Satiricus is a patriot. Hey, what the heck…it might not be the coolest virtue to admit to right now. Some might even say it wasn’t even a virtue… patriotism is the “last refuge of the scoundrel” and all that. But Satiricus was unrepentant. He loved his Guyana. And because he loved his country, he understood why Barack Obama had to extend the surveillance programme in America.

Not only “understood” but “agreed with”. That’s right, folks. Satiricus had no qualms about keeping tabs on those who would harm your country. Was Obama supposed to “throw back” while unwashed foreigners plotted harm to his country? No siree Bob!!! “Hit them before they hit you” sounded like a good motto to Satiricus.

And it wasn’t as if Obama had anything against foreigners. His father had been one from Africa. OK…OK…maybe Obama did have something against his father who abandoned him when he was a baby. But that wasn’t why he’d expanded the spy network, was it? Anyhow Satiricus didn’t feel the U.S. government listening in on some domestic conversations was any problem. He figured freedom had to have a price, right? And if the price was the government knew Satiricus sometimes “talked dirty” to his wife when he called home from New York when he was visiting, Satiricus was willing to put up with the shame and embarrassment.

But Satiricus was very upset that his own government didn’t seem to understand to keep people under surveillance in these troubled times. Didn’t they think Guyana was also under threat? So when he saw the headline in the government’s paper about “GNBS surveillance exercise!!” as he drove to work, he smiled. He wished he could’ve stopped and bought the paper from the vendor who’d flashed him the headline. But it was too late.

Satiricus hadn’t even known that Guyana had a surveillance agency – and he was a newspaper man. But then Satiricus figured a surveillance agency wasn’t going to be of much use if everyone knew of its work, would it? With the work of America’s National Security Agency (NSA) out in the open, Satiricus guessed his government didn’t mind letting everyone know that Guyana was also spying on its citizens. After all, thought Satiricus, “we have to keep up with America, where democracy is concerned!” He felt a glow of pride when he thought of the local U.S. ambassador learning how close we were to the real thing.

“GNBS?” Thought Satiricus, “I wonder what that stands for, Guyana National Bureau of Surveillance?” Not bad…he concluded. He wondered also as to who had been caught in the “surveillance exercise”. Satiricus just knew that those Trinis, who were spending billions to import food, were spying on us to learn the secrets of how to grow rice. He hoped some of them were nabbed. The thought of rice being planted by those voluptuous Trini carnival gals in their skimpy outfits was too much for Satiricus.

He stopped at the very next newspaper vendor and bought the government newspaper. GNBS stood for “Guyana National Bureau of Standards” and they’d just conducted a “surveillance” exercise on market scales!

Satiricus sucked his teeth and threw the newspaper out of the window.

Satiricus was not amused. Here he’d just defended the U.S. ambassador against his buddies’ claim that the Americans don’t really practice the democracy he preaches to us, in their own country. And now this story about trillions – that’s right, trillions! Fumed Satiricus – of phone calls and info from Verizon, Facebook and Yahoo and so on had been collected by the government. Without a single citizen even being told. “Smile!!! You’re on candid camera!”
Satiricus wondered idly what Barrack Obama would be telling his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping when the latter demanded that U.S. shape up on respecting citizens’ rights. “Oh…we didn’t really listen in. We just collected the data” just wasn’t going to cut it. The irony was, before the exposé on the super-spying by the U.S. government on its own citizens, Obama was supposed to be bringing up what the Americans claim to be “cyber hacking” by the Chinese! Who was hacking who now??
But Satiricus had other matters to attend to. His favourite niece, maid to the opposition, had brought him Rum Jhaat’s diary for his perusal. Satiricus had to read the latest entry quickly while his wife fed the niece some of the duck curry that was her reward. Satiricus, as an old newspaperman (none of that “journalist” handle for him – too pretentious) knew that you had to keep “sources” happy.

Dear Diary,
Ah lawd, Dear Diary. Ah in real sh*t right now. Now don’t say I always in sh*t…this one is big time. Ah doan know what Ah gonna do. All right, lemme get to de point. You know Ah does go up every now and den to New York to collect some funds fuh de party, right?
You don’t know? How de arse you think Ah does seh “gonna” dis and “gonna” dat. You think Ah does pick up that kinda foreign talk in Number 47 Village? Well, allrite. Ah does pick up some foreign talk when Ah carry news to de U.S. ambassador. But most of it is from dem basements in Bronx.
(Ah had to take two drink when Ah remember how mouldy dem basement is.)
Anyhow Ah in trouble because of dis phone tapping Obama carrying out. Deh find out that Ramdhanny and dem bais in Bronx give me US$50,000 when Ah been up deh last month. Deh musee have Guyana pon deh radar after that chap from the People’s National Congress (PNC) get caught for terrorism. Ramdhanny bin call me to tell me the good news.
So imagine de U.S. ambassador ask me how come Ah only give de KFC US$5000 fuh deposit in de bank. Oh lawd…Ah in trouble! So many times Ah do dis, and now dis happen ! Ah hope deh throw out that Obama quick! Is he fault.
Now Ah got fuh mek up more news to carry to de ambassador. An doan tell me is blackmail. Ah know all about blackmail.
(Goodbye, Dear Diary. Ah gonna finish dis large. Ah in real trouble.)

