SERENDIPITOUS HOPE FOR THE PROBLEM OF THE WORLD

Purple Turtle Beach, Dominica.  Serendipity is finding something where you least expect it.  I found it on Purple Turtle Beach.

This is just about the only appreciable beach on Dominica (da-ma-neek-ka), a tiny island Caribbean nation of 73 thousand folks, 290 square miles (less than 1/5^th the size of Rhode Island), and 365 rivers – more than one river per square mile.  (You saw a couple of these rivers in the Pirates of the Caribbean movies filmed on Dominica.)

I’m here keeping a promise to an extraordinary lady I met 25 years ago.  Eugenia Charles was Prime Minister of Dominica in the 1980s, an ally of America’s and friend of Ronald Reagan.  When a Soviet-Cuban sponsored coup seized control of the island nation of Grenada in 1983 and began converting it into a Communist colony of the Kremlin, Eugenia Charles, in her capacity of chairman of the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States, appealed to President Reagan to liberate Grenada.

As we all know, Reagan did so, but he would not have been able to without the unwavering support of Eugenia Charles.  It is thanks to her that the rollback of the Soviet Empire began.

At the time of the Grenada liberation I was in Angola with the anti-Soviet UNITA guerrillas.  I’ll always remember sitting by a campfire in the Angolan bush listening to BBC reports on my short-wave radio – and the coughs of lions out in the darkness.

I met Eugenia Charles the next year during a visit of hers to Washington – and when she learned I had never been to Dominica, she made me promise I would someday correct this global oversight.  It’s taken me a while, but here I am at last.

When Christopher Columbus discovered the island in 1493, it was on a Sunday, so he named it Dominica – Latin for Sunday.  When he returned to Spain and was asked what it looked like, he crumpled up a piece of parchment and tossed it on the table.  So the place was left alone for the next two centuries – and became a sanctuary for the Carib Indians being displaced by the colonizing Brits and French from other islands of the "West Indies."

The Caribs, though, didn’t have any real complaints – after all, they were a cannibal tribe who had gruesomely replaced the previous inhabitants of these islands, a people called the Tainos or Arawak.  Oh, and they practiced slavery. On the island of Guadeloupe,  Columbus gave refuge to three castrated Carib slaves who were due to be eaten.

Nonetheless, the Caribbean Sea is named after them.  All the Tainos get a legacy for is their invention of the hammock (hamaca in their language.)

The Brits finally got around to colonizing Dominica in the early 1800s and populated it with black slaves from Africa.  After a failed attempt to unite its Caribbean colonies into a single federation after WWII, Dominica gained full independence in 1978 – and was promptly taken over by a crazed megalomaniac named Patrick John.

Then something amazing happened.  Mass protests in the capital of Roseau were joined by the police and resulted in peacefully removing John from power.  Orderly and peaceful elections were held in 1980, resulting in Eugenia Charles becoming Prime Minister.  Dominica has been peaceful ever since.

But that may be coming to an end.  Eugenia retired in 1995 (she passed away in 2005 at age 86), her Dominica Freedom Party deteriorated, and a left-wing anti-business party, the Dominica Labor Party, gained power. 

In 2004, a 31 year-old guy named Roosevelt Skerritt was named Prime Minister.  He immediately severed Dominica’s diplomatic relations with Taiwan (established by Eugenia Charles) and switched them to Red China.  The Chicoms then announced an aid package of tens of millions of dollars.

Skerritt then proceeded to cozy up to Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez.  Money from Chavez has poured in, along with Cuban doctors.  Dominica has no beaches, no luxury resorts, no cuisine or great restaurants.  The only thing it has going for it is "eco-tourism" – extraordinary pristine natural beauty.  Yet Skerritt has agreed to Chavez’s demand for a huge Venezuelan oil refinery be built on tiny Dominica.

Last year’s elections completely solidified Skerritt’s hold on power.  They were so fraudulent that the opposition won only three seats out of 21 in the Parliament – and these seats have now been vacated by Skerritt.  An emerging Communist tyranny backed by Red China, Fidel Castro, and Hugo Chavez now has a monopoly of power in Dominica.

Where’s the hope in this?  In a 33 year-old Carib man named Owen Prince.

Purple Turtle Beach is a very laid-back local hangout.  There’s no hotel of any kind, just one funky ramshackle bar.  Over a rum punch (the secret is fresh grated nutmeg) for me and a Diet Coke for him, Owen talked of his plans.

He was one of 3,000 Caribs who live on 3,700 acres reserved exclusively for them – the only Carib Reserve in the Caribbean.  Almost no Caribs have any businesses.  They are simple farmers, growing bananas or fruits and vegetables, and making basket handicrafts.  Yet here is Owen who has saved enough as a taxi driver to get his own car, has a burgeoning tour business, will have three more cars and driver/guides soon, and will be launching a sophisticated website attracting customers in time for the next cruise ship season starting in October.

