WeblogBahamas.com

How the World views One Little Country called The Bahamas

By S3S

Having promulgated my thoughts about The Bahamas in a number of Blogs over the past 12 months that included coverage from my perspective of the multitude of 'evils' facing our little country (thus far 12 and counting ….), I thought it might be appropriate to provide pointers to what the 'world' thinks of us.

I do this because Governments are very easy targets; they reside in the public spotlight ('fish bowl') and cannot avoid the incessant public stare, despite sometimes going to extremes to hide their decisions and actions.  So it is right that alternative views should be offered that would tend to 'balance' the picture, especially if objective commentary is provided from those with vested and no vested interests. My thoughts could then be properly contextualised and the precarious position we are in reconfirmed or rejected/denied outright.

I think all would agree, however, that we are in a global competition that intensifies by the day and are competing from an increasingly weakening position, as precious internal resources (human and social capital) diminish and mismanagement of the resulting fewer resources continues at a regular pace. One of the main resources being diminished is a knowledgeable and educated population that can drive a talented workforce that will be attractive to a more diverse Foreign Direct Investment (FDI).  I have identified evils over the past year or so that I have headlined 'GIANT Evils' in my Blogs, in an attempt to promulgate my thinking on these issues, which include but are not limited to: Lack of a National Vision; Crime & Anti-social Behaviour; Declining Education; Economic Misfocus; Economic Dependence; Food Insecurity; Health & Welfare; Natural Disasters; Political Indecision; Need for Labour Reform (Unions and Collective Bargaining); Socio-political Reality; and the Immorality & Hypocrisy which inheres our population.

With regard to the issues listed below, these are the views of others, in particular, international, regional and local agencies, supra-governmental and non-governmental organisations (NGOs), including the United Nations (UN), World Bank (WB); International Monetary Fund (IMF); Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) and other agencies that gather and analyse data on countries on an ongoing basis. The indicators include governance, ease of doing business, corruption, failed states index and human development, inter alia. They are in no particular order (though I have tried to lump together the more general indicators at the start):

1. World Governance Indicators

http://info.worldbank.org/governance/wgi/sc_chart.asp http://www.imf.org/external/np/exr/facts/gov.htm

http://www.iadb.org/datagob/

** The Bahamas - Business Freedom of 72.5 (above regional average of 63.7)

2. UNESCO Statistics

http://www.unesco.org/new/en/education/themes/leading-the-international-agenda/efareport/statistics/statistical-tables/

The long statistical table is particularly instructive

3. Ease of Doing Business

http://www.doingbusiness.org/rankings

http://www.doingbusiness.org/data/exploreeconomies/bahamas

** The Bahamas is ranked 77^th out of 185 countries overall but 179^th for ‘registering property’ and 123^rd for ‘enforcing contracts’. What can we infer from these two rankings?

4. Corruption Index
http://www.transparency.org/cpi2012/in_detail  http://www.transparency.org/cpi2012/results  

** The Bahamas is ranked 22^nd with a score of 73, not bad, not bad at all.

5. Small Island Developing State (SIDS) Ranking

http://www.sidsnet.org/

http://www.un.org/special-rep/ohrlls/sid/statistics.htm

6. Failed States Index

http://ffp.statesindex.org/ http://www.foreignpolicy.com/failed_states_index_2012_interactive

** The Bahamas is ranked 134^th with a score of 55.1, not bad, not bad at all (c.f. Somalia ranks #1)

7. Human Development Index (HDI)

http://www.un.org/special-rep/ohrlls/sid/HDI-SIDS.pdf

** The Bahamas is ranked 6^th with a score of 41, and in ‘high human development’ column

8. Trade Liberalisation

http://www.gatt.org/trastat_e.html

http://www.oecd.org/tad/tradeliberalisation.htm

http://ec.europa.eu/development/icenter/repository/scanned_bs_csp10_en.pdf

Are we on the right track?

