A Limey In Bermuda

Wrong

In their latest post, the PLP blog is (surprise, surprise) attacking Michael Dunkley again. Unfortunately, one of their accusations is flat wrong:

"Dunkley Never Condemned Vile, Racist Cartoons. UBP supporters compared the Premier to Hitler, Mussolini and Idi Amin. Michael Dunkley declined to condemn these vile, disgusting and racist attacks."

Uh, yes he did:

Mr. Dunkley said: "We don't know who is behind this or who is putting them out there, but we do not accept them or tolerate them in any way.

"I want to be clear that we do not accept or condone this kind of behaviour and ask all individuals involved to join us on the high road."

I expect the PLP's blog will be issuing an apology shortly.

UPDATE: Following the publication of this post, the PLP amended their statement thus:

"Dunkley Never Condemned Did Not Strongly Condemn Vile, Racist Cartoons. UBP supporters compared the Premier to Hitler, Mussolini and Idi Amin. Michael Dunkley declined to condemn never overtly condemned these vile, disgusting and racist attacks. Update: Per the linked post, Michael Dunkley said that the UBP didn't "accept," "tolerate" or "condone" the ads -- however, he failed to outright condemn the ads."

Give it up, guys. You're just making yourselves look foolish.

The meaning of "attrition"

For the benefit of the PLP and some of their supporters, allow me to explain how the UBP can trim the civil service without firing a single civil servant.

The UBP's manifesto pledge was to "reduce the size of the civil service through attrition". The key word is "attrition", which is defined thus:

"a gradual reduction in work force without firing of personnel, as when workers resign or retire and are not replaced."

So, no flip-flopping at all.

Clear as mud

The PLP have responded to my post pointing out their inconsistency on the issue of who will be eligible for free day care.

In a statement on their website (which continues their impolite policy of refusing to link to any post that's criticial of them, or even referring to me by name), they say:

"Everyone's right. There will be an application process lest we be accused of sloppy management - however, no child will be denied DayCare because of the process. The needy will have access to the DayCare programme. And, all Bermudian parents will be able to enroll their children in free DayCare."

A colleague suggested that what they're trying to say is that all Bermudian parents will be eligible for free day care, but only needy non-Bermudians will. However that seems inconsistent with their statement that "no child will be denied DayCare because of the process" (emphasis mine).

So what really is their policy? Who knows.

Caption Competition: Election Special

It's been a long time since the last caption competition on this site. Given the nastiness of the current election campaign, however, I think a little light relief is long overdue. So sharpen your pens and your wit and go to it with the picture below.

Photo courtesy of The Royal Gazette

Photoshop entries are also welcomed and should be emailed to me.

Winners will be announced on Sunday.

Photoshop Entries

Uncle Elvis

SpudOnion

Jamahl Simmons' selective memory

In a new PLP YouTube video, PLP MP Jamahl Simmons asserts that the UBP are only interested in exploiting blacks:

"When you have meetings where they're asking us, "How can we attract the black vote?" but is not willing to do the things that are necessary to be appealing to the black community, you have to ask yourself, "Why?". Because at the core, they're not interested - it's just about exploitation"

Contrast this, however, with a statement Mr. Simmons made on this website two years ago, when he was still a member of the UBP:

"Two of the things that I am most proud of being a part of was the development of the Economic Empowerment Bill and our Economic Empowerment Zone - David Dodwell and his committee hammered out both of these ideas, got them before the public and for a while got a good national dialogue going on the issue of levelling the economic playing field... I will tell you that David has been extremely active behind the scenes developing our Race Relations and Economic Opportunity agenda."

That doesn't sound like a party that's only interested in exploitation to me.

Inconsistent

The PLP can't get their story straight on who will qualify for the free child care promised in their election platform.

"The PLP will provide free DayCare for all Bermudians. That's a big difference between us and the UBP. The UBP will only provide day care for so-called 'needy' families," said a post on the PLP's blog today.

However, yesterday Minister of Social Rehabilitation Dale Butler said that there would be an application process for families interested in free day care, which would begin one the criteria had been determined. And today, PLP candidate Patrice Minors flatly contradicted the comments on her party's blog when she said that only "families in need" will qualify for the service.

All families or just the needy? Which is it?

Shootin' de breeze

Chris Gibbons is blogging again. This time he's not just talking about technology, but "music, football, movies, books, life, Bermuda - oh and maybe a bit of Mac stuff too".

Welcome back, Chris.

The bullet

I was horrified to hear about the bullet and threatening letter sent to the Premier. It was an utterly despicable act and I hope that the police quickly find and prosecute the culprit.

The UBP unequivocally condemned the threat, however I thought it was entirely inappropriate of them to insinuate that it may have been a political stunt engineered by the PLP. I was also disgusted by the roundabout way in which they did so, trying to imply that this was something other people were saying, not them. Sorry, UBP - by including those rumours in your press release you were clearly trying to legitimise them. Shame on you.

I do not believe that the PLP deliberately orchestrated the incident to whip up support for the Premier. Some of their tactics in this election have been extremely dirty, but I do not believe that even they would stoop to that level.

I was also appalled by the asinine comments of an anonymous "veteran politician" in the Bermuda Sun who suggested that the bullet posed no threat to Dr. Brown's life. Of course it didn't, but that's hardly the point. It was clearly a death threat and I would imagine that the Premier has been quite upset by it.

That said, although I do not believe this event was of their own making, I do think that the PLP are trying to exploit it. As Tom Vesey commented in the Bermuda Sun, what purpose was served by calling a press conference to announce the discovery of the threat, except to escalate tension? The PLP were also quick to label the threat as "just another political dirty trick" and to imply that it was perpetrated by their "political opponents". It is possible that the contents of the letter that accompanied the bullet may have made its source evident, but I doubt it. I suspect it's still too early for the police to say who mailed the bullet. It could have just as easily come from a deranged PLP supporter unhappy about Dr. Brown's leadership as it could from a supporter of the UBP.

It's time for all politicians and their supporters to end the spiral of nastiness and mistrust that has lead to this latest low.

The wrong tone

I'm glad to hear that Thaao Dill has admitted that he and Hott 107.5 are breaking broadcasting laws. I'm disappointed, however, that he seems to regard it as a legitimate act of civil disobedience.

"We're in breach of a dumb law, and we will probably be fined," said Mr. Dill in a post on Bermuda Sucks recently. "BUT. by the time we are, everyone will know how wilfully repressive and potentially unconstitutional the law is, and it should be appropriately repealed by whoever has the juice to do so... It's a foolish, muddleheaded law and needs to be demonstrably treated as such to reinforce why it must be changed."

