Mea culpa time for NMI

The CNMI’s wobbly fiscal spine is forcibly pinned against the wall of some $1.1 billion in debts while continuing deficit spending—spending money in advance of actual collection—a dangerous habit that inhibits any opportunity for growth.

Unbridled spending shows our inability to domesticate spending on spending. This could be attributed to leadership’s inability to define, “What’s North?” And I’m not alluding to direction either. If you could resolve this query then you don’t have any problem with perception. If you can’t, you must work on instructional reading assignments. This allows you to venture into meaningful comprehension of substantive issues.

Does anybody know what really is the fiscal posture of the CNMI? Amidst the huge pile of debts, is there really a chance the annual pension of $45 million could be paid per the settlement agreement?

Aren’t there other significant obligations to contend with amidst revenue generation having headed Deep South? It means we all must reinvent the stick dance so we double it up with hopeful rain dance to see if the canoe of solvency could move out the harbor of bankruptcy. De dios mihu!

Steady trip to welfare status

It was in the mid-’80s when I played golf with a Kanaka boy from Honolulu at a links in Mililani. After several beers, we dropped him home at a large dwelling with a huge neatly trimmed yard. He said he makes $36,000 a year from federal subsidies. No wonder he wasn’t in a hurry to find meaningful employment. Uncle Sam bankrolls his needs plus a stint chasing after a small ball.

In this connection, with spikes in health premiums and other increases eating into the pockets of families here, it seems the beginning to forcing more healthy people to slide into welfare status over the more meaningful means of self-support. Was this by design or happenstance? I mean, why work when Uncle Sam covers most of my daily needs?

We hail from a culture of responsibility where our parents teach us to be independent. But even with dedication, this discipline slips through the cracks when meaningful opportunities no longer exist. It brings the lack of economic opportunities squarely back to leadership sleeping contently on the switchboard. Call it sleepwalking or negligence or both.

How do we begin addressing and resolving this socio-economic malady? Or is this supposedly the microcosm of our future? It begins with economic prosperity, the latter term a very discouraging word amidst the famine at home.

Pagan: Military assimilation

In 1974, I spent several weeks in Kwajalein, Rongelap, Utirik, and Bikini with the Atomic Energy Team for the annual check-up of islanders adversely affected by radiation.

I caught the ferry to Ebeye loaded with employees working on Kwajalein who return home at 6pm. Small Cessna airplanes ferry employees for a round of golf, swimming, partying and bowling from nearby Roi Namur. So what’s my point?

The development of Pagan need not be solely the CNMI’s. The military should find the money for the emplacement of basic infrastructure to allow resettlement of the island. The NMI is struggling in the filthy swamp of fiscal impotence—broke!

Islanders could work with the military establishment and community. It’s a peaceful co-existence that should reap the most benefits for both. It’s called assimilation. It’s a useful paradigm that leads to harmony between host and the military.

Sterile policies

If the issue is deeply mired in the filthy swamp of economic dystopia—where nothing works—why are policymakers so enamored with sterile policies that have nothing to do with economic revival or reinvestment? How could any of them miss the boat?

Indeed, the issue is of such magnitude that it requires personal perception and understanding of the deepening mess and what must be done to ease the village-level hardship. We haven’t seen any legislation of stride so designed to reinvigorate anchor investments.

The obvious disorientation is dizzying, all the while the heavy pining from our people for some sense of leadership. But there’s nothing up that alley. It’s the usual mediocrity in business as usual. Or is it the people they represent who’ve missed the boat? Sterile and irrelevant policies aren’t the answers either. This tired refrain has gone on for too long now.

Deepening mess

Pay cuts plus the increase in the cost of living are sufficient reasons for families literally struggling to look for answers and help from other family members.

When these costs eat into the family purse, you darn well hope that help of any sort at the eleventh hour is a must. Is there hope for help from upstairs?

Reminds me of a joke of two friends drinking at the Sugar Dock in Susupe. About noon, one of them took a plunge into the water. Returning to the surface, he pulled a chicken thigh from his pocket and started munching.

Asked his friend, “Where did you get your chicken?”

Said he, “The guys downstairs are partying and handed me one.” His buddy asked for direction. He pointed to a rocky shallow area.

When his friend took a dive he quickly resurfaced, face disarranged, all bloody and seriously injured too. Asked what happened, he replied, “They’re drunk already and slammed me with fistful of knuckles.” Oooops! Must be a messy dive, yeah?

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With a good number of our people suffering from kidney failure at an alarming rates, shouldn’t this be an urgent issue for research by CHC? It would be good to find out what causes kidney failure? Is it salt, fat, chronic case of Type II diabetes or just what is it? This alarming trend requires public education, i.e., causes and how to deal with the beast. I’d be more than happy to assist in the explanation of this material free of charge!