The photo above is from our archives, taken at last year's Antillean Fair. The Panama News was at this year's fair, which took place on the grounds of Panama City's Museo Afroantillano on the Saturday and Sunday of Carnival. We sold books, coffee mugs and dried saril to pay a few of our bills. See the Community page for a review of this year's fair.

Carnival is an important business event for Panama. The rise of cruise ship tourism is changing many of the basic facts of that industry, but it's still safe to say that Carnival is the high point of tourist season, however one wants to measure that phenomenon.

It's a break from many of the ordinary cares that Panamanians have. For example, the multiple scandals that are enveloping all branches of our government, across the partisan political spectrum. Corruption dominates our opinion section this time. In the Opinion section attorney, radio show host and activist Miguel Antonio Bernal and the local chapter of Transparency International weigh in on the current scandals, and we include an excerpt from a US Agency for International Development analysis of the the state of Panama's justice system. This issue's Editorial is about an urban planning issue, but really it's about a form of corruption that leads the politicians to make wasteful and destructive decisions. Our Letters section is also dominated by the subject of corruption. Our News section includes a wrap-up of the ongoing investigations and cover-ups, and both the News Briefs and the Business and Economy Briefs include entirely too many items about moral turpitude in Panamanian public life.

It's not a lot of fun when so much of the news is negative --- a lot of people tend to suspect that journalists are the ones who are spreading gloom, for one thing. However, the bad things that are happening are very real, and a serious newspaper needs to report the news as it is, not as we'd like it to be.

On the other hand, there's room for judgments about what's newsworthy. Unlike El Siglo and La Critica (the latter Panama's biggest-circulation daily), we don't go for the gory photos of the victims of auto accidents and the violence that lurks in too many of our homes and streets. It's hard to say where the line should be drawn, but there is a difference between news and pornography.

Our lead News story this time is about the France Field airport expansion and associated industrial and commercial development that happens to be at the center of bribery allegations, but our report is about a public forum where the likely environmental and economic consequences of the project were discussed. Our lead Business story is also about a controversy, as Willy Carrera reports on the various reactions to a proposed US-Panama tax information sharing treaty.

We continue to make some changes and additions to the site. One new feature is a page of links to Panamanian online media, which, among other things, will let you easily listen to a number of this country's radio stations or watch Panama's TV shows. We're also inaugurating our Spanish-language page this time. Plus, we have an extensive new list of links to English-language websites about Latin America.

One of the positive stories this time is Panama City's designation as a regional cultural capital, which, along with a preview of the Theatre Guild of Ancon's production of "On Golden Pond," graces our Arts section. Our Sports section touches on Panamanian cricket, our Travel page is about that low-tech form of transport that's bringing in more foreign visitors every year (cayuco racing season), and the Dining section took me out to the Amador Causeway (it was a great meal, and I had to do my duty and eat it).

January and February are Death Valley in the ad industry upon which newspapers subsist, and my January teaching gig is over, so our lean times are even leaner. As always, if you want to place your order for books --- my "9°N" anthology is $25 and William Donadio's "Thorns of the Rose" memoirs of growing up in a European Silver Roll family on the Atlantic side is $15, postage included in both prices --- or Panama News coffee mugs ($10), or to make a contribution toward the cause, send your checks or money orders to:

I thank all of you who have sent aid or encouragement, and all those who have reminded me of problems with the links in the last issue. I trust that my webmaster skills have improved a little, and will continue to do so.

Eric Jackson
the editor

© 2002 by The Panama News All Rights Reserved For information or problems with this page contact: editor@ThePanamaNews.com