If Mr. Dill were protesting against segregation laws, I'd be standing right next to him wilfully breaking them. But this legislation is far more prosaic. It is not only arrogant of Mr. Dill to think that he is entitled to protest a law he does not like by deliberately violating it, it's dangerous. Mr. Dill is doubtless regarded as a role model by some of Bermuda's young people and it is irresponsible of him to suggest that ignoring the law is a legitimate way of protesting it. Would carrying a machete in a public place be a legitimate act of protest against the mandatory three year jail term that such an act carries? I think not.

Even if Mr. Dill sees nothing wrong with that, his boss, PLP MP Glenn Blakeney ought to be making it clear that Hott 107.5 does not condone breaking the law. His failure to do so plays into widely held suspicions that certain members of the PLP consider themselves above the law.

The PLP ought to be thankful then for Renee Webb, their only member that has so far unequivocally condemned Hott's behaviour. "It is clear that based on the Political Broadcasting Regulations that using Hott broadcasters for political announcements and or ads during the election period is going against the regulations," she said. "It is not acceptable to remain silent while the law is being broken. It sets the wrong tone for a law-abiding populace."

It's unfortunate that Mr. Dill is unable to recognise that.

Royal Gazette offers RSS feeds at last

The Royal Gazette finally gets some RSS feeds for its news, business, sport and lifestyle sections. Hurrah!

Are free buses a good idea?

Aside from my concerns about how the PLP will fund their $10 million pledge to make public transport free, I have other doubts about the merits of the idea.

The aim of the policy is to get more cars off the roads. Thus, it presumes that cost is the reason that more people do not use the bus. But it's already considerably cheaper to ride the bus than take the car in to work. The fare from St. George's to Hamilton can be as little as $2 each way. In contrast, it's $5 to park a car in Bull's Head all day, not to mention the cost of gas and wear-and-tear on the car. People prefer to use their cars because they're more convenient. Making the buses free won't change that.

If this initiative does persuade more people to use the bus, however, it's likely to create a new set of problems. The rush hour buses from Hamilton to St. George's are already full, particularly during cruise ship season. Unless the Government also increases their frequency (something that it has so far been unable to do), the buses are going to become more crowded, and more people will be left behind at the stops. Whereupon those who can will go right back to using their cars again.

I'm just not convinced that this policy has been thought through.

Not the Royal Gazette

For some reason, www.theroyalgazette.com is displaying Daisy & Mac's website, not the Gazette's. The newspaper's site can still be found at www.royalgazette.com, however.

Technical error or a case of cybersquatting?

UPDATE: A reader writes in to point out that Daisy & Mac is owned by Dawn Zuill, the wife of Royal Gazette editor Bill Zuill. Oops!

Fiscally irresponsible

I find it amazing that not only has the PLP failed to say how they're going to pay for the freebies promised in their election manifesto, in some cases they're even breezily admitting to having no idea how much they'll cost.

In other words, they have no idea how much taxes will have to rise, or Bermuda's debt will have to increase, or existing government operations will have to be cut, to pay for them.

Fiscally responsible? I don't think so.

The great PLP giveaway

Free buses!

Free ferries!

Free day care for Bermudian families!

Free Bermuda College education for all Bermudians!

500 interest-free down payments for first-time Bermudian home owners!

Tax concessions for businesses employing Bermudians!

I sure hope the PLP's manifesto also explains how they plan to pay for all that.

Broken promises #4: Club Med

“In 2007, construction will begin on the new hotel in St. George’s,” said Premier Ewart Brown in May this year.

There are still three weeks until the end of the year, but the comments made by Works and Engineering Minister Dennis Lister yesterday confirmed that the Premier will not be keeping his promise. "When he said construction, he was saying in general terms," said Mr. Lister. "Part of that construction is pre-work. We have to begin pre-work so we can see development."

The demolition work may be a necessary precursor to construction, but it's not what the Premier promised. The distinction between demolition and construction is important, for several reasons:

1. The demolition work is being carried out by Works and Engineering, suggesting that it is being paid for by the Government. As far as I am aware, the developer, Carl Bazarian, and the hotel group, St. Regis, are still financially uncommitted.


2. There has been no suggestion that the main Club Med building is being demolished now - just the staff dormitories. It's the main building that is the biggest eyesore, and that the people of St. George's would most like to see gone.


3. Once construction starts, and people can see the new hotel taking shape, they can be confident that the process is irreversible. Demolition offers no such confidence, since even when it is complete, there is no imperative to proceed directly with construction.

If the Premier meant that demolition would begin before the end of the year, that's what he should have said.

By promising construction, the Premier raised the expectations of the people of St. George's. His failure to meet those expectations is going to lead to a lot of disappointed people in the town - not something you want in marginal constituencies at election time.

Other posts in the "Broken Promises" series:

1. Increased bus service
2. Corruption law reform
3. Public access to information

Suggestions for other broken promises can be emailed to me at the usual address.

More targeted tourism

Several readers have written in to point out other examples of tourism marketing directed at specific sectors. For example:

• Faith Based Tourism (Christians).


• The Government's sponsorship of the Second World Tourism Marketing Summit in China (Chinese business travellers from New York).

One reader also asked why, if we don't target specific segments, we retain the services of GlobalHue, an advertising agency that specialises in "providing creative ad work and marketing plans targeting African American, Hispanic, and Asian American consumers".

Let's be honest, Dr. Brown: Bermuda won't target gay tourism because many Bermudians are homophobic and won't make gay visitors feel welcome. Right?

Targeted tourism

In today's Royal Gazette, Premier Ewart Brown was asked if there was anything Bermuda could do to encourage gay tourism. "We don't go out and encourage any sector of tourism," was his reply.

That's untrue. The Premier is forgetting about the government's African Diaspora Heritage Trail initiative, which is designed to encourage blacks - specifically, wealthy African Americans - to visit Bermuda.

If we can target black tourists, why not gay ones?

Animal Farm

Several months ago, apropos of nothing, I decided to re-read George Orwell's Animal Farm.

It was written as a satire on Soviet Communism, but an uninformed reader could be forgiven for thinking that it was actually intended as a satire on today's PLP.

You need to read the whole thing to appreciate the many parallels (and I encourage you to do so if, like me, you haven't read it since your school days - it's short and easily digestible). But consider the extracts below.

First, how the pig Squealer would persuade the other animals to support their autocratic leader, Napoleon:

"Discipline, comrades, iron discipline! That is the watchword for today. One false step, and our enemies would be upon us. Surely, comrades, you do not want Jones back?"

