Live in Barbados

The National Hurricane Center in Miami reported late Monday that Hurricane Danielle is continuing to gather strength and could become a major hurricane by late Tuesday.

The storm is still far away from any inhabited areas, but forecast models show it could threaten the popular tourist island of Bermuda by the end of the week.

via Hurricane Danielle growing stronger – Chicago International Travel | Examiner.com.

Freedom is not enough, new democracies also need economic growth to mature.

THE violence tearing apart Jamaica, a democratic state, raises serious questions not only about its government’s capacity to provide basic security but, more broadly and disturbingly, the link between violence and democracy itself.

The specific causes of the turmoil are well known. For decades political leaders have used armed local gangs to mobilize voters in their constituencies; the gangs are rewarded with the spoils of power, in particular housing and employment contracts they can dole out. Opposition leaders counter with their own gangs, resulting in chronic violence during election seasons.

via Op-Ed Contributor – Jamaica’s Bloody Democracy – NYTimes.com.

Trinidad and Tobago has elected its first female prime minister in an early election, ousting an incumbent who was damaged by soaring crime and allegations of public corruption.

Kamla Persad-Bissessar and her five-party People's Partnership coalition won 29 of 41 seats in parliament, according to preliminary election results.

via First woman PM wins early election in Trinidad and Tobago – Americas, World – The Independent.

American regulators had concluded in 1997 that Allen Stanford, the sports-mad financier who bankrolled English cricket, was probably a fraudster, but they didn't charge him for 12 more years because it was too complicated a case.

Mr Stanford’s financial empire was hidden largely offshore in Antigua, where he received a knighthood from the government for his services to the economy and to cricket. He was finally arrested last year and is awaiting trial in his native Texas, having denied fraud.

via US regulators suspected Stanford in 1997 – Business News, Business – The Independent.

Good exposure for Caribbean photographers…

Feed the Uncommon Caribbean Flickr Pool « Uncommon Caribbean.

If you haven’t donated yet, watch this:

Haiti Earthquake Aftermath Montage from Khalid Mohtaseb on Vimeo.

Google have published a page covering many options for folks wanting to donate funds to help with the situation in Haiti.

On January 12, a 7.0 magnitude earthquake struck Haiti. Join recovery efforts mobilizing around the world to assist earthquake victims. Your donation will help disaster victims rebuild their lives and their communities. Google will also donate $1 million to help organizations provide relief.

via Support Disaster Relief in Haiti.

A very good friend mine wrote these words in the form of a letter which he is sending to various Canadian newspaper editors. I’m quoting him here because I also find that people are far too quick to recommend prayer as a viable solution in many of the articles I read about the situation in Haiti.

The tears flow freely this morning as I watch the devastation that is Haiti. But my tears and blood begin to boil when I hear seemingly every report end with the refrain that we all must pray for the people of Haiti.

This is no time to pray.

This is a time to ask why nine million people are living on a patch of ground fit for a half million. Time to ask why more than half of the tropical island of Hispaniola is a treed paradise and the remainder is a dust wasteland – and why the line between the two is visible from space. It’s time to ask the Pope, who has the gall to ask us all to donate, what the issue is again with the targeted use of some delicate rubber or other means of contraception.

Its time to review humanity’s relation to its landbase. What happens when the population exceeds the carrying capacity of given patch of land. What happens in Afghanistan? What happens in Somalia? In Yemen? Gaza? Rwanda? Chad? Do people deforest the land of whatever fuel energy remains, build the hovels that poverty allows and die under the rubble with the first gust of wind or shaking of the ground? If they are lucky, yes. If they are not, the machetes, machine guns, or rape gangs get them or turn them into child soldiers for the next round of horror.

It is time to face up to the fact that praying is not producing results. We prayed for Haiti four times lately when hurricanes decimated that country while leaving other countries that still had trees to hold the hillsides. Those prayers, if heard, were answered with a 7.0 quake.

This is no time to pray.

The magnitude 7.0 earthquake struck southern Haiti on Tuesday, knocking down buildings and inflicting a new catastrophe on the impoverished Caribbean nation, its ambassador to the United States said.The quake struck about 15 km 10 miles southwest of the Haitian capital Port-au-Prince shortly before 5 p.m. Joseph said he had little information about the extent of damage from the quake, but one government official — the only one he was able to reach — told him houses had crumbled “on the right side of the street and the left side of the street.”

via Appeals for aid after quake strikes Haiti – CNN.com.