The Writer’s Life: The Rise of Autocratic Rule

29 Sunday Sep 2024

Posted by in The Writer's Life

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Prime Minister Forbes Burnham of Guyana (1964-1980)
First Executive President of Guyana (1980-1985)
Photo Credit: Forbes Burnham Foundation (Facebook)

In Chapter Fifteen of my work in progress, I speak about the rise of the autocratic government in Guyana in 1974. In my adopted country, we now face the possibility of re-electing a former President who promises to be a dictator only on Day One. He’s got lots of judicial protection in his favor. On July 1, 2024, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that “the nature of Presidential power entitles a former President to absolute immunity from criminal prosecution for actions within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority. And he is entitled to at least presumptive immunity from prosecution for all his official acts. There is no immunity for unofficial acts.”

Without push-back from Britain and the United States, Guyana Prime Minister Forbes Burnham (1964-1980) consolidated his power through rigged general elections. For the American government, during the Cold War Era, the alternative leftist communist government was a definite no-no. Then, on December 14, 1974, as we the people prepared for the Christmas and year-end festivities, Comrade Leader Burnham declared his political party to be paramount above the State and all its institutions. That included the Courts and all pending cases against activists of the opposition parties. Burnham’s ruling political party and the State became interchangeable.

For those of us outside the corridors of power, our lives changed in unexpected ways. Churches that didn’t support the government’s agenda were viewed as enemies of the State. Any privileges the Catholic Church once held in the field of education were lost. Within three years following the declaration of the “paramountcy of the party,” my life was turned inside out.

Who knows what lies ahead for me and my sons should the framers of Mandate/Project 2025 have their way?

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Poem “Intolerance” by Brazilian Poet João Doederlein @akapoeta

22 Sunday Sep 2024

Posted by in Brazil, Poetry

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Brazilian Poet João Doederlein @akapoeta
Photo Credit: Poet’s Instagram Account

My Poetry Corner September 2024 features the poem “intolerance / intolerância” by Brazil’s young poet João Doederlein, writing under the pseudonym @akapoeta, from his bestselling debut poetry collection O Livro dos Ressignificados / The Book of Resignifications, published in 2017.

Born in 1996 in Brasília, the federal capital of Brazil, João began writing poetry at eleven years old. At fourteen, he started his first blog with his own texts. Then, two years later, he created an Instagram account where he began sharing his poems, together with his own illustrations.

While studying Advertising and Publicity at the University of Brasília (2015-2020), Doederlein created the Resignifications project in which he attributes new meanings to words. Based on the personal experiences of his generation, the poet, then nineteen years old, gave more weight to the objectivity of dictionaries with his poetic reinterpretations of nouns (n), adjectives (adj), and verbs (vt). In less than a year, his experiment spread across the internet, gaining thousands of followers on Facebook and Instagram.

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California: Another Year of Excessive Summer Heat

15 Sunday Sep 2024

Posted by in United States

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Rosaliene’s Succulent Garden – Summer 2024 – Los Angeles – Southern California

This summer, June through August 2024, the average temperature for the contiguous American states was 73.8° F (23.2°C) – 2.5 degrees Fahrenheit above average – ranking as our nation’s fourth-hottest summer on record. So says NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information. California – together with Arizona, Florida, Maine, and New Hampshire – “sizzled through their warmest summer on record.” Heatwaves are growing more frequent, more extreme, and longer lasting in the U.S. West and across the world as the climate crisis drives increasingly severe and dangerous weather conditions.

To end this summer with a bang, an excessive heatwave arrived on Thursday, September 5th, bringing a record-breaking temperature of 112°F (44.4°C) in downtown Los Angeles on Friday, September 6th, says the National Weather Service. With temperatures in the nineties in our neighborhood in West Los Angeles for five days straight, I was forced to stay indoors – no weekend gardening – until relief came on Tuesday, September 10th.

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Thought for Today: Climate Change Policies at Risk

08 Sunday Sep 2024

Posted by in Anthropogenic Climate Disruption

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Front Cover: Mandate for Leadership 2025: The Conservative Promise by the Heritage Foundation
Photo Credit: The Heritage Foundation

The new energy crisis is caused not by a lack of resources, but by extreme “green” policies. Under the rubrics of “combating climate change” and “ESG” (environmen­tal, social, and governance), the Biden Administration, Congress, and various states, as well as Wall Street investors, international corporations, and progressive spe­cial-interest groups, are changing America’s energy landscape. These ideologically driven policies are also directing huge amounts of money to favored interests and making America dependent on adversaries like China for energy. In the name of combating climate change, policies have been used to create an artificial energy scarcity that will require trillions of dollars in new investment, supported with taxpayer subsidies, to address a “problem” that government and special interests themselves created.