"Jones" refers to the animals' former master, the farmer that they rose up against and ejected from the farm, so that they could run the place themselves. Sound familiar?

Second, how the sheep would stop the other animals criticising their leaders:

"Frightened though they were, some of the animals might possibly have protested, but at this moment the sheep set up their usual bleating of "Four legs good, two legs bad," which went on for several minutes and put an end to the discussion."

Both are recurring themes throughout the book.

The final sentence of the book is one of the most well-known, but no less profound for that:

"The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which."

The PLP doubtless started as a principled party. And the UBP doubtless deserved to be kicked off the farm in 1998. But is today's PLP under Ewart Brown the same PLP? If the UBP were to come back, would things really be worse?

While the PLP's core supporters continue to bleat, "PLP good, UBP bad", moderate voters need to look from one party to the other and ask themselves if they can still tell which is which.

About time

It seems that both the UBP and the PLP will be releasing their platforms on Monday 10 December, just one day before advance polling and one week before the main voting day.

Better late than never, I suppose.

A response to Calvin Smith

Writing in today's Royal Gazette, Calvin Smith says:

"...very few whites are prepared openly to support the Progressive Labour Party. However, a far greater number of black Bermudians are prepared to support the United Bermuda Party."

Perhaps that's because the PLP does a better job of alienating whites than the UBP does of alienating blacks?

He continues:

"Good race relations cannot possibly develop in a situation whereby the majority race both in terms of numbers and birthright does not have equal access either to the economic or the political arenas."

The suggestion that black Bermudians do not have equal access to the political arena when the current Government is made up of nothing but black Bermudians is laughable. I agree that there is still not equal access to the economic arena, however that is primarily a result of historical factors, not present-day oppression by whites.

On the BHC:

"But what has been scandalous and shameful about the whole affair is the fact that documents compiled by the police relating to the Bermuda Housing Corporation investigation, were stolen from the offices of the Police."

Since the PLP and its supporters never tire of referring to the BHC documents as "stolen", I suppose I must again point out that it has still not been established whether they were stolen or whether they were leaked to Harold Darrell by someone with lawful access to them. However I look forward to a definitive answer if and when Auditor General Larry Dennis' sues Immigration Minister Derrick Burgess for defamation, which I hope he will.

Memory loss

One of the problems I've run into time and again while trying to research my posts is the difficulty finding old articles on the Royal Gazette's website.

Earlier this year, the Royal Gazette took a leaf out of the Bermuda Sun's book and redesigned their site in a way that broke all existing links to their content. That would be bad enough, but they also put in a new search engine that is unable to find any article more than a couple of years old.

The newspapers’ old stories form part of the community’s collective memory. Their loss has made it much harder for ordinary people to get the information they need to hold their government to account. Particularly at election time, when people want to reassess the things the government has done, and the promises made by both political parties, that’s a real loss.

Hopefully the papers will bear this in mind next time they decide to freshen up their sites.

A response to Guilden Gilbert

In a letter to the Editor published in today's Bermuda Sun, Guilden Gilbert, Jr. criticises the UBP for waiting until the calling of an election to announce their Code of Conduct.

In fact, the UBP have publicly mentioned their desire for a similar code on several previous occasions. In July 2006 they proposed a code of conduct on race, which was rejected by the PLP. And in July this year they called for a code of conduct for politicians to help set an example to young people. The PLP ignored it.

Mr. Gilbert goes on to ask why the electorate should believe that the UBP would be a good government, since only seven of their candidates have any track record of governing. However, none of the PLP's candidates had any track record in 1998. That didn't stop voters believing that they'd be better than the UBP then, and it shouldn't stop them believing that the UBP would be better than the PLP now.

Finally, Mr. Gilbert questions the amount of money that the Government has paid to airlines in revenue guarantees to persuade them to set up new routes to Bermuda. This number is a matter of public record. In November 2006, the then-airport General Manager Jim Howes said, “On an overall basis, we can report that the total revenue guarantee payouts by Bermuda International Airport have averaged less than $400,000 per year since 2003.”

Assuming that this average has not changed significantly in the last year, that would suggest that around $2 million in revenue guarantees has been paid altogether. This is considerably less than the $20 million figure cited by Mr. Gilbert (although he does not say where he got this figure from). However, it should be noted that the value of additional incentives, such as landing fee waivers or advertising support, has still not been made public.

Topsy-turvy

Alex Scott's suggestion that disillusioned PLP supporters should still vote for the party because changes could be made after the election is topsy-turvy.

"After the election, events are difficult to predict," said Mr. Scott. "I say to people: 'Don't abandon the party - to turn away because you don't like what's happening today is foolhardy because you don't know what's around the corner. After the election we will have the benefit of hindsight. We can say: 'Well, we survived, but we must now, if we are going to be a meaningful administration, and a successful Government, we should probably rethink this issue here... Afterwards the party will conduct the postmortem and will listen to the people and will make the changes necessary."

Sorry, Mr. Scott, but you shouldn't be asking voters to support your party based on what you might do. In an election campaign, you should be telling the country what you will do if you win. You're supposed to lay out your plans before the election, not after.

If you believe that Dr. Brown is a liability, you should have removed him before the election was called. If you believe that some of your policies need rethinking, you should have changed them earlier.

You made your bed. Now lie in it.

Dealing with criticism

So, it seems the PLP's blog will link to me, after all, as long as I'm saying something they want to hear.

Three weeks ago, I contacted PLP chairman David Burt to ask if he would include this blog in the list of links on the PLP's blog. I figured that since I link to both the PLP blog and Progressive Minds he would have no problem providing a reciprocal link. He didn't reply.

So instead, I decided to make use of the PLP blog's comment facilities. When replying to a post on the PLP's blog, I left a comment with an excerpt from my post and a link to the full thing. In blog parlance, that's called a trackback, and many blogs allow them (including this one). My comment was never published, however.

So which lucky blogs have made it onto the PLP blogroll? Three active pro-PLP blogs, one neutral one, and three other blogs that were last updated over 6 months ago. Neither Politics.bm, nor 21 Square, both of which link to the PLP websites, get a mention.

But everything about the way the PLP run their blog is dishonest. When a post on the PLP blog references favourable media coverage, it provides a link. When it references unfavourable coverage, or deliberately misrepresents it, no link is offered. When a commenter leaves an unfavourable comment it will often never appear on the site.

Well, why should a political party's website link to or publish comments from its critics, you may ask? Isn't that expecting a bit much?

