MIA > Archive > Tim Hector
Fan the Flame, Outlet, 11 October 1996, online here.
Transcribed by Christian Høgsbjerg.
Marked up by Einde O’Callaghan for the Marxists’ Internet Archive.
People may not know it. May not even believe it. Might even find it incredible. But nothing saddens me, even disgusts me, more than having to write about Lester Bird. Why so, you might ask?
There is nothing more saddening, more disgusting, more likely to make a grown man want to puke, than the spectacle of a man, big in size and position, reducing himself to, the peevish, the petty and below. Lester Bird does it so often, that one is forced to recognise that a petty man, a small minded person, however big his physical frame, or however grand his position will always be petty, small-minded and given to scapegoating and other cheap-jack functions.
The more I think of Lester Bird the more I remember Niccolò Machiavelli. For instance, when Lester Bird enacted his tax package, increasing all taxes on the people, all at once, I was reminded of that dangerous man Machiavelli who wrote this in the Prince:
“In taking possession of a state the ruler should well reflect as to the harsh measures that may be necessary, and then execute them at a single blow. Cruelties should be committed all at once.”
Lester would not have read Machiavelli, the philosopher of devilish statecraft. But, as you can see, Lester Bird repeats and represents Machiavelli to the letter. Just as he came to the Prime Ministership he did as Machiavelli would have, that is, execute his harsh tax measures all at one blow. His cruelties, as Machiavelli advised, were committed “all at once.”
What Machiavelli of the Middle Ages and Lester of the present do not know, is that there is an absolute connection between means and ends. Indeed, means determine ends. You begin harsh, you end harsh. Deception is your means, you end wallowing in deception. It is inescapable. For in the beginning is the end, as another philosopher observed.
Now take the latest Lester Bird fâux pas, a public error.
In writing to Baldwin Spencer on October 2, 1996, PM Lester Bird says
“You are of course quite correct that I did not reply to your last two letters. I did not reply for two reasons. First the ink is hardly dry on your signature to these letters before they are published under vitriolic headlines in the Outlet.”
First of all ask yourself what is the meaning of “vitriolic”. It comes from ‘vitriol’ meaning sulphuric acid. Vitriolic therefore means biting, scathing. So one speaks of vitriolic abuse. An article can be vitriolic, that is full of biting, scathing, sulphurous remarks. But one does not speak of a vitriolic headline! Only peevish and squeamish Lester would do so. Small boy in a big-man’s job.
And what pray, were those headlines which the thin-skinned, peevish, petty Lester Bird said were “vitriolic.” Hesse Report Exposes and Covers-Up for Molwyn and PM Lester Bird Tone Deaf to Baldwin’s Democratic Request. And then Baldwin Spencer Corners Lester Bird.
No matter how partial you are to Lester Bird, you cannot find an iota of vitriol in these headlines.
Baldwin Spencer applies twice to Lester Bird as Prime Minister and Minister of Information to reply to him on Radio and TV, as Leader of the Opposition, to statements PM Lester Bird made about the Opposition. Simple and fair request. Twice Lester Bird refused to answer. Remember, Baldwin Spencer was generous and gracious enough to ask the Prime Minister and Minister of Information, to reply to him two days after the Prime Minister had made his broadcast, giving time for arrangements to be made. On neither occasion did PM Lester Bird reply, neither in the positive or the negative. He rudely refused to be democratic.
To cover-up for his own breach of democratic practice, he scapegoats Outlet and says that Outlet which appears once a week regularly, carried Baldwin Spencer’s democratic request to him for the right of reply. Therefore, he did not reply. To be straightforward. It is as stupid an excuse as stupid can be.
The point is clear, whenever Lester Bird is caught in error, he finds a scapegoat. A scapegoat is always his stratagem. He never, never, never accepts responsibility for his own actions. I repeat Lester Bird is definitely Machiavellian. Let me quote Machiavelli again, the author of devilish statecraft, to reinforce the point. Machiavelli wrote in the Prince: “Though fraud in all other actions be odious, yet in matters of war and politics it is laudable and glorious, and he who overcomes his enemies by fraud as stratagem is as much to be praised as he who overcomes them by force.” This is Lester all the way. Fraud is his ever handy political stratagem.