Excerpt from “Chapter 12: Department of Energy and Related Commissions” by Bernard L. McNamee from Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise, Project 2025 Presidential Transition Project by The Heritage Foundation, Washington DC, USA, 2023 (pp. 363-364).

Highlighted below are the major proposals presented in Chapter 12 that place our current climate change policies at risk:

  • Eliminate the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE) which focuses on climate change and green subsidies and sets energy efficiency standards for appliances. If EERE cannot be eliminated, its budget should be reduced (pp 378-379). [Learn more about EERE at http://www.energy.gov/eere/office-energy-efficiency-renewable-energy%5D
  • End the role of the Grid Development Office (GDO) in grid planning for the benefit of renewable energy developers and defund most of its programs (pp 380-381). [Learn more about GDO at http://www.energy.gov/gdo/grid-deployment-office%5D
  • Eliminate the Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations (OCED) established in December 2021 “[to] deliver clean energy demonstration projects at scale in partnership with the private sector to accelerate deployment, market adoption, and the equi­table transition to a decarbonized energy system” (pp 381-382). [Learn more about OCED at http://www.energy.gov/oced/office-clean-energy-demonstrations%5D
  • Eliminate the Clean Energy Corps, charged with delivering a more equitable clean energy future for the American people, by revoking funding and eliminating all positions and personnel hired under the program (p 386). [Learn more about the Clean Energy Corps at http://www.energy.gov/CleanEnergyCorps%5D

Bernard L. McNamee is an energy and regulatory attorney with a major law firm and was formerly a member of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. He is also the Street Distinguished Visiting Professor of Law at the Appalachian School of Law. In addition to serving as a Federal Energy Regulatory Commissioner, McNamee has served in various senior policy and legal positions throughout his career, including at the U.S. Department of Energy, for U.S. Senator Ted Cruz, and for Virginia Governor George Allen. McNamee also served four attorneys general in two states (Virginia and Texas).

The Writer’s Life: The Men of God

25 Sunday Aug 2024

Posted by in Religion & Spirituality, The Writer's Life, Women Issues

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Fishermen – Photo by Sirikul R – Pexels

In Chapter Fourteen of my work in progress, I share my encounters with a few priests who did not live up to their role as spiritual leaders of their flock. Due to the sensitive nature of the topic, I’ve adapted a prosaic narrative style. Do let me know if this style works. Inspired by the Biblical quote heading the chapter, I’ve given them the fictitious names of fish.

While not all priests are predators, their fellow priests, bishops, and archbishops are complicit by their silence and cover-ups.

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“Work” – Poem by Jamaican Poet Laureate Kwame Dawes

18 Sunday Aug 2024

Posted by in Poetry

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Jamaican Poet Laureate Kwame Dawes (2024-2027)
Photo Credit: Chris Abani / Poet’s Official Website

My Poetry Corner August 2024 features the poem “Work” from the poetry collection Sturge Town by Jamaica’s Poet Laureate Kwame Dawes, published by Peepal Tree Press (UK, 2023). A writer of poetry, fiction, nonfiction, and plays, Dawes was born in Ghana in 1962. When he was nine years old, he moved with his family to his father’s ancestral home of Jamaica. He became a naturalized citizen, having spent most of his childhood and early adult life in the Caribbean Island nation. Since then, he has lived most of his adult life in the United States.

In his poetry collection Sturge Town, the then sixty-year-old poet reflects on his journey from his childhood in Ghana, through Jamaica, and on to South Carolina and Nebraska in the United States. The eighty-six poems offer a compassionate insight into history and identity, triumph and loss, joy and grief, love and relationships.

I connected with his loss and own mortality expressed in the poem “Condolence” (p. 66): Thrice this week, I send condolences to acquaintances / whose intimacy has grown the more by empathy – we are of an age / of sudden deaths, or the prolonged and painful passing of loved ones. / It is fall, and I know that we are all, in our small boxes, / dreading the dusk, knowing that trees turning orange and crimson, / will be, for years to come, the way we see our losses, / our complicated loves…

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Thought for Today: Abortion and Euthanasia are not Health Care

11 Sunday Aug 2024

Posted by in Health Issues, United States, Women Issues

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Front Cover: Mandate for Leadership 2025: The Conservative Promise by the Heritage Foundation
Photo Credit: The Heritage Foundation

Goal #1: The Secretary [of the Department of Health & Human Services] should pursue a robust agenda to protect the fundamental right to life, protect con­science rights, and uphold bodily integrity rooted in biological realities, not ideology.