Not if that party has any self-confidence, it shouldn't be. A link isn't an endorsement, it's an acknowledgment of the existence of another point of view. It's what blogging is all about: a debate between people with different opinions. You link to your intellectual opponents because you respect your readers' right to make up their own minds, while remaining confident that your own arguments are the stronger ones. The Barbados Labour Party links to the Barbados Free Press, one of its fiercest critics. Why won't Bermuda's Labour Party do the same?

The reason, I think, is because the PLP is generally extremely bad at debating with its critics. Whether this is because they are incapable, or lack self-restraint, or are just too lazy to bother formulating coherent rebuttals, I'm not sure. Invariably, however, the PLP's response to criticism is to attack the critic - demonising them, questioning their motives, or calling them a liar. Rarely is any attempt made to deconstruct the criticisms, or to agree to disagree.

It's this habit that's responsible for the angry, vitriolic comments we've had to endure from the PLP during this campaign. It's also likely the reason why the Premier refused to agree to a presidential-style debate with Michael Dunkley (particularly ironic given the Premier's fondness for behaving presidentially the rest of the time).

I don't want a link from the PLP's website because I want the traffic. I want a link, and my comments to be posted, because I want to see the party acknowledging and dealing with criticism in a mature manner.

But I won't be holding my breath.

Harold who?

Many voters still do not know who leaked the BHC dossier, despite former PLP supporter Harold Darrell's admission that it was him.

A recent survey by Research.bm found that 47% of registered voters who were certain, likely or possibly going to vote in the upcoming election did not know the identity of the leaker. Only 31% said that a former PLP supporter or member was the source of the leak, while 12% thought the UBP had done it and 7% thought the Auditor General was responsible.

The results suggest a frightening ignorance about the BHC scandal, but whether that's down to apathy or denial is unclear. Either way, the PLP will doubtless be satisfied that they've managed to sow so much doubt about the identity of the leaker.

The survey also asked all respondents who said that they intend to vote for the PLP whether they thought the party would be better going forward without Ewart Brown at the helm. Reassuringly for Dr. Brown, only 25% said it would. Dissatisfaction was significantly higher among younger PLP supporters, however, with 36% of those aged 18 to 34 saying the PLP would be better off without him.

The results suggest that despite some high-profile criticism of Dr. Brown recently, most of the party's supporters are behind him.

The final question in the survey looked at respondents' confidence in Bermuda's affordable housing program. Here, voters appear to be pessimistic. Asked how confident they were that there would be more affordable housing in 10 years, only 34% said they were "somewhat" or "very" confident:

The complete survey results can be found here.

Now that's funny

In the wake of the UBP's embarrassingly bad fish cartoon, Denis Pitcher offers a hilarious script for the ad that they should have produced instead.

It's funny, on-target, and cool. Well done, Denis.

Weird fishes

What the hell is this?

It's not funny, or clever. It's mindless. And it's only episode 1? God help us.

If this is the UBP's idea of humour we should all be grateful that the "outrageously funny" video satire of Ewart Brown that they promised us seems to have been quietly forgotten.

Incompetence, and worse

The PLP's claims to be competent managers of Bermuda's economy are looking mighty thin in the wake of the Bermuda Cement Company (BCC) fiasco.

It's hard to imagine a better example of ineptitude than the Government's need to resort to an emergency nationalisation because of their failure to ensure a smooth transition from BCC to a new operator. That they have allowed this to happen just three weeks away from a general election is incredible.

If this were the extent of the Government's mismanagement it would be bad enough. But by hinting that the contract to run the cement works will not be put out to tender, and that the new operator may not be obliged to relocate the site (as BCC was), the Government's behaviour risks going beyond simple incompetence into the realms of the unethical and the corrupt.

Establishing an open, competitive tendering process, with clearly defined requirements, is the only way the Government can salvage any credibility from this mess.

Hubris

Nothing typifies the arrogance of the Premier like this picture of his car parked in a handicapped spot outside the Harbourfront restaurant.

This isn't the first time that Dr. Brown's car has been caught parked illegally. A couple of years ago, I saw it parked on double-yellow lines outside Little Venice (and, satisfyingly, a traffic cop giving it a ticket).

Show a little humility, Dr. Brown, before you get clamped.

Whither the manifestos?

We're now over half way through the election campaign, with just two weeks until advance polling starts. Yet so far neither party has produced a manifesto.

The UBP has produced their "Agenda for Change", which does outline some of the things we could expect from a UBP government. Yet the party admits that this is "not a comprehensive document", and promises more details in its election platform. So where is it?

The PLP is no better. Their website does contain a list of their accomplishments, and the recent Throne Speech did outline some of their plans. But there's still no sign of any document summarising the party's vision for the next five years.

I have heard that the UBP may be holding back for fear that the PLP will steal some of the ideas in their manifesto if they publish it too early. The same may be true of the PLP.

A reluctance to show your cards is understandable before an election has been called, but afterwards it's just pathetic. An election campaign ought to be a time for the electorate to review and discuss each party's vision for the next five years. Without manifestos to form the basis of the debate, that's much harder. When a candidate comes round to my house canvassing, how I am supposed to ask him informed questions about his party's proposals if I don't know what those proposals are?

The time for worrying about the theft of their intellectual property has passed. Both parties should release their manifestos without further delay.

Government TV

Writing on Progressive Minds, 30strong argues that cost of CITV, the Government's new TV station, is justified because its programming is cultural, not partisan. His comments echo those of Premier Ewart Brown at the channel's launch, who said, "On this platform culture takes centre stage, not politics".

I haven't watched CITV for long enough to say whether that's the case or not. The only time I turned it on, I caught ten minutes of a turgid interview with Wayne Perinchief about the Workforce Equity Act. That was certainly political, but I have no idea how representative it is of the channel's output. Since we were told that one of the reasons for CITV was to allow Bermudians to hear more than one side of the story, however, I doubt that its aims are solely cultural.

Nevertheless, even if CITV's schedules were filled with nothing but cultural programming, it wouldn't matter. The Government's job is to run the country, not to produce television. Leave that to the private sector, which has the resources to do a better job and the financial incentive to do it more efficiently.

"The departure has already started"

While you're trying to decide whether former Premier Sir John Swan's recent warnings about international business are genuine or just scaremongering, keep in mind these comments made by a senior Bermudian reinsurance executive earlier this year:

"The threat of departure of the insurance industry has been both simultaneously exaggerated and understated.

The threat is exaggerated because the implied suggestion of a rush to the L.F. Wade International Airport is unrealistic. Inertia is a powerful force, even in business.

The threat is understated because the departure (in a relative sense) has already started. With each month, a smaller and smaller percentage of the companies' employees are to be found in Bermuda. With each month, more and more of the Bermuda companies' operations are to be found overseas."