9. National Economic Indicators - GDP per capita

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/bahamas/indicators http://www.tradingeconomics.com/bahamas/gdp-per-capita

Compare any two years, e.g. 2004 to 2012 to see the trend 

10. Debt-to-GDP Ratio

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/country-list/government-debt-to-gdp

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/bahamas/government-debt-to-gdp

Important here to look at the trend lines for each country; again, can compare years

11. GDP Growth

http://www.tradingeconomics.com/country-list/gdp-annual-growth-rate

Compare any two years to see the trend

12. Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) attraction

UNCTAD World Investment Report 2012

http://www.unctad-docs.org/files/UNCTAD-WIR2012-Full-en.pdf

Patently small in stature, we nonetheless figure prominently in many of the above indices. On the surface, we appear to be an extremely wealthy little country, but when we dig a bit deeper, we can infer from trends that our vaulted position of the past is slowly ebbing away.  Also, there is no thought given to emerging social issues that might be masked by this apparent decline in wealth. Together the indices paint a mixed picture, but as stated at the start, it is for you to make up your own minds.

© S3S

Lessons in Freedom: My “I told you so world.”

by Tibor R. Machan

So all of us who have long concluded that big government--which is to say, government with wide, nearly unlimited scope of power over the population it is supposed to serve--is a menace, no better than a gang of embezzlers and extortionists, can shout out “I told you so.”  From the time of the American Revolution it should have been crystal clear that trying to solve the problems of a society with what government has to offer, namely, brute force (more or less subtly applied) is a horribly bad idea.  Yes, it was that even before but by then plenty of major interlocutors in political discourse knew it well.  Sadly, the governmental habit was by then so ingrained in most populations around the globe that getting rid of the habit became nearly impossible.

My own special area of concern has been government regulation, that insidious practice of meddling with people’s lives on innumerable fronts, and I have been watching just how addicted some leaders and public philosophers are to the idea.  So I read such publications as The Economist, Barron’s, Bloomberg Businessweek and the like almost religiously, perhaps because I am hoping against hope that the message that government regulations are nasty as all get out will in time sink in.

The most recent issue of The Economist has a special report on world banking and what jumped out at me when I finished reading it was the naivete of the final paragraph of the report: “Paradoxically, stricter regulation intended to tame banks that were thought too big to fail is leading to the creation of even bigger and more systemically important institutions.” (May 11, 2013, p. 18).  The futility of trying to fix economic problems with government regulation has been pointed out long ago--I learned it back in the mid 1960s from University of Chicago economics genius, Sam Peltzman--just as has been the futility of big government intervention itself, but even the editors of the normally sensible magazine, The Economist can pen sentences like the one above, as if they were making some sort of novel observation! They should remember a famous quip attributed to Albert Einstein, namely, “Insanity [is] doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results..”

Guided by the idiocy of the likes of Paul Krugman, thousands who chime in on the topic still believe that using the government to fix things is a worthy notion. The institution may have some merit for purposes of guarding our basic rights, as Jefferson and the other signers thought, but beyond this there just is no excuse for trusting it with any tasks.  (When I make mention of this to some liberal friends I often receive a list of state achievements such as the Hoover Dam, the TVA, etc. that allegedly would not get done if government were de-authorized; but all that commits the fallacy of the false alternative: we either have government intervention or nothing.  How about developing non-government solutions and institutions to address the problems?)

We could extend this discussion, of course, to all the current fiascoes, with the IRS and the Department of State, etc., where the classical liberal teachings have gone unheeded.  But I am sure readers can reach those conclusions on their own, at least here.

May 18, 2013

We are delighted to present Lessons in Freedom, essays by Dr. Tibor Machan, for your pleasure.

Dr. Machan holds the R. C. Hoiles Chair in Business Ethics & Free Enterprise at Chapman University's Argyros School of B&E.

Visit his web site here...

