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<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=1 width="100%" border=0><TBODY><TR><TD><SPAN class=TopStory>Champions of the poor</SPAN>
<SPAN class=Subheadline></SPAN></TD></TR><TR><TD>Lance Robinson
Tuesday, October 10, 2006
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<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=5 width=70 align=left border=0><TBODY><TR><TD>
</TD></TR><TR><TD><SPAN class=Description>Lance Robinson</SPAN></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE><P class=StoryText align=justify>One of the most debilitating and repressive of all human conditions is pervasive and ongoing poverty. It is a state of existence that is an all-encompassing social trap from which it is extremely difficult to extricate oneself. It is also at the same time a condition that, because of deep need and a lack of hope, allows its hapless victims to be manipulated and exploited in the most shameless manner by unscrupulous people.<P class=StoryText align=justify>True champions of the poor who engage in philanthropic enterprises do so mainly by virtue of the fact that they have the resources to do so. They hardly ever speak of their endeavours and hardly ever seek applause. Those with such resources like Warren Buffet or Bill Gates very often succeed on a grand international scale with programmes that greatly benefit the poor and do so out of a sense of their own genuine philanthropy. There are many others, however, whose self-serving claim of their love for the poor springs entirely from their own ulterior motives of trying to acquire or hold on to power by exploiting the poor.<P class=StoryText align=justify>Jamaica, like many other countries, is a case in point where those who would seek power find fertile ground for manipulation and exploitation of the poor. Because the poor, in the hands of unscrupulous people, are like clay in the hands of a potter. And like the potter loving his clay, in like fashion does the politician love the poor. There has hardly been a politician since the dawn of creation who did not love the poor and who did not co-opt them as his own constituency.<P class=StoryText align=justify>Talk is cheap, and it's easy for politicians to love the poor in their well-crafted political speeches! But those who talk incessantly about alleviating poverty are very often the most incapable of producing any economic programmes that truly alleviate the plight of the poor, and for them to indulge in populist distribution programmes and debt-creation strategies as a remedy for poverty is completely disingenuous and will only prolong the misery of the poor.<P class=StoryText align=justify>Poverty in any country is nothing more than the result of succeeding incompetent governments exercising poor economic management in their respective countries. It is truly amazing that in spite of Jamaica's long history of failure (indulging in handouts and distribution to "solve" the plight of the poor), the poor people of Jamaica still allow themselves to be manipulated into repeating the same mistakes. As a result of such policies, Jamaica is slowly being inundated by a sea of encroaching poverty, and proposed solutions to date have been nothing more that meaningless platitudes and promises.<P class=StoryText align=justify>In our current scenario of electioneering fever, the battle waxes hot between rival factions as to who are the true champions of the poor. In this country, the poor get battered around like fodder in a hen house while politicians seek to lay claim to their loyalty.<P class=StoryText align=justify>For the most part of the last generation, Jamaica has had the misfortune of being in the grip of socialist politicians whose populist approach to economics always favoured distribution over production - policies which always left us poorer. And when a country displays almost a total incapacity to improve its economy over a prolonged period, while at the same time contin
<SPAN class=Subheadline></SPAN></TD></TR><TR><TD>Lance Robinson
Tuesday, October 10, 2006
</TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE>
<TABLE cellSpacing=0 cellPadding=5 width=70 align=left border=0><TBODY><TR><TD>
</TD></TR><TR><TD><SPAN class=Description>Lance Robinson</SPAN></TD></TR></TBODY></TABLE><P class=StoryText align=justify>One of the most debilitating and repressive of all human conditions is pervasive and ongoing poverty. It is a state of existence that is an all-encompassing social trap from which it is extremely difficult to extricate oneself. It is also at the same time a condition that, because of deep need and a lack of hope, allows its hapless victims to be manipulated and exploited in the most shameless manner by unscrupulous people.<P class=StoryText align=justify>True champions of the poor who engage in philanthropic enterprises do so mainly by virtue of the fact that they have the resources to do so. They hardly ever speak of their endeavours and hardly ever seek applause. Those with such resources like Warren Buffet or Bill Gates very often succeed on a grand international scale with programmes that greatly benefit the poor and do so out of a sense of their own genuine philanthropy. There are many others, however, whose self-serving claim of their love for the poor springs entirely from their own ulterior motives of trying to acquire or hold on to power by exploiting the poor.<P class=StoryText align=justify>Jamaica, like many other countries, is a case in point where those who would seek power find fertile ground for manipulation and exploitation of the poor. Because the poor, in the hands of unscrupulous people, are like clay in the hands of a potter. And like the potter loving his clay, in like fashion does the politician love the poor. There has hardly been a politician since the dawn of creation who did not love the poor and who did not co-opt them as his own constituency.<P class=StoryText align=justify>Talk is cheap, and it's easy for politicians to love the poor in their well-crafted political speeches! But those who talk incessantly about alleviating poverty are very often the most incapable of producing any economic programmes that truly alleviate the plight of the poor, and for them to indulge in populist distribution programmes and debt-creation strategies as a remedy for poverty is completely disingenuous and will only prolong the misery of the poor.<P class=StoryText align=justify>Poverty in any country is nothing more than the result of succeeding incompetent governments exercising poor economic management in their respective countries. It is truly amazing that in spite of Jamaica's long history of failure (indulging in handouts and distribution to "solve" the plight of the poor), the poor people of Jamaica still allow themselves to be manipulated into repeating the same mistakes. As a result of such policies, Jamaica is slowly being inundated by a sea of encroaching poverty, and proposed solutions to date have been nothing more that meaningless platitudes and promises.<P class=StoryText align=justify>In our current scenario of electioneering fever, the battle waxes hot between rival factions as to who are the true champions of the poor. In this country, the poor get battered around like fodder in a hen house while politicians seek to lay claim to their loyalty.<P class=StoryText align=justify>For the most part of the last generation, Jamaica has had the misfortune of being in the grip of socialist politicians whose populist approach to economics always favoured distribution over production - policies which always left us poorer. And when a country displays almost a total incapacity to improve its economy over a prolonged period, while at the same time contin