International Advisory Services has already said that it is looking to outsource because of the difficulties of having to constantly replace work permit staff.

Butterfield Bank has set up its fund administration centre in Halifax, citing the lower cost of office space and greater availability of qualified staff.

Other companies that have opened offices in Halifax, or have plans to do so, include Flagstone Re, Citco, Olympia Capital and Marsh. I'm also aware of another international company who is outsourcing a substantial part of its Bermuda operations to Canada. I would be surprised if there aren't others that I'm unaware of, too.

Even when there are no immediate job losses in Bermuda as a result of these moves (as was the case with Butterfield Bank), there's still an opportunity cost: any new positions that these companies create will be in the new location, not here. That's no problem for Bermudians willing to relocate, but it doesn't help those who want to stay here.

The departure has already started. That's not scaremongering. That's a fact. Even if the reasons are sometimes economic rather than political, the effect on Bermuda is the same.

Broken promises #3: Public access to information

In November 2003, then-Premier Alex Scott pledged that the PLP government would introduce freedom of information legislation.

In July 2004, Mr. Scott said that Public Access To Information legislation would likely be tabled early in the next Parliament.

That didn't happen, but in a discussion paper presented to the legislature in 2005, the Government said:

"The Government hopes that PATI legislation can be introduced in the House of Assembly within the next 12 to 18 months... Ultimately, the Government hopes to achieve implementation within 3 to 5 years of the PATI legislation being passed."

Over two years later, however, the legislation has still not been introduced. But when you'd rather the public didn't know about the state of their hospital, or the cost of your jollies to China, perhaps that's not surprising.

Other posts in the "Broken Promises" series:

1. Increased bus service
   
2. Corruption law reform
   

Suggestions for other broken promises can be emailed to me at the usual address.

Eau de xenophobia

The nasty smell of xenophobia hanging around some of the members of the Government continues to worsen.

First, Immigration Minister Derrick Burgess suggests that non-Bermudians should stay out of local politics. Then the same Minister drives through legislation restricting the property rights of Bermudians married to non-Bermudians. Now Deputy Premier Paula Cox, who ought to know better, has criticised the UBP's proposed payroll tax cut on the grounds that it might "[assist] the non-voting non-Bermudian".

Heaven forbid.

Never mind that a non-Bermudian earning $40,000 a year is going to find it just as difficult to make ends meet as a Bermudian earning the same (if not more so, since they are more likely to be without any family in Bermuda who they can turn to for help).

Never mind that it's fatuous of Ms. Cox to emphasise the non-voting status of non-Bermudians, since I doubt that she's suggesting that that's why they should be precluded from Government assistance (should the needs of Bermudian children below voting age be ignored too?).

Never mind that some of those non-Bermudians will be married to Bermudians, who will indirectly benefit from their spouse's tax saving.

Never mind that should those same non-Bermudian spouses one day get Bermuda status, they may remember Ms. Cox's statement as they place their votes in future elections.

Some members of the PLP are wearing their xenophobia as if it were a perfume. Someone should tell them that it stinks.

Broken promises #2: Corruption law reform

When the BHC report was released in 2004, DPP consultant Kulandra Ratneser said that more cases would have made it to court if the law (specifically, the Criminal Code Amendment Act) had been modernised.

In response, then-Premier Alex Scott promised that the PLP government would review Bermuda's corruption legislation. "We are going to review the laws," said Mr. Scott.

Alas, nothing has been heard of Mr. Scott's promise since.

Other posts in the "Broken Promises" series:

1. Increased bus service

Suggestions for other broken promises can be emailed to me at the usual address.

A simple truth

The Bermuda Immigration and Protection Amendment Act 2007 is the most offensive piece of legislation that the PLP have passed in their time in office.

The Act is supposed to crack down on “fronting”, the practice where a Bermudian buys land on behalf of a non-Bermudian who is not legally entitled to own it. In other words, a Bermudian and a non-Bermudian working together to knowingly circumvent the law. What's shocking about the Act is that Bermudians who are legitimately married to non-Bermudians are now being tarred with the same brush.

“Regrettably, Bermudians have been buying multiple properties with funds supplied by their non-Bermudian spouses in order to circumvent the policy,” said Immigration Minister Derrick Burgess recently. It was a jaw-dropping thing for him to say, as it made it clear that the impact of the Act on mixed-status couples was not accidental, but deliberate. His statement implied that Bermudians marry non-Bermudians for their money and that non-Bermudians marry Bermudians in order to be able to invest in Bermuda real estate. Mr. Burgess made no distinction between a genuine marriage and a marriage of convenience.

Prior to this Act, non-Bermudians were still only allowed to have a "legal right" to one property. This meant that their name could only be on the deeds of one property, and they had to get a licence for this.

The new Act adds another restriction, however. Now non-Bermudians are now not permitted to have an "equitable interest" in a second property, either. In other words, they must not give any financial assistance towards acquiring the property. They cannot be a guarantor of the mortgage or provide funds to pay off a mortgage.

Thus, the Bermudian partner can own as many additional properties as they like, and can use them as they please (e.g. rent them out, add units, subdivide the land, and so on), but only as long as the non-Bermudian partner does not aquire a legal right or equitable interest in them.

This is discriminatory because it means that Bermudians married to other Bermudians can potentially leverage two incomes when purchasing additional properties, whereas Bermudians married to non-Bermudians can, at most, leverage only one (their own).

(At least the new law will not impact the couple if they own one property and the Bermudian partner inherits a second. Since the non-Bermudian's name is not on the deeds (no legal right) and he did not help to acquire the property (no equitable interest), the couple could keep the property and even rent it out and put the rental income into their joint account. I have confirmed this with Martin Brewer, the Chief Immigration Officer.)

The arguments that Immigration Minister Derrick Burgess has put forward to defend the legislation are as follows:

"The Government is more concerned about preserving residential properties that might be purchased by Bermudians who do not already own a home in Bermuda. Home ownership by as many Bermudians as possible is a principle goal of the Government... In the absence of this legislation, there is nothing to stop a Bermudian who marries a wealthy non-Bermudian from acquiring as many properties as he or she likes to the detriment of Bermudians without access to such riches, and this is simply unacceptable to this Government."

But what if the non-Bermudian is not wealthy? What if he has as much money as the average Bermudian spouse? Then, as the non-Bermudian spouse could not have any greater impact on the housing market than the Bermudian one, why should his spouse not be able to leverage his assets?

Conversely, what if two wealthy Bermudians were to marry? The Act would not prevent that Bermudian couple from acquring as many properties as they liked, yet the impact on ordinary Bermudians would be exactly the same. Indeed, a wealthy unmarried Bermudian could do the same.

