Ian On The Red Dot

Acts 19:15

“Jesus I know, and I know about Paul, but who are you?”

I keep thinking about this verse when I read the myriad rantings against the government online and assess the many offered solutions.

Who are we?

We are citizens and we most definitely deserve to be heard.

But for change to happen, people (not just those in government) need to be willing to listen.

Why should they listen to us, instead of turning against us, and hanging us by our balls (this is a phrase my secondary school teacher taught me in Sec 1)?

Then the man who had the evil spirit jumped on them and overpowered them all. He gave them such a beating that they ran out of the house naked and bleeding.

Sons of Anarchy, the gripping FX series with Shakespearean aspirations, returns for season 2 with a bang. Literally.

Spoilers ahead:

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Apparently Catherine Lim asked Minister Mentor whether the military would be sent in on the really slim chance that the PAP loses an election.

Minister Mentor’s answer makes sense. His answer is reproduced below.

Some thoughts. If the government is really messed up and incompetent, I’m pretty sure the PAP would be able to come back into power lawfully after 1 cycle.

However, even if the new opposition isn’t really messed up and incompetent, there are my ways the PAP can indirectly fuck up the new government to make them look like idiots.

Let’s talk about the people in the civil service, the President and the people who work for him. To me, it is human nature to be loyal to the people who were in power when you gained power.

The PAP has been in power for a long time. Let’s just say that the PAP can ask the funeral parlour owner for many many favors.

Is this corruption? No. Don’t be silly. It is human.

It is also human to mistrust new authorities. We had that problem when a new PC took over our platoon. Do I trust him? Do i follow the SOPs set by the old PC, SOPs that worked?

It takes time to build the guanxi. 5 years might be too little time to get the mojo going. Not too hard for the old leader to tell the follower not to follow the new leader.

For those with aspirations to be dictators in Singapore, the males have been so well-trained that Catherine Lim’s question is moot and that a coup can be done as easy as saying ABC.

If the PAP really wanted to do something after a freak election, just get the military to do a SAF-wide activation. All the males have been well-trained in mobilization and will return to their camps to report. Just keep the males there. Confiscate mobile phones upon report. Tell the males to gather at the parade square and prepare store for moving out. Don’t actually need to move out.

Trust me, most of the Singapore males will not miss a mobilization exercise. Maybe, they might get an inkling that it is a coup happening. But no one will not dare go back. Why? Cos the male will say this to himself, ‘if i don’t go back, and the new government topples, I will be charged for AWOL. Ok… better go back’.

Now, before I end, I must say this. The ministers in our government do have connections with the military. Come on, look at some of their ranks. It would be naive to think that they cannot push the current officers in the SAF to do what they want them to do if they really wanted them to do something.

And one final note, the only thing saving us from these sort of shenanigans is that we currently have decent men in our government. But they won’t be there forever, and we as a nation better do something to ensure that when wolves do get in, they can’t fuck us up.

Which if you look at Minister Mentor’s answer, is something our current leaders have been trying to do. I pray they have done enough.

