than it shifted the center of political gravity, with its misaligned points of virtue that can so easily be checked for exaggeration.
…“unique combination of youth and technocratic ideas, pragmatic talent with decades of political, administrative, and international experience of Bharat Jagdeo in Guyanese politics”…
I mean really… they had to know that the “youth” of Irfaan Ali is as remarkable as his felony record and the ‘dropped’ charges merely render him a felon with passport access to countries of inconstant morality.
And Jagdeo’s technocratic talent and years of administrative experience?
Is that code for sustaining a 40% poverty ratio even after relief through Heavily Indebted Poor Country Initiative…inclusive of Debt Cancellation in 1999 and 2003, plus that of the Chinese convoluted debt retirement/replacement?
Ellis’s piece may have been sautéed for digestion by other stomachs but we’ve consumed it and will complain of the political colic that it has caused…
Sure, we get that the thrust is to halo this Government, once excoriated without equivocation by US State Dept and to whom WikiLeaks should be grateful for the over pouring of show -and- tell on how to conduct government engineered lawlessness – in spite of a drug enforcement framework and despite labels like ‘Bribe Tolerant’ , as it pertains to the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
The scandal is that this Tank piece doesn’t even follow the protocol of the blurred lines that segue into advocacy but is a bare faced force feeding of fairy dust pleasantries …when the comprehensive character warts of this criminal duo are hanging like political barnacles off of their alleged characters.
And we’re not accusing him of lying in the least but we’ll state that there is the appearance of a purposeful deconstruction of reality in Mr. Ellis’ opinion…which offends patriotic Guyanese with an acute allergy to foreign manipulation.
Maybe his intent was simply to mischaracterize the foisting of the felonious President onto the population, as if he were some second coming.
But we understand the power of disinformation, the churning of which shapes public opinion when disseminated from these privileged platforms, providing soft wax for the footprints of these vaulted charlatans…servants in waiting for the hypocritical West.
That’s why we screamed our suspicions over US Ambassador Lynch being appointed Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary to Guyana in January of 2019, shortly after the No Confidence vote in December of 2018.
It was a title that gave Madam operational latitude in Guyana, right when the US was using the malleable mind of its – fill in the blank – Trump to do some warmongering in Venezuela that tickled the powder keg of John Bolton and promised Marco Rubio deity amongst Venezuelan Transplants to Florida, that would guarantee him ‘Senatordom‘ way past his current level of dotishness.
The US’ lack of fondness for the PPP and its ideology dates back to President Lyndon Johnson’s 1968 concern over Cheddi Jagan’s socialist ideology which is the same strain of politics that its State Department spurned during Jagdeo’s governance.
It’s ‘Diplomacy’ comes as a package deal, aid and protection from incursion if you support our regional interests – geopolitical dominance– by refusing to give “our enemies permission to set up military bases“.
And factoring in to all this is the chronology of the Plenipotentiary Madam’s activities
– arriving in Guyana on or around March 9th 2019, presenting her credentials to Granger on March 13th and on April 10th receiving an email from Mercury LLC on behalf of Jagdeo and his Party about his inveigled No Confidence Motion; all less than 30 days after pledging service to all Guyanese-
which neatly packages the Madam’s mission… for all the opportunistic naysayers calling this diplomatic asymmetry coincidence.
WHAT EVER !
Venezuela’s oil had been presented to the vacant Trump as a conduit to his place in political history by his more deft lieutenants, Marco Rubio and John Bolton.
Madam’s mission was to deliver.
Using a Government of thugs to accomplish the mission is filed under ‘necessary resources’.
John Bolton’s lament “We once had a capacity for clandestine efforts to overthrow governments. I wish we could get those back.”…informs our opinion.
And we’re submitting that it is a compass for Tank Thinkers rose coloring the characters of Jagdeo and Ali, whose shade of tarnish sprawl across the covert records of countries that keep them.
Ellis’ piece should have earned swift opprobrium for the contra characterization of these men, known more for their political aberrations than service… Pertinent Officials in Guyana...
So being precocious or as others call it ‘fronting’, we’ve decided to register some sort of protest on behalf of those who will always see Jagdeo as irredeemably vulgar, Irfaan as a felon who escaped justice because vulgarity heads the system and the current state of politics and Government in Guyana as a product of foreign interference, related to the country’s new found oil bounty and its geographic proximity to Venezuela.
Ellis’ Tank piece may have been delivered in the vein of that Machiavellian principle … Use a lie if it suits your purposes; say it often enough and it will be adopted as truth.
And again, we’re not calling the goodly Tank Master a liar.
We’re just saying that, irrespective of how often Tanks present this irreverent duo in re-made image, the rest of us will continue to see them as the political marauders who machinated the collapse of a country, once known as the breadbasket of the region by depleting its basket… one loaf at a time.
And they’re back on the job.