If the concern is wealthy non-Bermudian spouses, why didn't the Act set a limit on the financial contribution non-Bermudian spouses could make? And if the aim of the policy is to give every Bermudian the chance to own a piece of the rock, why not prevent every Bermudian from owning more than one property?

"Many ordinary Bermudians struggle a lifetime to acquire one property and the Government believes that it would be unjust to allow non-Bermudian spouses to acquire multiple properties and deprive Bermudians of even the meagre opportunity they have to acquire their first 'piece of the rock', ultimately driving Bermudians to become tenants in their own country."

This is a straw man. The non-Bermudian spouse would not be acquiring multiple properties, the couple would. And even without the new Act, the non-Bermudian would still be prevented from having his name on the deeds of more than one of them, so all legal rights to the properties would remain with the Bermudian.

"Although married to a Bermudian, the non-Bermudian spouse is still a non-Bermudian and cannot expect to have all the rights of a Bermudian until such time as he/she obtains Bermudian status.”

Another straw man. The issue is not whether a non-Bermudian spouse should have the same rights as a Bermudian. It's that the Bermudian spouse does not have the right to utilise the assets of her partner if he is non-Bermudian, whereas she does if he is Bermudian. That is discriminatory, and it's the Bermudian, not the non-Bermudian, who is the victim.

"The two main limitations on non-Bermudian spouses are that they may hold only one parcel of land under licence and they are not able to vote in the General Election or By-Election process. Were the Government to accept [that a non-Bermudian spouse should be able to hold more than one parcel of land], then, logically the Government would be obliged to allow these persons to participate in General Elections from the day of their marriage."

Aside from the fact that the argument is not whether non-Bermudian spouses should be able to own more than one property, these two limitations have nothing to do with each other. It would be perfectly possible for the Government to remove one but not the other.

Bermudians who are legitimately married to non-Bermudians are not fronting for their spouse. The Act's refusal to acknowledge that simple truth is why this legislation is so offensive, and so bad.

Full disclosure, for those who may be unaware: I am a non-Bermudian spouse of a Bermudian, with a Bermudian son.

Bias, fairness and objectivity

A recurrent theme of the PLP’s campaign is that the media has a pro-UBP bias.

Is there any truth to this claim? Or is the PLP misrepresenting opinion as bias (whether deliberately or accidentally)?

A thought-provoking discussion of the difference between bias, fairness and objectivity can be found on the website of Malcolm Gladwell (author of bestsellers “The Tipping Point” and “Blink”). It’s long, but well worth a read.

Newspaper articles should be objective. Editorials and opinion pieces (and blogs) should be fair. “The difference between fairness and objectivity is considerable,” says Gladwell. “The test of a newspaper article is that when a reader finishes reading it, he or she has no idea where the writer stands on the issues under discussion. That's objectivity. With fairness, the bar is a little lower. It is perfectly permissible—even advisable—that a reader [should] know where the writer stands on the issue under discussion. It is important only that we be fair: that we accurately and appropriately represent the ideas at hand.”

Bias can be thought of as a systematic failure to observe these principles. A journalist is not biased if he has an opinion, only if that opinion is regularly evident in his articles. A columnist or editorial writer (or blogger) is not biased if he expresses opinions (that’s his job), only if he regularly misrepresents his intellectual opponents and fails to meet and confront them on their own terms.

Last week, the PLP’s blog suggested that the Royal Gazette was biased because of an editorial that said that the UBP had a lot of good ideas and an article that allegedly questioned the Premier’s leadership and the PLP’s unity. But that editorial did not misrepresent the PLP’s position. Indeed, it acknowledged that their proposals on the Bermuda College were worth debating. As for the article, not only was every statement factual (assuming that the Gazette wasn’t fabricating anything), it also quoted several MPs who said they thought the Premier was secure in his job.

Indeed, ironically enough it was the PLP's blog that was the one guilty of a lack of fairness. It misrepresented the Gazette by implying that they had acknowledged that their editorial was evidence of their pro-UBP bias, whereas what the Gazette actually acknowledged was that there was a risk that the PLP could misconstrue it as such.

Is the journalist’s opinion ever visible in local news stories? Certainly. Matthew Taylor’s recent description of the Premier’s PLP banquet speech as an “insult-strewn tirade” revealed his opinion of the speech. Similarly, when the Bermuda Sun’s Nigel Regan suggested that reports attempting to paint the government as anti-expatriate were “mostly politically driven”, he was also guilty of failing to suppress his own opinions. In the case of both newspapers, however, I’m not sure this happens sufficiently frequently to qualify as bias.

As for the Gazette’s editorials, I can’t think of one example where they have misrepresented the facts. Thus, I don’t see how anyone could suggest that they systematically do so.

Moreover, there are plenty of counter-examples, such as Friday’s article which gave front-page billing to a PLP poll that put the party ahead of the UBP, and a recent editorial that praised the Premier for his part in putting on the PGA Grand Slam of Golf and the Bermuda Music Festival.

An article that is critical is not the same as an article that is unfair. And having an opinion is not the same as having a bias.

Bank of Bermuda internet banking redux

Last October, the Bank of Bermuda rolled out a new internet banking system. While the new system offered some improvements over the old, transaction downloads to Microsoft Money were essentially broken.

In the .ofx file, the payee field no longer contained the payee information (it was buried in the middle of the Memo field instead). In the .qif file, all transaction dates were out by one day. At a stroke, the amount of time it took to reconcile the transactions in my accounts more than doubled.

Despite several email exchanges with the Bank’s customer support and one of their developers, the issue was never resolved. Glumly, I resigned myself to a future of frustrating, manual transaction reconciliation.

Recently, however, a former commenter on this site alerted me to a solution. It’s a free, third-party program called mt2ofx, that takes the download file provided by the bank and reformats it to put the right information in the right places before passing it on to Microsoft Money. I’ve been using it for a couple of weeks now, and it works like a charm.

It’s a little tricky to set up, but you only need to do it once:

1. Download and install the program. You can get it here.

2. Start the program and click the “Options” button to open the options window. At the bottom of this window is a button labeled “Payee Replacement”. Click that button to open the “Payee Mapping” window.

3. In the “Payee Mapping” window, click the “Add” button. In the box labeled “Payee Mapping Rule”, set the first dropdown to “Memo” the second to “contains” and the third to “\.\d\d\s(.+)” (trust me). In the box labeled “Set the payee to”, type “%1”. Then click the “Update” button, followed by “Save & Close” to go back to the options window.