From the moment of conception, every human being possesses inherent dignity and worth, and our humanity does not depend on our age, stage of development, race, or abilities. The Secretary must ensure that all HHS programs and activities are rooted in a deep respect for innocent human life from day one until natural death: Abortion and euthanasia are not health care.

A robust respect for the sacred rights of conscience, both at HHS and among gov­ernments and institutions funded by it, increases choices for patients and program beneficiaries and furthers pluralism and tolerance. The Secretary must protect Americans’ civil rights by ensuring that HHS programs and activities follow the letter and spirit of religious freedom and conscience-protection laws….

Excerpt from “Chapter 14: Department of Health and Human Services” by Roger Severino from Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise, Project 2025 Presidential Transition Project by The Heritage Foundation, Washington DC, USA, 2023 (p. 450)

Roger Severino is Vice President of Domestic Policy at The Heritage Founda­tion. As director of the Office for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) from 2017 to 2021, he led a team of more than 250 staff enforcing civil rights, conscience, and health information privacy laws. Roger sub­sequently founded the HHS Accountability Project at the Ethics & Public Policy Center. He holds a JD from Harvard Law School, an MA in public policy from Carnegie Mellon University, and a BA from the University of Southern California.

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The Writer’s Life: Choosing Childlessness as a Young Nun in a Patriarchal Church

28 Sunday Jul 2024

Posted by in Guyana, Religion & Spirituality, The Writer's Life, Women Issues

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Rosaliene (right) and Celeste (fictitious name) with Bishop Guilly SJ – First Vows and Receipt of Religious Habit – Georgetown – Guyana
Photo taken by Father Bernard Darke SJ for the Catholic Standard Newspapers

In Chapter Thirteen of my work in progress, I share my failure in living the religious vows as a celibate and childless woman in a patriarchal church. In retrospect, I have come to realize that the Guyana Mission, established during the British colonial period and headquartered in the United States, was not prepared for dealing with young women who challenged the lingering colonial mindset within the community.

The 1970s was a decade of great social-political-economic upheavals in our fledgling nation. The 1976 government takeover of all schools owned and run by the Catholic Church and other Christian denominations struck a decisive blow for the religious community accustomed to its autonomy. By abandoning my teaching post in Guyana’s hinterlands, I unwittingly became the first casualty for the religious community, as discussed in more detail in Chapter 16.

While the sisters struggled to adapt to the country’s new ways of thinking and being, three of the youngest professed local nuns, all trained in the United States, left the community. Of the seven of us, trained at the newly established novitiate in Guyana, only three stayed to make final or perpetual vows.

Nowadays, here in the USA, the patriarchal religious right would like to turn back time to the “Golden 1950s.” Make America Great(er) Again, they implore, bowing down before their Anointed One. A faithful disciple, now sharing the pulpit, believes that “childless cat ladies” shouldn’t have the same civic rights as women with children. What an upside-down world for women who are childless by choice or for biological reasons!

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“Nevertheless” – Poem by Nigerian American Poet Olatunde Osinaike

21 Sunday Jul 2024

Posted by in Poetry

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Nigerian American Poet Olatunde Osinaike
Photo Credit: Poet’s Official Website



My Poetry Corner July 2024 features the poem “Nevertheless” from the debut poetry collection Tender Headed (USA, 2023) by Olatunde Osinaike, a poet, essayist, and software developer. The following excerpts of poems are all sourced from this collection, winner of the 2022 National Poetry Series.

Osinaike earned his BS in Engineering from Vanderbilt University (Tennessee) and his MS in Information Systems from Johns Hopkins University (Maryland). Originally from the West Side of Chicago (Illinois), he currently lives with his wife in Atlanta, the capital of Georgia.

How did a data scientist for the consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton also become a poet? In an October 2023 interview for his alma mater, Vanderbilt University, Osinaike said: “I don’t think of the data science and the writing as different. You definitely use a lot of creativity in how you code. The best observations I ever got were in a technology forecasting class with Andy Van Schaack [associate professor of the practice of engineering management] my junior year at Vanderbilt. We talked about scenario analysis, convergent opinions. So, even if I’m looking at something under a microscope, I’m also thinking about the world around what I’m observing.”

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