Satiricus was fond of Americanisms. And that’s why he really didn’t mind Rum Jhaat affecting an American accent and talking about “gonna” do this and “gonna” do that.

Never mind the jerk hadn’t spent more than a couple of weeks in the States. Heck maybe he’d been looking at old John Wayne movies on TV. Lets mosey down to the saloon for some liquor, pardner.

But Satiricus would’ve never thought the ex-Talker Rum-Kara was also taken by the American way. In fact, Satiricus always believed that Rum-Kara was a very proper British gentleman who naturally thought the Americans loud and crass. But here was the man, if the Stabber News was to be believed, advising his old party the PPCEE to bruk up their party leadership and put in a new one.

The only people Satiricus knew who broke up things that worked perfectly well were the Americans. His cousin Albert who lived in the States was always telling Satiricus and the boys when he visited, about how those people would break down perfectly good buildings just to put up new ones. Satiricus figured this was what happened when you had too much and you had nothing to do. He didn’t think this was the situation with the PPCEE.

Satiricus thought about why Rum-Kara wanted change in the leadership structure. The old man had introduced the structure when the party had been under great pressure. But today the party was under even greater pressure. The party then had to speak with a united voice. Today the people needed that more than anything. The party had to stave off comrades who jumped ship. Today there were even more of those rats.

Satiricus asked himself which was the most successful leadership structure in the world today?  He didn’t have to think long: the Chinese. They had done what no other leadership group had ever done before. Raised more people out of poverty than anytime in the history of mankind. Look at how that new Chinese president was handing out billions of dollars in aid, like if it was small change!!

And he did it with the very leadership structure that Rum-Kara was saying the PPCEE should “bruk-up”. And you didn’t have to be communist to use the same structure. Satiricus remembered that it was the same structure that Singapore and Korea had also used – and look how well they had done.

Then the thought struck Satiricus like a bolt of lightning. “Had Rum-Kara decided to take revenge on his old buddies for dumping him?” Revenge, Satiricus remembered, was always served cold. And to have his old party bruk up the only thing that had made it survive all the PNC pressures would be cold indeed!

But then Satiricus remembered. Pressie and his party leaders also had family in the States. They would remind him of another Americanism: If it ain’t broken, don’t fix it.

Satiricus wasn’t too thrilled with all the attention being given to poetry all of a sudden. Here the government was flying in all these people from England and other foreign locales. For what? To torture another generation of youths who might be between off frolicking on the cricket fields? Or better yet, catching fish in the back trench, like he used to do?

If the truth be told, Satiricus was a dunderhead when it came to poetry. Back in school, his literature teacher told him he was a “Philistine”. They were not as poetic back then – they called it “literature” which the boys pronounced “lich-ri-chur”. Today they called it “English B”. Must be poetic, Satiricus thought doubtfully, but what did he know?

From the sneer in Miss Janoba’s voice, young Satiricus had pretty much figured out she was calling him a lout. But just to make sure, he asked the kindly old Mr Bubble, who was the grounds man at the cricket ground where young Satiricus often skipped school to hang out.

Mr Bubble, who was also the local pastor, was surprised. He sheepishly confessed that Philistines were a set of people who still had their foreskins on during biblical times. Seems that before David became king, he had to bring back 100 Philistines’ foreskins before he could marry King Saul’s daughter. Sounded like a funny kind of dowry to Satiricus but since he still had his foreskin and his dad had paid a dowry (not of foreskins, though) for his mom, Satiricus figured he must be a “Philistine”.

So when he went home that afternoon he told his father the teacher called him a Philistine because he didn’t like poetry. To his delight, his father smiled and slapped him on his back. “Damned right, we are!!! My father was a Philistine, my grandfather was a Philistine and all the Satiricuses were proud Philistines!” he grinned in delight.

“So people will want our foreskin to buy wives?” Young Satiricus asked his dad with some trepidation. He’s gotten attached to his foreskin.

“Nah!!!! That’s not what the ‘Philistine’ thing is about nowadays.” His dad sat him down.

“The teacher girl want to tell you, we ain’t got culture. But don’t worry ‘bout that namby-pamby stuff…we got we own culture and we own poetry. You ever hear them canecutter cuss? That is poetry.”

“So you does use some poetry pon we dad?” asked Satiricus.

“Damned right I do! When you work as hard as me poetry can’t be that softy – softy stuffy about daffodils and raindrops. It got to say what we feel, boy,” Satiricus waited for his dad to finish.

“We drink rum, fight when we’re done, knock table and sing poetry about how rice and flour dear a shop and price na pay at all.”

Satiricus smiled as he remembered the old man. He was happy to still be a Philistine.