4. In the Options window, click the button labeled “Post-conversion actions”. Where it says “Output file type”, select “OFX (Open Financial Exchange File)”. Select “Open it with the follow program”, and click the button with the folder icon to specify the location of the Money import handler (if you are using Microsoft Money 2007, this will be “C:\Program Files\Microsoft Money 2007\MNYCoreFiles\mnyimprt.exe”). Click "OK".

5. In the options window again, click the "Scripts" button at the bottom. In the list of scripts, make sure "Generic-OFX.vbs" is at the top and is the only one with a check mark next to it. Click "OK".

6. Close mt2ofx.
   

Now log on to internet banking and download the transaction history file you want (in the OFX format). Instead of opening it with Microsoft Money, however, tell Windows to use mt2ofx to open it. The program will convert the file and then open it in Microsoft Money, where you should find that all the payee names have now been imported (mostly) correctly.

You can fiddle around in mt2ofx’s options screen some more to fine-tune the behaviour of the application. For example, I have specified additional Payee Mapping rules to handle certain payees whose names appear in the Bank’s download file in different formats (e.g. one rule checks to see if the “Memo” field “starts with” the value “TO BELCO”, and if so, sets the payee to “Belco”).

It’s annoying that it’s necessary to go to these lengths to work around a problem that the Bank should easily be able to fix. But for now, it’s the best solution there is.

Cents-less

Please can someone explain why, when I want to withdraw a non-standard amount of cash from a Bank of Bermuda ATM machine, I need to enter the amount in dollars and cents?

Since the machine only dispenses bills, why make me punch in those two extra zeroes?

Broken promises #1: Increased bus service

Premier Ewart Brown likes to portray himself as a man who gets things done. As a man who can cut through opposition and make things happen.

Unfortunately, reality does not always accord with this rosy image. This will be the first in a series of posts highlighting promises that he and the Government have made that they have failed to keep. If you have any other suggestions that you think should be included here, please let me know.

Let's begin with the bus service. On 5 April this year, Dr. Brown said:

"As of Monday, April 9 buses will provide new half-hourly schedules on routes 7, 8, 10 and 11. This addition to the existing schedule will create a 15-minute service to Dockyard and St. George's... the full 15-minute headway on the routes is expected to be in full operation as of May 14."

This was actually a repeat of a promise he first made at a Town Hall meeting in St. George’s in November 2006.

A few days later, however, Dr. Brown was forced into an embarrassing climb-down when it was revealed that he had not bothered to consult the bus drivers about his plan. In an attempt to help Dr. Brown save face, BIU President Chris Furbert said that the drivers were not necessarily disagreeing with the new schedule but just wanted to examine the document before signing off on it.

Seven months later, however, there is still no sign of the additional buses.

Parking in Hamilton

After reading the opinions of some motorists on the Corporation of Hamilton’s new clamping policy, I can understand why the Corporation is having to spend $300,000 to secure the city’s car parks with automatic barriers too.

If you object to clamping on the grounds that it might make people mad, or cause retailers to lose business, or because we need to be more laid back, or because “it’s horrible”, or (my favourite) because something might happen “out of your control” that results in you not putting a ticket on your car, you should be embarrassed. Take responsibility for your actions, for God’s sake. If you don’t want to be clamped, pay the parking fee.

That said, I sincerely hope that the new parking machines will accept more than quarters and dollar coins. With it costing $5 per day to park at Bull’s Head, ensuring that you have enough loose change to stuff into the machine each day takes planning and strong pockets. A lack of change must be a contributing factor to at least some of the cars left without tickets.

At a minimum, I hope the new machines will accept bills and change. Better, they’ll take credit and debit cards too (as the machines at the airport do). Best of all would be if they accepted a stored value card like London’s Oyster card, which, in an ideal world, would be accepted on the buses and ferries too.

Keeping it clean

It’s difficult to believe that anyone could object to the UBP's plea to keep the election clean and focused on the issues. But object is precisely what the PLP and some of its supporters are doing.

The argument seems to be that the UBP have spent much of this year doing many of the things that their new Code of Conduct says they shouldn't, so it's a bit rich of them to turn round now and try to get everyone to hold hands and sing kumbaya.

I can sympathise with this, up to a point. However, even if you accept that the UBP's behaviour has been less than stellar, the PLP have been no better. They've shown no hesitation in striking back with unsubstantiated allegations (Grant Gibbons and TBI; the suggestion that UBP and the media are "in cahoots") and name-calling (almost any adjective used to describe a UBP MP in the Premier's speech on Saturday; "racist dog") of their own. So agreeing to a truce now would hardly leave them at a disadvantage.

That said, the UBP's initiative is not without its problems. Who decides when the Code has been breached? One man's fair comment is another's inflammatory statement. And what sanctions will there be for anyone who does violate it?

Nevertheless, it's a step in the right direction. I doubt that most voters will have the stomach for six more weeks of negativity like that exhibited by the Premier on Saturday evening. If the PLP chooses to go down that path, they could suffer for it at the polls. Perhaps it would be in their best interests to swallow their pride and sign up to the UBP's Code, after all.

Credit where it’s due

The PLP is trying to take credit for bringing the allegations of racism at the hospital to light:

“The PLP government established the Office of the Ombudsman which investigated the allegations at King Edward and brought them to light. Under the previous UBP government, there wasn't an Ombudsman. Thankfully, the PLP established the Ombudsman's office which was able to bring this important report exposing racism at King Edward to light.”

The PLP does deserve credit for establishing the Office of the Ombudsman, which was indeed responsible for investigating the allegations of racism at the hospital. However it was not the Ombudsman that first brought these allegations to public attention. It was the Mid Ocean News, in a story in March 2006.

I wonder why they forgot to mention that?

If the shoe fits…

The PLP blog is complaining about the Royal Gazette again, this time for describing the Premier’s speech on Friday evening as an “insult-strewn tirade”.

The Gazette ought to be more careful about editorialising in its news stories, particularly given its current status as the PLP's bête noire. But an “insult-strewn tirade” is precisely what the speech was.

It was insult-strewn because Michael Dunkley was described as “pious” and “self-serving”; Bob Richards as “snide” and “nasty”; Grant Gibbons as “a poster boy for the Mid-Ocean News”; and Harold Darrell as “a demented deviant”.

It was a tirade because of its use of hyperbole and intemperate language. The UBP and the media were described as “the most vicious and vile opponents in the history of our struggle”. The Gazette’s decision to run a negative story about the Premier’s stem cell research centre during the PGA golf tournament was “one of the most dastardly acts I have ever seen committed by a free press”. The Premier referred to “lies” or “lying” 17 times, and used the word “stolen” in reference to the BHC dossier 13 times, even though that has yet to be established.

