With the exception of Tom Moody, who has been a high-level coach, I can’t say for certain that the television analysts quite understand the nuances of the T20 format. Since Andre Russell’s blitzkrieg at the Queen’s Park Oval, they have almost continually complained about the Tallawahs’ batting order. They keep …
Read More »CPL 18: This is not the year for a TKR loss; Best defends the demonised Dwayne Bravo
“A tragedy of magnanimous proportions.” The phrase is borrowed from cricket media’s Mr Malaprop, who used it to summarise the rapid demise of “a triumvirate” of Jamaica Tallawahs batsmen in a recent CPL match. I damblay it to sum up how the hordes of boisterous Trinbago Knight Riders are likely …
Read More »Media Monitor: Best reviews PNM government’s continuing “communication” challenges…
Meaning, every competent Communications person knows, is made at the receiving end; whatever the message you intend to send, there is no guarantee that that is the message that will be received by those in whose garden the despatched message happens to fall. Whether or not it bears fruit at …
Read More »Media Monitor: NIF, NoF, Nuff; can Government really bank on OCM?
If you watched the TV6 7pm News on Thursday, then you should have a clear idea of how deep in the doodoo our media are. And since One Caribbean Media (OCM) is one of the five companies on whose entire or partial assets the National Investment Fund is “collateralised”—not my …
Read More »Media Monitor: The problem with the T&T media’s World Cup coverage; aite!
The Trinidad Express probably thinks that the World Cup craze is so all-pervasive that they don’t need to bother too much about the rest of the paper. Here is a sentence from last Friday’s Editorial, headlined “Facts the antidote to fake news:” “Evidently hot under the collar, he—the reference was …
Read More »Father’s Day reflection: today’’s dads, yesterday’s granddads and different attitudes to the three Rs
Back in the 1970’s and 80’s, there was a Family Planning Association (FPA) bumper sticker which reminded the world that “The challenge is not in becoming a father but in being one.” After all, all it takes to have a child is a little rudeness, a little luck, (good or …
Read More »Monitoring Me (Epilogue): A Mother’s Day message for present-day parents to ponder
The voice on the other end of the line was female but it was neither family nor familiar. And without so much as a perfunctory greeting, she got right to the heart of the matter. “Mr Best, yuh eh have no mudder?” “I beg your pardon?” I said, taken aback. …
Read More »Monitoring Me 4: The Sisyphus miracle of rolling stones, uphill tasks and labours of love
My first encounter with Sisyphos came in Sixth Form Latin class at QRC when I was in my mid-teens. And a decade or so later, I was halfway between 18 and 28 in 20th Century French Literature class at UWI when I was introduced to the Camusian version of the …
Read More »Daaga make we do it! Black Power stories of the Q and the 1970 Coup
“Power alone,” the poet Syl Lowhar wrote in Tapia’s “Black Power in Human Song” special somewhere in the 1970’s, “will never make us strong. The heart must also sing the human song.” Almost half a century after Geddes Granger’s NJAC empowered Black people in Trinidad and Tobago, the politically most …
Read More »Media Monitor: Go brave, Guardian Media; just keep right on maccoing Michelle-Lee
As a once respected media house, the Guardian may well believe maccoing to be its thing. But as a former journalism lecturer, I am very sure it isn’t mine. I am not, therefore, in the least interested in knowing who Michelle-Lee Ahye’s partner is. Or his or her sex. Or his or her gender. …
Read More »Monitoring me 3: Ali’s reply to Trump, Bolt pulls up Rogge, MJ’s silence and the eye of the Tiger
“If white America were judged by the quality of its people,” Muhammad Ali might have said, “the USA might not finish too high on any list.” Ali was like that, never pulling his punches, unbowed, cowed neither by Joe Frazier’s aggression nor George Foreman’s power nor the might of Uncle …
Read More »Media Monitor: Darryl’s PS, Camille’s BS, Rowley’s stress and the PNM’s right royal DS mess
Jereem Richards’ 200m Commonwealth Games gold medal was all the rage yesterday. So I want to salute the 24-year-old sprinter on his achievement and give him all the respect he deserves for it before I turn my attention to another medallist. Richard Thompson has thrice medalled at the Olympics. And …
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