How could you even be considering taking on the feds, when our islands are in such a desperate need for reasonable leadership right now? We can’t afford four hundred thousand dollars! Where on Saipan do you think you could possibly, legally, find that kind of money? What are you trying to do, go down in CNMI history as the man who put the cherry on top of this economic disaster? Okay, okay, say you do get that money and add it to CNMI’s outstanding debt. Then you proceed with the lawsuit and go in court and trial goes on for a few months and then…we lose. That simple. You would have wasted money (which, ironically, we probably got from the feds) put us in more debt, shamed us, and made us appear to be ungrateful and incapable of working with the federal government with any discussion not concerning money being given to the CNMI to waste some more of. It’s just talking sir! It’s just negotiating! No one is going to tie you up and put tape around your mouth! No one is going to reject any sensible offer you propose! Is it really that hard? We are so near to being federalized already there is not much of a point if you try to fight it.
“It is very American to sue the feds,” says Matthew Gregory. So now we’re trying to be American? This Mathew Gregory is telling us that it is very “American” to sue them and so we sue them…but isn’t that kind of contradictory? Let’s see if I grasp this concept here. It is American to sue the American government. Is that right? Ah, the irony of everything! Fitial is being told by an American to use money we probably got from the feds to sue the feds because it is the American thing to do. Does anyone else see something wrong with this picture?
Oddly enough, our only hope is the Legislature. So long as lawmakers refuse to give in to Fitial, we will not proceed with this lawsuit because the governor does not have the power to appropriate public funds, thankfully. For once, I believe that they are actually being rational up there. They (for now) are not giving in to this lawsuit. But will it last? Will the lawmakers of the CNMI whom we, the people of the CNMI, have elected to do what they feel is right have the ability to keep saying no?
KALANI REYES
Dandan, Saipan
