Gordon Robinson | The essence of American football

Today we embark on another trip across the galaxy to our favourite fantasyland, Apocrypha.

This time, it’s Opposition leader Bark Balding who was forced to consult Oma D’unn. Regular readers remember Oma, a former politician and finance minister whose consultancy firm “Oma Unsacked” was built on his reputation for solving political problems by parable. Like a moon, Oma was bright only in the dark, but was the proud holder of a PhD in Logic.

Although he was selected PNP (Promises Not Performance) party leader, Bark’s political experience was limited especially in election management. The Party, already experiencing too many foul-ups in candidate selection, appeared to be limping into the looming campaign. Bark was concerned PNP might falter in the campaign’s closing stages due to governing JLP’s (Just Lazy People) more experienced and charismatic leader Andrue Polemess.

Oma told him to buy an NFL team. Bark looked puzzled so Oma told him the story of the Washington Redskins.

“As the world, which is rumoured to include (not be) the United States of America, became more and more politically correct therefore mindful of cultural and national sensitivities, pressure began to mount on NFL team the Washington Redskins to change its name.

Dan Snyder, owner of the Redskins, resisted for a long time and then, after falling attendances that he couldn’t relate to poor team performances took its toll on team revenues, he finally capitulated.

Snyder announced that the team was dropping ‘Washington’ from the team name, and would henceforth be simply known as ‘The Redskins.’ Snyder said he agreed that the word ‘Washington’ imparts a negative image of poor leadership, mismanagement, corruption, cheating, lying, and graft, and is not a fitting role-model for young fans of football.”

By now, Bark’s head was spinning so Oma explained that the immediate problem didn’t lie with Bark as the political leader of the Party but with whoever was Election Manager. Bark needed a different Manager – like an NFL owner who actually understood what supporters and fans meant when they asked team leaders to act in their interests. A team manager who understood what was being said to him would react appropriately.

“Don’t be like the apocryphal Dan Snyder” Oma told Bark. “Listen to your core supporters. Listen to consumers of your product which, in your case, are voters. LISTEN. Actually hear what they have to say. Don’t twist their words to mean what you want them to mean so that you can do what’s good for you instead of what’s good for them.”

Back home on The Rock, Jamaican PNP, apparently determined not to learn from past mistakes, achieved yet another candidate selection disaster this time in Westmoreland Eastern. Like a bull in a china shop it insisted on repeating past errors of parachuting “name-brand” candidates more likely to disrupt local political rhythm than garner votes. Worse, the latest parachuted candidate, Dayton “Chatty Chatty” Campbell, is PNP General Secretary.

What’s wrong with that, you ask?

Let me count the ways. As an individual candidate Chatty Chatty was so politically divisive in North West St Ann he inspired thousands of Comrades to stay home on Election Day 2020. Somehow, he also managed to attract not only a JLP opponent but also a very influential PNP activist who ran against him as an Independent. He lost (by 2,000+ votes) a constituency inherited from PNP Legend Burchell Whiteman who held it since 1989. Before 2020 Chatty Chatty was Town Crier (“electrifying speaker”?) for Peter Bunting’s failed campaign to unseat Peter Phillips as Party Leader. In that effort, Chatty Chatty not only failed to achieve Rise United’s expressed mission but succeeded in splitting PNP down the middle and alienating voters from every non-garrison Rise United candidate including himself.

Chatty Chatty may well have invented the phrase “lose-lose”!

Then there’s the fact that, as GenSec, this double political failure is PNP’s election CEO; street General; and Managing Director of all election operations. Is it desirable, or even possible, that Chatty Chatty can do that job effectively while running for a seat where some Comrades aren’t exactly welcoming? Why is PNP doing this to itself?

PNP’s electoral modus operandi must be the most ham fisted in Jamaica’s history. This spectacle of a GenSec as election CEO while fighting his own party workers to capture a seat for himself must be a feature of the Guy Lombardo Show! Time come to send in the clowns.

Any PNP victory would be proof positive that Jamaica votes Governments OUT not in.

Peace and Love.

Gordon Robinson is an attorney-at-law. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com