Johnnie Christie and Floating Boats - Song of the week - May 20, 2013 - Martyr

Well we got out to Crazy Johnny's on Saturday night for the Johnnie Christie and Floating Boats CD launch, and we're glad we did.

Not only was Johnnie in great form, the band (Johnnie Christie, guitar and lead vocal - from 25 North, Joe Euteneuer, lead guitar and vocals - from 25 North, Andrew Beckford, bass - from Sub Culture, Ricky Rolle, drums - from Sub Culture, Kyle Baley, keyboards - from 25 North) was exceptional.

Hope you enjoy Martyr (track 4 from the cd) below.

Please visit their Facebook Page here… and of course, buy the cd.

Martyr

The Bahamian Dream Book Launch with Dr. K. Jonathan Rodgers

Dr. K. Jonathan Rodgers is launching his second book at Doongalik Studios on Village Road, Friday, May 31, 2013, 6pm to 9pm.

According to the recent Doongalik Art Newsletter May 2013 (pdf) “The Bahamian Dream“ … "examines the key economic and social situations in the country. Come out to hear his theories on how and why we need to turn the country’s economy around and engage in constructive discussions on the topics, be amongst the first to purchase your copy of his analyses, and get it signed - This promises to be an interesting evening!"

Photo of the week: Scottish Rite Temple, Indianapolis, Indiana

While visiting Indianapolis a few years back, I walked past this beautiful old building. And it's not a church. It's the Scotish Rite Temple. A lodge.

They actually provide tours of the interior. It was just incredible.

Rick Lowe Images by Rick Lowe is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
Based on a work at www.weblogbahamas.com.
Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available at http://www.weblogbahamas.com/.

Find more photos at Through The Lens

I've got the "Memphis Blues Again"

Back on May 1, we went to Memphis, Tennessee for the first time and were lucky enough to take in the Beale Street Music Festival and more as you can see from the collage of tickets in the image. The city was great, the sight seeing was darn good, the food was wonderful, but the music was just amazing!

Here's a list of the bands/musicians we saw. Hope you can check them out at the links below.

I just keep reliving the music in my head, that's why I say I've got the Memphis Blues Again. Thank goodness I wasn't stuck in Mobile with them, with apologies to Bob Dylan.

May 1 - B.B. King's Blues Club
Blake Ryan Band

May 3 - Beale Street Music Festival
Jimbo Mathus & The Tri-State Coalition
The Wallflowers
Sheryl Crow

May 4 - Beale Street Music Festival
Fuzzy Jeffries & The Kings of Memphis
Sonny Burgess & The Pacers
Jake Bugg
Jerry Lee Lewis
Mavis Staples
Government Mule
ZZ Top

May 5 - Beale Street Music Festival
Barbara Blue
The Slide Brothers
Gary Clarke Jr.
Davy Knowles
Royal Southern Brotherhood

May 6 - Rum Boogie Cafe
Brandon Santini

Mr. Perry Christie: "FNM has no moral authority" to accuse the PLP of conflicts of interest

You gotta love it. The leader of the only institution that uses legalised force to accomplish its goals is accusing someone else/another group of having no moral authority to accuse them of such acts.

Let me put it this way. Mr. Perry Christie (PLP), Prime Minister, has suggested that the Opposition FNM have no moral authority to accuse his party of conflicts of interest when they have done the same thing.

Here's no less than a lawyer and the leader of the Government suggesting that conflict of interest is okay if someone else does it.

When will we mature enough to simply do the right thing?

By suggesting that conflicts are bound to happen in our small country excuses him in this case is not satisfactory at any level. There are established protocols and guidelines, maybe even laws, that require certain steps before contracts are awarded, that Mr. Christie should want his government to follow whether his predecessor in office did it or not.

When did partisanship provide license to commit wrong doing? And even if a party supporter thought this was acceptable, shouldn't the Prime Minister disabuse them of such thoughts instead of encouraging the behaviour?