I repeat, Lester Bird never read Machiavelli. He is not a reader of books, just like his father. Lester Bird is Machiavellian instinctively. He is a particular social type. Like Shakespeare’s Malvolio, in Twelfth Night Lester believes “that all who look upon him, must love him.” And those who do not must be scapegoated and berated as either an “ass” or “a prating coxcomb.” So with Bishop Reece or so with Outlet. The moment you do not say what Lester Bird wants to hear, you are marked down for crucifixion. Such as Lester Bird, a particular social type, can only surround themselves with sycophants. People like Sam Aymer, who, to advance himself wrote Lester Bird’s diatribe against Bishop Reece. Or those like Hartley Henry who make a living by flattering two-bit leaders for big bucks. Or like Asot Michael who enrich themselves in millions by flattering the “Boss”. It is of such stuff that Lester Bird is made and surrounded.
It might be well to remind Lester Bird himself and his flatterers of what a very famous writer, perhaps the best essayist of all time, William Hazlitt, had to say. Hazlitt wrote: “The only vice that cannot be forgiven is hypocrisy. The repentance of a hypocrite is itself hypocrisy.”
The political problem of Lester Bird is that he makes political hypocrisy a way of being. He is the quintessential hypocrite. He believes nothing. Writes nothing. Thinks nothing. Holds nothing dear. He can be against today what he stood for only yesterday. Let a single example suffice.
Lester Bird resigned from his father’s Government because the Blom-Cooper recommendations were not implemented. Himself in the power he sought so greedily, the Prime Ministership, he has not implemented a single one of the Blom-Cooper recommendations!
In fact, Lester Bird violates the very Blom-Cooper recommendations by appointing his brother Vere as Special Adviser to himself as Prime Minister, on telecommunications. Though Blom-Cooper said that Vere ought not to be appointed to “public office again.” Yet, the same Lester Bird having violated Blom-Cooper in all essentials, could rely on Blom-Cooper for not relieving Finance Minister Molwyn Joseph of Ministerial office while he was being officially investigated. The hypocrisy is endless. It is a way of being. And Lester Bird persists in this practice of hypocrisy because he believes as did Niccolò Machiavelli who wrote “For in our country, wrong is right.” Lester Bird without having read Machiavelli is Machiavellian through and through. He is such, because he is a particular social type. More on that later.
Look at Lester Bird’s last display of hypocrisy, hypocrisy unlimited.
Lester Bird wrote in black and white, if you please this:
“While it is true that the [Hesse] Report did find that rules and regulations were breached, the Report concluded emphatically that government was not deprived of revenue, nor was any attempt made to do so.”
Now Hesse found in his findings this in his very own Report and in Hesse’s own words, simple and direct.
“I however, find that by removing the [Rolls Royce] car from the Port without assessment of value, government was deprived of revenue legally due to it on the importation of the car.”
That is as clear and precise a statement as you can ever get. “Government was deprived of revenue, legally due to it on the importation of the car.” Yet Lester can have the temerity to turn Hesse’s “Government was deprived of revenue” into government “was not deprived of revenue”. And then say that twisting Hesse’s positive statement “Government was deprived” into its exact opposite “Government was not deprived” is a “matter of interpretation. It is clear that for Lester Bird, in this country, wrong is right. For he, can always make what is, into what is not. As the writer Hazlitt so wisely wrote “there can be no forgiveness for the vice of hypocrisy. Because the repentance of a hypocrite is itself hypocrisy.”
Remember that Lester Bird is engaging in this Machiavellian quibble not for quibbling’s sake. He is doing so, to escape his duty as Prime Minister, namely to uphold the law and prosecute those who robbed the revenue with the Rolls Royce.
