Nicholas Laughlin's blog etc.

The golden arches no longer gleam against the Trinidad sky, as yesterday's Express reports:

"McDonald’s customers bought their last Big Macs yesterday when the American fast food giant abruptly shut down operations at its chain of four restaurants in Trinidad and Tobago.

"The closure took effect at exactly 5 p.m.

"None of McDonald’s franchisees would comment on the abrupt departure of the fast food giant which has been posting some losses and is in cost-cutting mode.... Statements from McDonald’s Trinidad operations and its advertising agency attributed the closure to poor financial performance of the restaurants."

(Good riddance to plastic food, I say.) But has the invisible hand really achieved in T&T what Jose Bove & the anti-globalists are still trying to do up there in Europe?

This morning, as I do every day on my way to work, I drove past what used to be the Westmoorings McDonald's. All the signage had disappeared overnight, & it seemed to me the Colonel, barely twenty feet away, was smiling rather more broadly than usual.