Lessons in Freedom: Why Free Will Matters

by Tibor R. Machan

Let me once again quote George Orwell, who reportedly noted that “Sometimes the first duty of intelligent men is the restatement of the obvious.”

The idea that without free will there can be no morality is one of those obvious facts that bears repeating.  It was Kant who famously insisted on this but others have signed on as well.  For instance, it is arguable a point made by Aristotle, too.) In an age that is highly respectful of the opinions of scientists, even opinions that do not arise from their work as scientists, seem to contradict this but even scientists have affirmed the point!

For a simple view of what nearly all scientists believe is that everything that happens in the world has to happen exactly as it does happen.  In short, scientists are supposedly committed to determinism which is, at least in its usual meaning, incompatible with free will.

Free will involves being the originator of one’s actions or conduct.  Unlike physical objects, plants and most animals, human beings are supposed to have free will in that they normally initiate what they do.  Their conduct is not fully explainable by reference to impersonal factors such as their genetic make-up, their history or race or gender, etc., etc.  They are, instead, agents of much of what they do, of their behavior.

Now this idea seems incompatible with how scientists view the world, although in fact scientists aren’t supposed to be prejudiced in favor of determinism or free will, for that matter.  Whether human beings have free will is something to be discovered, not assumed.

If nature is so constituted that it makes room for free actions, we human beings would be good candidates for being able to act freely, on our own initiative.  Why not? Well, some think that because everything is moved by something else, that holds for what people do as well.

But is this right? Do our thoughts, for example, about free will or political liberty or child raising all spring forth impersonally, without our own agency having a role in the process?  Is what we think about free will and determinism or anything else no different from the movement of the planets or atoms?  Or could there be some entities in the world that possess the capacity to initiate some of their conduct?

Perhaps one such area of self-movement is where human thinking and intending occur, in our minds, just as the criminal law and morality sees it.  If this is denied, what we believe about everything is itself just an impersonal event, not something we produce with our thinking!

OK, much more can be said about this but the gist of it is captured in the few paragraphs above. For now what matters is that if we lack free will, then we also lack personal responsibility.  We are, in short, not the source of what we think and do.  It is all que sera, sera!

But nature could well be rich enough in its possibilities that agent causality makes perfectly good sense.  Some, perhaps few, entities start to act on their own.  (This is a capacity usually ascribed only to God but there is no reason why people couldn’t have it!)

Needless to say, free will is necessary for moral and legal praise and blame as well as all the great varieties of creativity evident in human affairs, for good or ill!  This includes the activity of trying to figure out whether free will exists!

But one unwelcome results of the existence of free will is that millions of people could act differently from how they actually act, could have acted differently as well, etc., much better than they have acted.  Not everyone welcomes this for it leads to the idea that some folks are guilty of misconduct while others are praiseworthy for acting properly, even heroically.

In short, the idea of free will implies, among other things, that egalitarianism is false, something that those who would embark upon regimenting us in life do not like to admit.

We are delighted to present Lessons in Freedom, essays by Dr. Tibor Machan, for your pleasure.

Dr. Machan holds the R. C. Hoiles Chair in Business Ethics & Free Enterprise at Chapman University's Argyros School of B&E.

Visit his web site here...

Family of Tony Hepburn asking for help to find him

More bureaucracies = more deficits, debt and taxes

Mr. John Rolle, Financial Secretary, Ministry of Finance says the proposed VAT will improve revenue and keep their spending very disciplined.

Meanwhile, Mr. Ryan Pinder (PLP), Minister of Financial Services wants three new bureaucracies as a result of international trade agreements.

Fiscal constraint has not been the strong suit of either government since independence with the exception of one or two years. Heck during the record income years of 2002 to 2007, the government of the day ran huge deficits.

Implementing more and more bureaucracies, increasing the size of government exponentially, is no way to get deficits, debt and taxes under control.

I do not envy the task Mr. Rolle faces.