Yours Faithfully
Dr. Griot

You have been good Skinner. I respect your position. I will leave Evan to speak for himself. I am done

CUMMINS and Thomas, If after two letters from me and you do not get it you never will. I am more than convinced now that there is a dire need for re-education and this education is not taught in schools. I now have a better understanding of the fixed mindset which is causing our demise.

yes Skinner. And Rodney if he was alive woul;d agree with you. He would have introduced a Marxist periodisation of Guyana and definitely materialist dialectics would have been in the cirriculum.

He would have ensured that the nature of class and the exploitative nature of the capitalist system be made known and so people would know why the vast majority would of necessity remain at some level of poverty and unable to enjoy the basic frredom that they fought for.

If he were alive the debate would have been on a higher level.

And Bishop maybe you can explain why the Indians got rich under the PNC? Why most of them supported the PNC? What was the role of the Black workers in defending the PNC? and whether those very Rich Indians continue to grace the office of the President.

That class know how to ensure their interests are looked after. can we say the same for the workers or is it that they have been kept so divided that they are weak and unable to stand up united in theior defence.

“Martin Luther King, Nelson Mandela, Mahatma Ghandi” were effective in fulfilling only one aspect of Social/political activism. Their successes have not eradicated poverty. The same poeple are still pulling the strings. In the US look at who filling up the jails.

As a matter of fact, before King and Rosa Parks African businesses were booming. Why? Africans were buying from Africans. The passage of the civil rights bill poured more people into the market place for the White businesses. A lot of Blacks went out of business.

As I said before we have to re-program ourselves to understand business. We have to move from being merely consumers. WE also have to identify a business niche. I travel a lot around Texas. In the most remote areas, where minority groups reside, the persons owning the gas stations and convenience stores are Middle eastern – Indian, Pakistani, Jordanian. Food – Chinese

Went to Fort Worth in a predominantly African American area and found the owner watching cricket – Trinidad Vs Australia. The man is from Pakistan. I spent a lot of time with him. People wanted to know what kind of base ball we watching. These folks are fearless. Good question – how are they finding these business opportunities. Net working and being united. There is a lot to be learned.

Evans and Cummins do not have a clue about what I a putting forward. How sad.

Now, I am yet to meet or hear of somebody who champions and actively promotes poverty so this letter provides quite new and interesting information for me. I know of nobody who wants to live (really) poor, the poorer being the better life. Something tells me if that were the case then people would have been flocking to countries like Guyana and Somalia. I know of governments, through their policies (or lack of), that promote poverty so maybe Randy knows of something I don’t. Recently I was particularly interested in the local finance minister’s target GDP growth rate of 4.7% per annum.I compounded that number on Guyana’s GDP per capita ($2500.00) and realized that is would take 45 -50 years for the average Guyanese to attain the living standards of the average Barbadian of today ($19,000);that is without even factoring in inflation and average global growth rates. I saw the government’s policies as promoting perpetual poverty but never knew there were people in the Caribbean and Guyana who actually believe in such a philosophy so much to make it their mission. My initial feeling was the government is trying but not trying hard enough to ease the sufferings of that innocent child whose parents voted either for or against the PPP. Randy’s information opens another avenue in my thought process.

Now that Randy is blogging with us, can he tell us if the Guyana government possess the “Caribbean Intellectual’s” mind- set and is anti-wealth aka pro-poverty? Moreover, I would like to know if Guyana represents the lone contrarian in the Caribbean.

I look forward to a response and am not interested in your qualifications or personal wealth or what you think of yourself.What keeps me interested in Guyana is that anybody’s little child who wants an opportunity to pursue his dream.He,like me,doesn’t care about politics but just wants to live in a society that works.

And Dr. Randy Persaud do you accept that there is imperialism or is that a figment of peop[le’s imagination

randy after the filthy rich gets their 70 percent how much is left for the rest.

I applaud your accomplishment.

If you use your credit card to invest then its good. If you use it to purchase consumer goods then it may be a different matter. Even then I would want to believe that the interest rate would be pretty high. And in any event you and other may earn a good living but it is the financial oligarchies that hog the cake.

History has created the wealthy. but it has also created as the other side of the coin the poverty stricken. History has also created the filthy rich. Its not a question of blame but understanding the way the present economic structure distributes wealth. Its a question of understanding the structural implication of the level of skewed diatribution of wealth.

If America for instance historically developed the capacity and so consumes 25 percent of the world’s resources and only have 6 percent of the world’s population does this have implications for the reamining 94 percent of the world’s population. And If one were to include the other G7 and their consumption levels how much would remain for the remaining 70 percent of the worlds population.

In the USA if 60 percent of the newely created wealth goes to 60 percent of the population and one percent goes to 80 percent of the population and the real wages of the American workers is falling would this have implications.

are these things we should speak about.

You speak of middle class. maybe you need to define your concept of class. Concepts need to be operationalised so that we all refer to the same thing when we utilise an expression.

Are there any other definition of class that might be more meaningful and which may be more useful in the examination of society and social change. Rather that the upper, middle and lower class how about the working and the capitalist class. Do you feel that these are useful categories to consider as we attempt to examine society and social change.

With all the qualifications that you have I am sure you would find no difficulties is educating us with regards these.

You have to commence thinking out of the box.

The reality is that no matter what, such an approach within the system that we have would not change the fact that the vast majority in especially third world countries would be in poverty.
In the same way the capitalist countries that took the first leap now controls vast capital that is used to exploit more labour to generate even more wealth for them. those that start late have difficulties.

In Guyana lets assess who commenced investing and those who followed and wonder if its possible to catch up.

Regardless, why are we using the categories Blacks and Indians when the majority of both are in poverty.

If all of us were to become PHD’s tomorrow somebody would have to collect the garbage. How would we pay them then. i am sure education can give someone an edge but it would in no way change the structure of things. How many of us would become capitalist and appropriate profits to get rich. It would of structural necessity be a minority.

I have been reading your pieces on these pages, and I’m now shocked to learn that a man of your demonstrated intellectual mediocrity can actually lay claim to achievements that normally elevate others to olympian status in the intellectual realm.

Man, spare us your ineffectual boastings and dedicate yourself to the futile task of trying to convince sane and sensible men and women that your PPP is the best thing since they met their first love.