In parts of the Caribbean, including here in Trinidad and Tobago, fooling someone is referred to as “giving a six for a nine.” Last week, a High Court Judge was arrested and charged with—as it is popularly known—driving under the influence. After his court appearance, it was reported that the …
Read More »Daly Bread: Bitter-sweet royal wedding Saturday; Kingdom Choir versus PanTrinbago comess
Sheku Kanneh-Mason, aged 19, was the cellist at the royal wedding Saturday before last. Just about the time he was playing Schubert’s Ave Maria, in a setting of style and civility, two things happened. The first was my train of thought that we had artistes of high calibre, who could …
Read More »Daly Bread: Runaway violent crime is the predictable outcome of political indifference
Anyone with a copy of The Daly Commentaries or a good memory will know that these columns have repeatedly condemned the dreadful expression “collateral damage”. On Monday last, that phrase was disparaged in an editorial in this newspaper entitled “Crossing the 200-murder mark.” Unfortunately, it is “more than a few …
Read More »Daly Bread: Assault with a deadly weapon; how privilege and connections impede justice
Within the last fortnight, the deadly weapons of privilege or perceptions of privilege in our socially fractured islands have again been assaulting us, albeit in very different contexts. The High Court gave a judgement in which the State, not for the first time, was ordered to pay damages to two …
Read More »Daly Bread: Seeing it up close; what we can learn from Venezuela
Extensive comment on current events in Venezuela is not for me to make, but I am confident that events unfolding there are the outcome of a long-standing bitter polarisation between the Venezuelan political and socio-economic elite and the working class. When the poor and dispossessed eventually found a champion in …
Read More »Daly Bread: Fantasia in G; suggestions for Tobago Jazz Festival and the T&T tourism product
Later today at the Tobago Jazz Experience 2018, Fantasia is scheduled to be a headline act. I do not know in what keys Fantasia sings her rhythm and blues, but her appearance in Tobago today is a case of Fantasia in G, because the engagement of such artistes is part …
Read More »Daly Bread: Minding the gap; why President Weekes is off to a commendable start
Reliable sources have confirmed that a minister who is being re-assigned from one ministry to another is not required to be sworn in consequent upon his re-assignment. As a result of a mistaken belief that another swearing-in was necessary when Darryl Smith was moved from the Ministry of Sport to …
Read More »Daly Bread: Life in the never-ending movie; a bizarre political week in T&T
Scenes in the public life in Trinidad and Tobago have become so unreal that I have been listening to Brother Valentino’s “Life is a stage” to re-digest his opinion that in Trinidad and Tobago we live in a never-ending movie in which we all have a role to play. Ministers …
Read More »Daly Bread: Doh look dong or behind; T&T politicians at sea
I am using the vernacular “doh look dong” instead of “do not look down” in order to keep real the dangerous nature of the predicament of the passengers transferred at sea from the water taxi Trini Flash to the larger vessel, Cabo Star. As readers will recall the Trini Flash …
Read More »Daly Bread: Replenishing the reservoir of hope; welcome, President Weekes
Her Excellency Paula-Mae Weekes became the sixth President of the Republic on Monday last. She gave an inaugural speech that was universally well received. Her central theme was the question of what are we to do when “in the state of the State, we might see every reason to despair.” …
Read More »Daly Bread: Break-ins, break-outs and Govt’s blunder of appeasement
This troubled Sunday morning, let’s view the continuing Chief Justice saga through the prism of Watergate. On 22 July 1973, the headline on the front page of the Washington was ‘Nixon sees witch-hunt.’ At that time, the now famed Washington Post reporters, Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein, were actively pursuing the …
Read More »Daly Bread: Sabbatical or tactical? A look at Archie’s controversial leave and section 137
In a column published on 17 December 2017, I foretold that there was a political sub-plot by means of which Chief Justice Archie would be given a soft landing in March 2018. At that time, I also referred to talk that the Chief Justice would be going on extended leave …
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