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Friday, March 29, 2024
HomeNewsArchivesPlaying Chicken with a Mack Truck is Usually Bad for the Chicken

Playing Chicken with a Mack Truck is Usually Bad for the Chicken

We are very pleased with the Senate decision to move the Atlantic Basin Refinery deal on to the full session Friday.
Many of us are skeptical about whether ABR can pull off its plan, but to stay on a collision course with Hovensa would be fatal not just to the government of the Virgin Islands, but also to the thousands of people who are clinging to the hope of going back to work some day.
In the old days, playing chicken with the big guys might have worked because the Virgin Islands was seen as an orphan child of the United States that Uncle Sam wanted to protect in some way.
Has anyone noticed that Uncle Sam has turned into a vindictive old curmudgeon?
He’s not the benevolent kind uncle that used to bail us out for whatever reasons: guilt, ancestral shame or even genuine concern for a small place with few independent resources.
It’s a new day in the United States. Please take note: Nobody cares about us.
It is time that we abandon the “Chicken” game and do what is in the best interest of our people and our economy upon which we all depend. It is time we took responsibility for ourselves. It’s time we stopped being combative with every single outsider who tries to help us – and themselves for God’s sake. Of course they have their own interests at heart. But not everybody is a thief trying to rob the Virgin Islands. Some people are trying to find a happy medium in which they make money and so do we. We’ll find out which ABR is. In the meantime, the chicken lives.
Thank you to the senators who were smart enough to get out of the way of the Mack truck. We hope you do it again on Friday.

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