The economic crisis of Puerto Rico has had some minor appearances in the mainstream media over the past few months, but little is known about the true nature of the crisis by the general public. Puerto Rico has collected a national debt of over 72 billion US dollars and has defaulted on one of its payments and almost did again recently. The Puerto Rican government is using all of its funds in order to pay these loans back to what are mostly Wall Street goons that have boughten most of the debt. The U.S. Senate recently had public hearing about the economic crisis and all of the committee chairmen co-sponsored a bill called the "Puerto Rican Assistance Act of 2015", which gives some assistive resources, but its main purpose is to install a "Fiscal Control Authority".

Throughout the island and the mainland, responses to this "control authority" has been mixed. The Fiscal Control Authority will install a six member board, five of which will be appointed by the U.S. President, a figure that Puerto Ricans cannot elect, and the sixth member, and Chairman of the control authority will be the Secretary of the U.S. Treasury, which is a member of the Executive Cabinet, also a figure that is not elected into office. The Secretary of the Treasury will have two votes and the other five members will have one vote each. This Fiscal Control Authority will have absolute power about all fiscal policy Puerto Rico will establish without the need of approval by the Governor or Congress of Puerto Rico. Throughout the proposed Senate bill, there are provisions that, if passed by Congress and signed by the President, would basically give absolute power to the United States over Puerto Rican economic affairs. The Authority would be able to control the budget, establish political control, issue debt, and have prosecution powers against the elected officials of the Puerto Rican government.

So, if we review, this is what we'll find; The United States Senate wishes to implement a Fiscal Control Authority to make and implement economic policy in the island. The members of this Authority will consist of six members that are all appointed by the U.S. President, a figure that Puerto Ricans, the people that these policies are going to affect, could not vote for due to the island's colonial status. The Chairperson of this board is the Secretary of the Treasury, and the other five members consist of three residents of Puerto Rico and two that are not (plus the Chair). It's like we've gone back to the beginnings of the 20th century and are willing to have a foreign established government oversee the welfare of our country!

If this is not a clear violation of democratic values, I don't know what is! Democracy is a system in which the people vote their representatives into government who will create and execute laws. If this Fiscal Control Authority is implemented by the federal government, the U.S. would be the violating basic civic rights of Puerto Rico by giving them the authority to undermine the people of Puerto Rico and its interests. This bill has very little amount of provisions that will actually aid the Puerto Rican economic crisis, but has many that establish the powers and responsibilities of this Control Authority. The colonial status that Puerto Rico lives in to this day is one of the main issues that caused our crisis and this Authority is just another manifestation of this status issue. It's a Puerto Rican oligarchy begin established by the federal government and holds the interests of the wealthy Wall Street goons and none for the people of Puerto Rico who all wish and fight for a better country.

¡Viva Puerto Rico LIBRE!