Old-School Colonialism Will Fix Puerto Rico: Guy

OK, you've had your fun. Time for the grown-ups to take over.

Almost 100 years ago, an American president helped enshrine the principle that all peoples should be free to govern themselves—you know, after the white ones taught the brown ones how to do it for a while. Rep. Jeffrey Duncan is afraid that the Puerto Ricans have failed that test: After all, the island and its hedge-fund creditors have spent months trying to work out a solution to its little debt problem, so far to no avail. And so Duncan, whose state—for now—still celebrates its own failed bid for sovereignty on its capitol grounds, thinks its time for a little bit of fiscal martial law down there.

In one of the strongest bids yet for federal intervention into Puerto Rico’s fiscal woes, a member of Congress is calling for a control board to take over the island’s beleaguered government….

“I believe legislation to require the establishment of a financial control board, to enable the politically unpalatable changes necessary to put Puerto Rico back on the road to self-determination, may be needed,” wrote Mr. Duncan, who is chairman of the Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere of the House Foreign Affairs Committee….

Mr. Duncan’s call for a control board will most likely find favor with hedge funds and other investors that own billions of dollars of Puerto Rico municipal bonds and are seeking to head off a default or debt restructuring.

Financial Control Board Should Take Over Debt-Laden Puerto Rico, Lawmaker Says [DealBook]