It was fascinating to listen to Owen.  With a simple education and no training whatever in Austrian economics, he thinks like a true win-win entrepreneurial capitalist offering unique value and customer service.  Every suggestion I had on how to improve his new business he had already thought of and was implementing.

And he is just getting started.  The position of Chief of the Caribs is an elected one.  Owen ran for Chief at age 31.  He was defeated – everyone said he was too young – but he lost so graciously that he’s expected to win next year.

That in turn, together with running a successful business, will enable him to establish political relations with leaders of the pro-business party such as Jerry Brisbane.

"Our Labor Party," Owen explained, "is like your Democrat Party.  It’s been taken over by people who are both far-left and corrupt.  They destroy freedom and expand their power, while at the same time are in bed with corrupt businesspeople who get secret monopoly deals and subsidies like no duties on imported products they need for their business in exchange for payoffs, bribes, and campaign donations."

This guy has a better grasp of the Dems than a lot of Americans, I thought.  How does he know this?  "The Internet," was his reply with a shrug.  He continued.

"That’s why I like real businessmen like Jerry Brisbane.  The Dominica Freedom Party kind of died, so its replacement is like your Republicans, the United Workers Party – don’t worry about the name.  Brisbane is the number one businessman on the island and many others as well, like St. Kitts.  He doesn’t want a party of government-business collusion and corruption like Labor.  So he supports the UWP which is pledged to set good rules then get out of the way so we can have businesses and create jobs."

All I could do was look at him and blink.  How can this be?  Here on Purple Turtle Beach on this tiny Caribbean island I find the hope of the world.  For Owen has put his finger on the problem.

We complain about Zero and the Dems in Washington.  But they are just a symptom, an expression of a problem that is everywhere, from local bureaucrats in your state to governments around the planet.  The problem of the world is too much government.

So much government that it can dispense huge favors and subsidies, to which shysters posing as real capitalists flock like flies to dung.  So much government that power is an end in itself, and ruining people’s lives becomes its sadistic purpose.

I have a friend, let’s call this person Bob, who as a business advisor ran afoul of a state bureaucracy.  They pursued Bob for years, demanded his every bank record and email, held a hearing called a "trial" in which the hearing examiner called a "judge" fined Bob hundreds of thousands of dollars and destroyed not only his business but all the start-up businesses he was working with.

The bureaucrats make the rules, enforce the rules, and adjudicate their alleged violation.  There is no innocent-until-proven-guilty in their phoney trials.  All the phoney judge has to decide is if there’s a "preponderance of evidence" against you – and he decides what evidence counts – and you’re screwed.  All just to carve another notch in the bureaucrats’ fascist belts.

There is too much government – at every level, in every city, in every county, in every state, in every country in the world, with achingly few exceptions.  ("Skye" on the Forum would argue that Nye County, Nevada is one.)

The bigger the government relative to its jurisdiction, the more inevitable the collusion, corruption, and tyranny.

We focus too much on Zero.  We focus too much on Pelosi and Reid and Frank and the rest of the Fascicrats.  We need to focus more on the fundamental fact identified by Thomas Jefferson, that  government – all government at every level – is a necessary evil.

It is necessary, it cannot be abolished.  But it must be constantly pruned, restrained, and restricted, or else its capacity for evil will grow until it subsumes our freedom and prosperity.

This is what is happening to America – on every level from local to state, not just nationally.  It is what is happening to the world, from Dominica to Europe to China. 

It is not enough to de-elect 100 Dems from Congress in November.  It is not enough to want a victory over the Democrat Party.  The recapturing of our freedom as Americans requires a victory over too much government.  Not just in Washington, but across the board, in every state and community.

John Boehner (R-OH) announced yesterday (5/25) that if Republicans take back the House in November, they are "committed to repealing" ObamaCare.  This is a good start – but it’s just a start.  The GOP should have as its existential purpose now pruning back too much government.  The TeaPartyers operating on a state and local level should act the same.

A real light bulb turned on in my brain listening to Owen.  If a Carib guy on Dominica can all by his lonesome figure this out, understand what it takes to create businesses, jobs, and prosperity, and instinctively know how government is so destructive to that creation and freedom in general, then there is real hope that there are Owen Princes in countries all over the world and America.

The people of Dominica rose up against a tyrant once before, and Owen is confident that they will again.  The people of America surely did in 1776, and I am confident they will do so again.  The Second American Revolution starts on November 2^nd. 

It’s not a revolution against the Democrats.  Let’s make it a revolution against Too Much Government – TMG.  And not just in Washington, but everywhere – everywhere – in America.

Now – if you’re contemplating a Caribbean trip or cruise, don’t pass Dominica up.  You can reach Owen for your private island excursion at [email protected].  But don’t put it off like I did.  It won’t be too many years until Owen Prince is no longer in the tour business and will be the Prime Minister of Dominica instead.