So what do you want? Messy lying statistics? If you are not arriving from ignorance, it means that you are fully biased by the time you enter into the debate. The VAT was born in St. Lucia and quite soon after that companies started going under, lots of people lost their jobs and there is now very little in terms of new foreign investment. David have you ever owned or had any experience running a business in St. Lucia? Why don’t you try creating one today, and maybe you might be qualified to talk about solutions. You talk a lot but say absolutely nothing, you see, economics is big con job, people become wealthy on the backs of the masses, you just need to sell hope to…

I prefer not to argue from ignorance hence my reliance on empirical evidence. In no way, shape or form am I ever going to go from an abject statement of ignorance to an abject statement of certainty in one fell swoop. That’s precisely the problem the pervades in Saint Lucia. I am not willing to submit any argument unless I’ve thoroughly researched the topic. A surgeon doesn’t operate prior to finding out what ails the body. A series of x-rays, MRIs, cat-scans and so on are performed to determine what exactly is causing the problem then it can be fixed. Thus we need examine our communities and its inhabitants to determine what triggers crime. We need to examine policing tactics to…

“Empirical evidence” is a the term used when a sensitive subject is being exposed. David we are talking about policing in the Americas. Canadian and American police have some real bad Johns who brutalize not only the public but even their wives, it’s a horrible job to be in. Now the VAT issue, for goodness sake brother man you know like everyone on the island that the VAT’s arrival was like the arrival of hell, everything in the economy and the society went south because the percentage was way too high, it needed to be around 8%. I don’t think you can be objective in this matter because you may have your own personal interest. You really like empirical evidence.

I beg to differ, Crime has been a problem for well over a decade now. There are several reasons for crime occurring and until you can show me empirical evidence that there’s a correlation between VAT and high crime I will remain skeptical of your argument. Furthermore, police aren’t like that all over the world. Take a quick look at Nordic countries and you’ll find that police rarely use force but that’s tantamount to the cultures of those countries. It’s unfair generalization to make that all policing organizations don’t show a penchant for human right and also it’s unfounded that there are few good policemen. Again, provide some empirical evidence of that, until then I will…