editorial

Even if the whole point of Carnival is to break the rules...

She should know that certain things just shouldn't be done

Go directly to Hell. Do not pass the Pearly Gates. Do not collect credit for time served in Purgatory. Such is the fate, our religious leaders occasionally warn us, that we risk by participating in the modern pagan version of the Bacchanalian orgy that we know as Carnival.

Panama's churches lose that argument to the majority of their members every year. Some of them recoup part of the loss by attracting some of the most faithful to religious retreats while most of the rest of the country is partying.

These concerns are and ought to be the province of religious authorities. But there are other arguments to which priests, ministers, rabbis, imams and other colleages of the various faiths ought not to be subjected.

Don't get us wrong. Some of the Carnival arguments are the best part of the show. Las Tablas and other Interior venues have rival Calle Arriba and Calle Abajo organizations, the queens of which specialize in stylized insults of their counterparts. If the mayor decrees that a particular song is too offensive and bans it, prompting in the first instance a threat of withdrawal from the deprived queen and then at Carnival flagrant disobedience, that's part of the show.

But beyond the pale is the holding of Carnival celebrations in front of a church. Yes, there are places in the Interior where that's historically done, and in those small towns whose only public squares amenable to Carnival festivities also feature the local Catholic church, the priests tend to close their doors to the revelers and the police tend to put up their "do not cross" warnings to keep the drunks off of the church steps.

In Panama City there is no lack of available space to plead that might excuse the insult of holding Carnival in front of a house of worship. But nevertheless Mingthoy Giro, the presidential appointee who runs Panama City's Carnival, has decided to put the party in front of the buildings of at least two religious congregations, the Assemblies of God church and the Chinese Buddhist temple on the Transistmica.

The Buddhists have not registered strong protests, but the Pentacostalists sure have. No matter. No congregation, whether of the majority Catholic faith or of these religious minorities, should be put into the position of having to protest against Carnival. Drunken revelry just doesn't belong in front of a house of worship.

There are other questions about and obvious problems with the Transistmica as a Carnival venue. For one, its physical separation from all of the tourist hotels means a bigger police operation will need to be mounted to avoid muggings of foreign visitors walking between their lodgings and the festivities. Then there are the seven gas stations and a number of other businesses that didn't have the loss of several days of business figured into their plans that were disrupted by Giro's late announcement. Then there's the general lack of transparency, best shown by Giro's refusal to talk about the expenditure of public funds on Panama City's Carnival.

Let us hope that the possible problems are resolved in a satisfactory fashion, and that Carnival on the Transistmica turns out to be safe, fun and the sort of thing that will lead foreign visitors to go home with positive stories about Panama for family and friends.

But let's also have a big improvement in manners from our government and its appointees. Carnival doesn't belong in front of a church or temple and people who don't understand this don't belong in charge of Carnival.

Editor's note: Due to many protests, in the end the Carnival area was pulled back at both ends so that the actual partying didn't happen in front of the church or the temple.

But it was the (lack of) thought that counts.

Panama City's Carnival celebrations should not be subject to late announcements, ensuing protests and last-minute changes.

The Penal Code matters in the FTA debate

The proposed Penal Code that Martín Torrijos's presidential committee wrote, Martín Torrijos's cabinet passed on to the legislature and deputies of Martín Torrijos's political party approved in committee is a public disgrace, even if the politicians are forced to back down on every one of its many objectionable points. Members of the US Congress would be well within their rights --- as a matter fact would be conscientiously performing their duty --- to look askance at any representations from officials or lobbyists of a government that would legalize domestic violence and statutory rape.

And then there are other proposed Penal Code reforms that go directly to the heart of any free trade deal. The PRD proposes to ban virtually all investigative journalism, by prohibiting the publication of documents that are obtained by reporters but not intended for publication, and by imposing criminal penalties for revealing any political secret that a politician may later put a "reserved" stamp upon. The PRD proposes to strengthen the already notorious and unacceptable impunity for bribery and other criminal activity by legislators and judges. And despite any slogans that lobbyists and the ad cartel may invent, there go most of the remnants of our already scant transparency, judicial security and level playing field for business. There goes, in fact, any just basis for the sort of economic merger implicit in the proposed US-Panama Free Trade Agreement.

How bad is it? It's so bad that last-minute reservations and retreats really don't cure the problem, now that we know what the Panamanian politicians' true intentions are.

Bear in mind...

Fear not those who argue but those who dodge.

Marie Ebner von Eschenbach

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from a religious conviction.

Blaise Pascal

Good girls go to heaven, bad girls go everywhere.

Helen Gurley Brown