We need no hostility towards America to insist on self-respect. We need no romance about Havana to remember the humanity of Cubans. And we need no permission from either capital to think. Andrew, Kamla and every other custodian of Caribbean office should remember the distinction: you represent a people; you do not possess them. Keep the international friendships. Make the diplomatic journeys. Bring home an argument that can stand without the photograph. But leave our right

By Dennis A. Minott, PhD. October 23, 2026 Dr Dennis A. Minott Abstract Small Island Developing States (SIDS)—and the Jamaica Public Service Company (JPSCo) in particular—face an existential dual mandate: eliminating the macroeconomic drag of imported fossil fuels while maintaining grid stability against severe climate shocks. In response, vendors from the Global North heavily market Small Modular Reactors (SMRs), typically rated between 50 MWₑ and 300 MWₑ, as zero-carbon bas

Public sector compensation must remain firmly anchored in proportionality, transparency, and public trust. While securing capable leadership for national reconstruction is necessary, paying the CEO of NaRRA significantly more than the head of U.S. FEMA—in a country where average annual per capita income is a fraction of that in the United States—is indefensible. At a time when ordinary citizens are asked to endure hardship and fiscal constraint, executive compensation of this

The argument for SMRs as a “green economy” solution, when applied to a seismically active, debt-constrained, institutionally thin, tourism-dependent archipelago, becomes not merely optimistic but epistemically negligent. The book by Jorge Morales Pedraza and its successor paper are useful as catalogues of what SMR technology hopes to become. They are dangerous as blueprints for what Jamaica should do.

My old friend Everald “Warmy” Warmington deserves a patient answer. His reported contention that white people did not capture Africans, but merely bought people whom black people had captured, contains both a historically untenable generalisation and a conclusion that does not follow from its premise. Some African rulers, merchants and intermediaries participated knowingly in the slave trade. Their conduct deserves scrutiny and condemnation. But... Read More Online

By Dennis A. Minott, PhD September 28, 2026 For more than half a century, I have worked in and around renewable energy—hydroelectricity, biomass and solar—asking essentially the same Jamaican question: why should an island lavishly endowed with sunshine, wind, water, vegetation and human ingenuity remain chronically dependent on imported fuel? In Thunderclap 7, “Political Will Needed: The Arithmetic of Jamaica’s Energy Autonomy by 2031”, I argued that the answer is no longer

Four services. Four amens. No preliminary theological examination. Let us resist cheap conclusions. Those timings were my observations of one encounter, not controlled measurements of comparative intelligence. Network conditions, service configuration and other variables were uncontrolled. Neither did four agreeable replies prove that the systems had independently reached a theological conclusion. The word “Amen” ordinarily carries assent. On a screen, generated by an AI serv

Consider the case of British historian Orlando Figes, who admitted using aliases to praise his own work as ‘fascinating’ while rubbishing that of his rivals. A senior editor at The New Republic used a sockpuppet to offer extravagant praise to himself on his own blog. These were not harmless deceptions; they were calculated attempts to distort professional judgement and public perception. ECONOMIC DIMENSION Now, consider the implications for financial markets. In an era where

The Caribbean’s scattered geography need not condemn us to scattered power. Malaysia shows how culturally diverse territories, separated by sea, can operate within a serious federal structure. The Philippines demonstrates that thousands of islands can still function as one national market and one international force. Meanwhile, CARICOM remains rich in declarations but poor in enforceable unity. Jamaica struggles within the confines of a small economy; Haiti’s agony is treate

Tomorrow, however, is the busiest liar on Anansi’s Island. It is always approaching, never arriving. It promises high-value employment that degenerates into temporary subcontracts; national ownership that dissolves into long-term concessions; open market competition that hardens into private monopoly; and national development that somehow requires ordinary insects to remain permanently outside the great milker's gates. The pre-dawn milking invariably begins with public

It is not necessarily caused by recklessness. The people experiencing it are often disciplined workers who rise early, travel far, perform necessary jobs and return home exhausted. They have calculated the supermarket bill, postponed the dentist, reduced the electricity usage, stretched the cooking gas and told the children that the requested school item will have to wait. Still, the money finishes first. The trouble is that too many Jamaicans are paid too little to partici

In Anansi’s Island, the road to riches is seldom straight. The old spider of folklore survived by wit because he was small & vulnerable. His modern descendants have improved the method. They use influence, opacity & public money, then call the outcome development. A way to become rich is to discover a nat'l crisis before everyone else does.

I am writing to express my profound gratitude for... Read More Online

The prevailing economic model in Jamaica is not development; it is a meticulously structured extraction. It is a system of “billioneering” off Jamaica by money-men, rather than investing in Jamaica. To understand the mechanics of this modern economic bypass, one must examine the structural pipelines of our two most critical national domains: tourism and energy.

What began as a small mentoring tradition eventually became an international educational movement. More than 7K young people have now passed through A-Q and its related initiatives, and the number continues to grow, though more slowly today through online engagement. Its alumni include Jamaicans, Trinidadians, Belizeans, Americans, Bahamians, Antiguans, Brazilians, Haitians, Saint Lucians, Grenadians, Guyanese, Nigerians, Japanese, Koreans, Burmese, Caymanians, Pakistanis, I

'A photograph decorates a wall; knowledge equips a life. If this difficult episode encourages Jamaica to invest more deeply in literacy, numeracy, teacher development, early intervention and genuine educational equity, then something valuable will emerge from this disappointment. Educational equity does not mean pretending that every child has reached the same destination. It means ensuring that every child receives the support necessary to get there.'... Read More Online

The Prime Minister deserves credit for encouraging discussion about Jamaica's long-term energy future. Such conversations are necessary and welcome. However, ambition must remain tethered to sound, scientific, and engineering reality. The electrical grid does not respond to speeches, headlines, or technological fashion. It responds to engineering competence, disciplined maintenance, resilient institutions, and sound economics. Jamaica's path forward is neither mysterious n

There is a curious phenomenon that periodically appears in Jamaican public policy. A difficult national problem emerges. The hard work of institutional reform, technical competence, disciplined maintenance, and long-term planning remains unfinished. Yet instead of addressing those fundamentals, influential voices become captivated by a grand technological solution promising to leapfrog reality. The latest manifestation is the renewed enthusiasm for Small Modular Reactor

Fukushima taught the world an important lesson. Complex systems fail not merely because of a single event, but because multiple events can overwhelm assumptions embedded within a design. Even if a Jamaican SMR survived a major hurricane intact, the transmission and distribution infrastructure connecting it to consumers might not. A generating plant, however sophisticated, serves little purpose if the lines carrying its electricity are down. The Jun 5 blackout was a signal,

The future of Jamaica may depend upon recovering precisely this discipline. Not more information. Not more commentary. Not more amplification. Better discernment of signals. The question is whether we possess the wisdom, courage, and discipline to recognise them. And having recognised them, whether we possess the character to act.