Dear Editor,
I know that it is usually said if you do not bend the tree when it is small you have to chop it down when it is big. My philosophy is we can prune it and often times the garden looks good. I believe the same for the youth.
Where do we start? I am thinking on those of us who call in on talk shows. Could we not start by dedicating time in bigging up those who are involved in “Shoot hoops and not guns” and continue doing so just as we are constantly, (what I consider wasting time), talking about our inconsiderate if not incompetent politicians. I am sure if all of those talk show hosts go back in their archives they will only find five or six topics that are not the same.
Now I will go out on a limb and declare that every mature person on St. Maarten is either a mother or a father. Meaning that we should stop wasting valuable time that we can dedicate to raising, disciplining, educating our children on, I would candidly say it, useless politicians. Probably if we do that then we will be on our way in forming a society of which we do not have to open the newspapers anticipating negative local news.
Meeting on medical Marijuana to determine who is going to get the biggest cut from the profits? What about all those other drugs that are prescribed, did the ingredients have to be legalized before they were approved. I thought it had to be proven that they would cure the disease or sickness and you would be advised of the side effects. I did not know the ingredients had to be legalized. If that is so why do we have to reinvent the wheel; this is being done and accepted for centuries.
I stand to be corrected on all of this but if I have understood well when advertisement is made for a new drug or medicine, the side effects are mentioned and not the legality. So are we beginning another avenue by starting to legalize everything in order to be able to continue greasing palms. Should we not start by determining who is a St. Maartener so that if we decide to legalize Marijuana that at the least it will only be farmed by St. Maarteners so that at least the money will stay on St. Maarten and that we would be able to limit whatever is to be limited to St. Maarteners. When we determine who is a St. Maartener we can determine which jobs or permits are limited to St. Maarteners, for instance public transportation. And as I always mention, a transition period can be added to every law that is made or changed.
Legalizing Marijuana, who are we fooling? We should let Government know that they should not waste our time and money trying to legalize something that is already legal because it is widely used by both public and law enforcement. People, get up in the morning, say thank you to the creator, give your children a hug and kiss them, tell them that you love them, have good advice for them, encourage them to learn well, teach them good manners.
Let us big up shoot hoops, start demanding organizations like the YMCA, whose motto is to develop mind, body and spirit. By the way, Government should organize public transportation by starting to lay out bus stops and bus routes. When the public is guaranteed transportation to and from their destination by Government most of the gypsy problems will be over. The tax department could also help because these people rent cars daily to do their gypsy work so they earn a good dollar, which is not fair to the legal bus drivers. Because Government does not want to interfere with those bus permit holders, Government is up to its old tricks again. Trying to employ the hackers to stop them from hacking Government. A otro perro con ese hueso.
Russell A. Simmons