Again, let me quote Machiavelli to define Lester Bird. Machiavelli wrote that the ruler, as Prince or Prime Minister, “should know how to be a great hypocrite and dissembler, for men yield so much to immediate necessity, that the deceiver will never lack dupes.” Always Lester Bird dissembles, in order to dupe the people, who feel the pinch of necessity, and so will go along with endless corruption.
Because Lester Bird as Prime Minister, attempted as deceiver to make dupes of this entire nation, by making Hesse say, in his words, Hesse “emphatically concluded” – exactly what he did not say, as a self-respecting nation we should be asking Lester Bird to resign. Resign, for attempting once too often, to fool all the people all of the time. However, Lester Bird has in fact made a fool of himself by twisting Hesse’s simple truth to make a trap for fools, and thereby shown the fool he always will be. Beyond repentance, because his repentance is itself hypocrisy.
I said earlier that Lester Bird is a particular social type. He is part and parcel of the national elite. Not the nationalist elite, but the national elite. Fanon best describes this national elite type which has appeared as rulers in nearly all Third World countries. Wrote the great Frantz Fanon, whose insight and incisive analysis of post-colonial countries is still unmatched, the national elite.
“Seen through its eyes its mission has nothing to do with transforming the nation; it consists, prosaically , of being the transmission line between the nation and an [external] capitalism, rampant though camouflaged, which today puts on the masque of neo-colonialism.”
The national elite wrote Fanon “will be quite content with the role of the Western bourgeoisie’s [read, for example, Stanford] business agent and it will play its part without complexes.” And continued Fanon “this same lucrative role, this cheap-jack’s function, this meanness of outlook and this absence of all veracity, symbolises the incapability of the national middle class to fulfil its role.”
It is not an accident then, that Lester Bird as Prime Minister, performs the cheap-jack function of national hypocrite. It is a lucrative role. The role of being business agent for Wexelman, or Stanford and assorted off-shore bankers. To do this he must turn the entire nation into dupes, willing to accept that what we see, is not what we see. So that he may dupe us all the time, in the interest of the Principals for whom he serves as Prime Minister, as their business agent. His Cabinet becomes a group of men, without knowledge or opinions, who go along to get along. A nation treks to anarchy.
As Fanon again writes of Lester Bird and his political type:
“The economy has always developed outside the limits of their knowledge. They have nothing more but an approximate acquaintance with the actual and potential resources of their country, human or material, and therefore they can only speak of the economy on a general and abstract plane.”
That is why whenever Lester speaks he is so full of abstract bombast. The words predominate, not the economic content. His windy wordiness is not accidental. It is essential to his cheap-jack’s function as business agent for his assorted Principals be they Space Research, or the network of Colombians whom the U.S. State Department says is in effective control of the airport here, for its nefarious business.
With this type in control, Fanon said, predicting Lester Bird to the T 35 years after he wrote The Wretched of the Earth: “In the same way there is no change in the marketing of basic products after independence”. wrote Fanon: “So too not a single industry is set up in the country.” Stagnation and deterioration is the result. It is an exact description of Lester Bird and his sorry political record of over 20 years.
But Fanon is even more cogent on the Lester Bird type. He wrote:
“As soon as independence is declared, far from embodying in concrete form the needs of the people in what touches bread, land and the restoration of the country to the sacred hands of the people, the leader will reveal his inner purpose: to become the general president of that company of foreign profiteers impatient for their returns.”
Remember the concept: the general president of the company of foreign profiteers and racketeers impatient for their maximum returns as quickly as possible. It fits Lester Bird like his customs tailored foreign suits.
In consequence, Lester Bird is the national hypocrite, duping the masses ever and always, making wrong, right. It is not that Lester Bird had to read and study Machiavelli to be the arch-typal Machiavellian. It is that Lester Bird is in the identical social situation as the ruling types of Machiavelli’s time. He therefore, is the arch-type of Machiavelli’s devilish state-craft.
Lester Bird then, is a lesson Antigua and Barbuda must learn, so as never to repeat it.
Last updated on 14 February 2022