This lack of USVI self-identity works for the United States. The United States wishes to expand hegemony through its own Caribbean backyard.  The phrase on the license plate, “America’s Caribbean,” sums up the status of the USVI and signals that any self-identity that may lead to an independent State has to be regulated.  Fortunately for the United States, the inhabitants of the USVI are effectively regulating away any sense of self-identity.