If the shoe fits, wear it.

Stolen?

The Premier's speech at the PLP banquet on Saturday evening used the word "stolen" in relation to the BHC dossier 13 times. The last I heard, however, it had still not been established whether the dossier was actually stolen or whether the source of the leak legitimately had access to it.

Did I miss something, or was the Premier just employing a little truthiness?

Why the Premier should address the BHC allegations

In his speech at the PLP banquet on Friday evening, Premier Ewart Brown spoke candidly about his refusal to answer any of the allegations in the leaked BHC dossier. He said that to do so would have set a “dangerous precedent”, requiring any leader to answer “any unfounded allegation” made by “an anonymous source”. The court actions were brought to protect “the sanctity of police files and the right of every Bermudian to be free from targeted defamation based on their contents”.

No-one should be persuaded by this. First, the BHC allegations were not unfounded, as Chief Justice Richard Ground pointed out in the original hearing. “The (BHC) allegations are not gratuitous, in that there is some evidence to support them,” he said.

Second, the source is no longer anonymous, being revealed in Friday’s Mid-Ocean News as PLP supporter Harold Darrell.

Third, these were not any old police files, relating to the private affairs of any old Bermudian. As the Chief Justice observed, “The allegations [do not] concern the private personal life of those concerned. They touch upon their conduct in office.” Thus, the Premier’s suggestion that the courts’ ruling would open the floodgates to the leaking of any police file about any Bermudian was just scaremongering.

For these reasons, the Premier owes Bermudians some answers to these particular allegations. Christian Dunleavy has a good summary of the questions that need answering.

It’s still not too late, Dr. Brown.

One reason to vote UBP

The UBP have been critical of the Government’s recent legislation that purports to crack down on fronting, but actually discriminates against Bermudians married to non-Bermudians (I’ll talk more about this in a future post). But I hadn’t heard the UBP say what they would do about this awful piece of legislation should they win the election. So this evening I emailed Opposition Leader Michael Dunkley to ask. His response:

“The recent legislation will be scrapped and we will look at more appropriate ways to deal with fronting.”

That’s great news, and one very good reason to vote UBP.

Back in the saddle again

They say that a week is a long time in politics, so perhaps it's unsurprising that the nine months that I’ve been on hiatus feel like an eternity.

In that time, the Government has pushed forward a number of controversial new initiatives, including anti-fronting legislation, the Workforce Equity Act, and Goodwill Plus. They have suggested that non-Bermudians should stay out of local politics, and gone all the way to the Privy Council to try to stop the press publishing more allegations of official misconduct. Bermuda has seen the launch of several new blogs, including three favourable to the PLP, and the political parties have discovered Facebook. Then last week, the Government called an election.

It was the latter announcement that finally persuaded me to restart this blog (although I came close earlier this year, when the impact of the shockingly discriminatory anti-fronting legislation became apparent). Given the awfulness of some of the legislation passed or proposed during the last year, and the increasingly anti-democratic tendencies of Premier Brown’s government (for example: the widespread use of special development orders; the attempts to gag the media), I am genuinely fearful of what will happen to Bermuda if Dr. Brown is given a fresh, five-year mandate. As I am not yet a Bermudian, I cannot vote in the upcoming election. However, I can attempt to influence public opinion through my writing, and I feel that I have an obligation to do so. At least if the current government is returned to office I will be able to say that I did my best to prevent it.

That’s not to say that I will be playing down the Opposition’s faults. I have some serious problems with the UBP too, including their failure to commit to extending the Human Rights Act to include sexual orientation, and their pledge to give the taxi drivers more money without requiring any improvement in service. Although they have criticised term limits and the anti-fronting legislation, I have not yet heard them commit to repealing those laws should they win office. And despite their professed love of openness, they have yet to answer a question I asked on their Facebook group in August about why they appear to have abolished their shadow ministry for racial equality and economic empowerment. Nevertheless, I think they currently represent the lesser of two evils.

As you may have noticed, I am no longer accepting comments on this site. My reasons were eloquently summarised by tech blogger Joel Spolsky earlier this year: “When a blog allows comments right below the writer's post, what you get is a bunch of interesting ideas, carefully constructed, followed by a long spew of noise, filth, and anonymous rubbish that nobody ... nobody ... would say out loud if they had to take ownership of their words." That’s not always true, of course: sometimes commenters do have interesting and worthwhile things to say. But the signal-to-noise ratio isn’t high enough for me to justify the time – and libel risk – involved in comment moderation. Besides, as Spolsky points out, if you have something to say there’s a better way to make yourself heard: "Get your own space, write compelling things, and if your ideas are smart, they'll be linked to, and Google will notice, and you'll move up in PageRank, and you'll have influence and your ideas will have power.” The proliferation of local blogs during my time on hiatus, some excellent, others less so, has demonstrated the viability of this approach. Those of you who comment on my posts on your own site still have the ability to publicise your comments here by sending me a trackback (see the "Related Links" section of each post).

I don’t know how long I’ll be back for. Stuart Hayward was bang-on when he recently described Bermuda’s political environment as “toxic”. At a minimum, I will be writing on this site until the election, but whether I’ll keep going beyond that, I have yet to decide.

Right now, though, it's nice to be back in the saddle again.

On sabbatical

I’m taking a leave of absence from blogging, for an indefinite period.

I’m tired of the same old stories of incompetence, dishonesty and self-importance that make up much of the local news. I’m tired of writing about them, and rehashing the same old arguments again and again and again. I’m tired of the insults and the bickering; tired of having to read every comment and determine what’s fair comment and what’s libellous or a personal attack. And I'm tired of taking crap from people - whether they look like Tony Brannon or not. After three and a half years of running this site, I need a break.

If you want to be notified when I start posting again, you can either enter your email address in the box titled “Updates by Email” in the sidebar of this page or subscribe to the RSS feed.

Thanks for reading, and for your contributions. I’ll be back when my batteries have recharged, hopefully later this year.

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YouBoob

Might I suggest that if the Department of Tourism is planning to distribute any more promotional videos of Bermuda on YouTube, they make them considerably less boring than this one. Show, don't tell.

Disabling comments on them might be a good idea too.

» LATER: It looks like the Department of Tourism probably weren’t the ones who uploaded this to YouTube. Instead, it seems to have been put up there by someone in Germany calling themselves “postpunk”, who presumably nicked the video from the DoT’s website. Moreover, although today’s RG article suggested that YouTube was one of the non-traditional marketing methods being considered, according to the Bermuda Sun’s transcript, Dr. Brown didn’t specifically mention that site.