Satiricus was confused. Now this was not an unusual circumstance for Satiricus. But this time, he just couldn’t make head or hair of what was going on. Or going down. He’d just turned on his television and there was this young man, who said the policemen had tortured him to make a confession. Now Satiricus had learnt not to jump to conclusions in these matters.

But then as he looked at the long-haired young man in immaculate white shirt and pants, it seemed to Satiricus like a case of déjà vu all over again. The police were up to their old tricks harassing choir boys. For the life of him, Satiricus couldn’t figure out this mystery. What did the police have against choir boys?

Satiricus remembered when there was all that trouble on the East Coast Demerara. Every day the police would be hauling in choir boys just because police were being killed like flies. And like the case on TV right now, it didn’t matter what all the friends and relatives and neighbours of the young man said about how angelic the young men were…the police were unmoved.

There was the matter that the choir boys almost always had police records…armed robbery, attempted murder, murder. You name the crime and these boys had the charge.

Their rap sheets were each pages long. Some of them even did the time. But after listening to the character witnesses who were trotted out, it was obvious that the police had fobbed off the charges on the choir boys and worked with their friends in the judicial system to put them away. Their parents and brothers and sisters and friends wouldn’t lie, would they? These poor choir boys had been framed…every one of them.

And the police just wouldn’t let up. Only last year, Satiricus remembered that there were these nice choir boys just singing hymns by the street corner in their village of AgriKola. Out of the blue, these big, burly police swooped down on them like the destruction of Sennacherib.

 As one of the choir boys told the story, in biblical allusion:

“The police came down like the wolf on the fold,

And his cohorts were gleaming in black and gold;

And the sheen of their guns was like stars on the sea,

When the brown wave rolls nightly on deep Kitty.”

Again Satiricus asked himself, “What was it about the choir boys” that seemed to drive the police over the edge. As he mulled over the conundrum, the answer suddenly dawned on Satiricus. These choir boys represented all that the police were not and could never be. They were sweet and gentle; they helped old ladies across the street; they contributed to blood drives. And they sang hymns on street corners. After all, their relatives always said so.

The police were just jealous of these choir boys, that what it was. Flat out jealous. After all what did THEY do? Just go out, day in and day out to fight crime.

Satiricus is not a devious fellow. But getting to his age in Guyana – especially navigating through the PNC years – he’d learnt to look below the surface when he heard some things. Especially from some people. “Nah all who guh a church house ah guh fuh pray,” his sainted mother had taught him. So when he read that GrainJa wanted to investigate people trafficking in people, he wondered what was really going on. The biggest “trafficker-in-persons” was the opposition’s best friend, Mook Lall from the MuckrakerKN.

 Luckily, his wife’s niece, who offered maid service to the opposition, had filched the Mook’s diary for him to take a peek. She said that it was only fair since the Mook had his own personal Peeper. Satiricus started to read:

Dear Diary,

 A wha a gon tell you DD? You na mind if me call you “DD”’, eh? Is de latest thing. Everybody calling everybody wid they initials. Ah does call me best, bosom friend, TY. You know is who, right? Yeah, we own de big store together.

 Anyhow, DD, I gat fuh tell you about dis traitor GrainJa. He think RumJhaat gon mek snap elections happen and he ask me to give he some money fuh prepare fuh de election. What he think, money does grow pan tree? Ah tell he things getting hard in America, and people na going backtrack so much nowadays. Things getting brown.

 (Ah had to sniff some of that white powder, DD. Is another latest thing ah pick up. Ah need a pick up when ah remember how things brown.)

 And guess wha GrainJa seh?? He gon fix me good. He sound just like RumJhaat who seh he gon fix Ahsnie. Must be de latest thing going around wid politicians. He should fix he spitting when he talk. Ah gat fu get an umbrella when RumJhaat around.

 What ah didn’t tell GrainJa was dat ah gon form me own party fuh de next election. Look, DD, ever since CN close up shop, de people want a voice. Who can fill CN shoes better dan me? Ah short like he; a talk like he; I gat media like he; and ah like when people tell me deh know me.

 You nah see me goin pan TV and things and talking big words like “media”? Ah learn plenty things hanging out wid the opposition. Ah learn fuh march and protest from Dessie. You remember Baddam! write dat ah used to have dinner with Dessie? Is teach, he bin teachin’ me. A learn mo fyaah and slow fyaah, too.

 (Ah had to tek a sniff, DD when I remember Dessie. De man used to call me “son”. Ah gon follow in he footsteps, sniff.)

So look what GrainJa do. He tell pressie fuh set up CoI to investigate TIP. But Ah know is me he gat in mind. Is me backtracking he want fun shut down. He know ah bin cussin’ pressie and pressie vex.

But GrainJa don’t know me good. He forget Ah backtrack he cousin. Ah gon put a good squeeze on he cousin in Brooklyn and dat gon shut he up.

(Sniff, sniff, sniff….zzzzzzz)