Well this is certainly the touristy, naïve view that many people seem to have of the Caribbean: “the carefully balanced and beautiful life of the Caribbean people or their islands.” Well I don’t know about beautiful life at all. Like anywhere else, the Caribbean is also plagued by problems of political corruption, crime, poverty, economic exploitation and of course US and UK overt and covert interventions. We have a long history of this, beginning with their arrival in the islands and extermination of its original people. We have not yet been able to escape their legacy and their ongoing interferences.

Perhaps it would be good to read a bit on the extent of US and UK foreign policy as it applied to this region. Grenada, Cuba and now Haiti are just some of the more glaring examples, but there are countless others, some more obvious than others, to draw from. Many Caribbean leaders cannot make a single move in their own countries without the approval of the Euro-American ‘ big brothers’ and must always consider when their policies may become unfavourable to the business interests of the American and other European business elite.

Paradise? No paradise here from where I sit; except maybe in the tourist brochures.