by Simon
•Simon is a young Bahamian with things on his mind
who wishes to remain anonymous. His column 'Front Porch' is published
every Tuesday in the Nassau Guardian. He can be reached at
frontporchguardian@gmail.com.
Bahamians enjoy front row seats to an unfolding story in which two longstanding rivals are about to turn an outdated cold war into at least a lukewarm relationship.
Just about every step in the thawing of relations between the U.S. and Cuba will be met with the sky-is-falling panic by true believers across both the Florida Straits and the so called left-right divide.
As a point of reference these straits serve as a maritime border and as potentially common ground for three neighbours: The Bahamas, Cuba and the U.S.A. Of course, “straits” can also refer to an array of difficulties.
A constellation of events will shape the pace of the rapprochement between our geographically closest neighbours. How these events are taken advantage of, missed or disregarded will determine the substance of the evolving relationship.
Obama/Symonette Comparison Is Flawed
by Simon
•Simon is a young Bahamian with things on his mind who wishes to remain anonymous. His column 'Front Porch' is published every Tuesday in the Nassau Guardian. He can be reached at frontporchguardian@gmail.com.
It is easy – indeed, too easy – to blunder and bluster into bad comparisons and misleading and misplaced analogies. In September a local columnist concluded:
“Furthermore, let’s not forget that Barack [Obama] is a black man running for president in a white world. Translate that same situation to The Bahamas and that would mean a white man running for prime minister in a black world.
“But wait. Haven’t we already floated that balloon with Brent Symonette and burst it with a lot of racist talk from the same politicians who are now shouting loudest in defence of Barack Obama. But that’s another story.”
Actually, it is a dramatically different story. But wait! Haven’t we already floated that balloon and burst a lot of racist talk by having as our first Premier after internal self-rule a white Bahamian, Sir Roland Symonette, the father of the current Deputy Prime Minister.
What is so inept about the Barack Obama/Brent Symonette comparison is that white Bahamians were not historically locked out of the highest levels of political or economic power and are not locked out today.
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