You look at our record and the moves we’ve made. Let me put it simply like this. First, we maintain a system which gives any opposition the opportunity to displace us peacefully. We allow the system: we’ve not interfered with the civil service, the judiciary, parliamentary procedures, the police and so on.
If you can win an election, so be it. If at some point we are not able to find a team which can equal an opposition team, on that day we deserve to be out. If we become corrupt, inefficient, can’t deliver, we’re out.
What if we have a freak election, as we may well have? Many voters say openly: ‘In my family, three of us voted for you but two voted against, just to let you know that we want an opposition voice.’ In that situation, you may have a freak result. That worries me.
So we’ve set in place a President with blocking powers. Any opposition that comes in will find that he cannot touch the reserves, otherwise you can promise the sky and spend the money. And all our hard-earned savings will go in five years.
Second, you cannot change the top officials without the President’s consent. Any raiding of the funds must be approved by the President who has a council of presidential advisers to advise him yes or no.
Now, why should we do all these if we expect to overturn an election?
We expect that if we are voted out, to stay out, and hope that within one term, that new government, incompetent and unable to deliver, will be out. And there’s enough core competencies and the funds to enable a fresh PAP government to revive the system.
I spent 15 years thinking about these safeguards and finally persuaded my younger colleagues that we needed these because they can’t guarantee that each time they will produce a better team than the opposition just because you’ve done so in the past.
I don’t see any problem in the next election, and probably the election after that. But if we don’t get a good team in the election after that and the opposition does get a good team together, we’re at risk.
One of the first lessons I learnt in politics was from Harold Laski. He said if you don’t have a system that allows fundamental change by consent, you will have a revolution by violence. If we block all possibilities, we must expect violence. In that violence, eventually the army won’t shoot because you are in the wrong. That’s what happens in Africa, the army goes in and holds up the president and often shoots him.
If we had not these thoughts at the back of our minds, why do we do these things? Just to bluff the people? Doesn’t make sense. An army commander, air force or police, has to be approved by a committee and the President must agree. Why? Because we will appoint the commanders? No, because a stupid government will do the wrong things and when we return, we may find the whole machinery has collapsed, as often is the case. Simple.

I had an interesting conversation with an American friend of my colleague some time ago. We were discussing the Singapore government and I mentioned that there is some feeling among certain sections of the populace, contrary to what our government professes, that the government is corrupt as evidenced by the insane wages they have.

The American friend made the argument that the Singapore government could not possibly be corrupt insofar as corrupt is being defined as “the exchange of favors and influence for illegal payments” and high wages while distasteful are not illegal.

While one cannot underestimate the power of an avaricious nature in pursuing personal aggrandizement, his argument was anchored on the premise that since the government was already ridiculously rich from their wages, when they are in office, there was no need for them to indulge in (?illegal) actions to accumulate personal wealth. In the long run, Singapore actually might save money because the government officials are then in a position to choose the best projects at the best prices and not those which provide kickbacks in any form (of course, this assumes that government officials understand the market and are smart enough to assess then choose the best tenders).

He continued that ultimately the Singapore government’s actions can be reduced to this – to continually maintain power by appealing to the people (and whatever other possibly unfair political and legal means) with the ultimate aim to be the ONE to serve the population of Singapore.

What would be the flip-side?

The Singapore government does whatever it can to gain money and influence to maintain power and while in power only serves the interest of those supporters that had lend their influence and contributed to the personal coffers.

The conceit of this argument is the faith in the nobility of the ruling class and that the worst thirsts and hungers of human nature can be quenched and satisfied.

Basically, like my NS friend might say, the government ‘can fuck us twice’. Get high wages and still be corrupt.

The problem with analogies to explain anything is that it rarely is a one-to-one mapping. Sometimes we extend the analogy beyond its usefulness to explain just one concept. I’m guilty of that as are many bloggers. But that’s so besides the point.

Nocturne wrote this. It was a seductive argument.

But there’s one problem. It assumes that the PAP will always want the best for all Singaporeans, the average Singaporean, the Singaporeans in the lower segments of society….

Basically, it assumes the PAP will always be this paragon of virtue.

Assumptions they say, makes an ass out of you and me.

We could just say let’s keep the status quo until the shit really hits the fan. But then what? Shouldn’t we try to be more prepared for the day the shit hits the fan. Shouldn’t we work towards a system that can handle the shit hitting the fan when the PAP is currently a paragon of virtue as opposed to something much much worse (cue Zimbabwe).

This comment sums up the problem:

Interesting. Anyway I was just thinking… I might like all my employees to aspire to be the next CEO, but at the meantime if I only need a Junior Mgr, then I’ll just hire one without the need to hear about his aspirations. Of course, there are those who even expects his truck driver to aspire to be a CEO and have a plan for it.

We as citizens seem to demand so much from the PAP. But we don’t hold our opposition to higher standards. We make excuses for them. Oh, the PAP has done this. The PAP has done that. How can the opposition compete. Let’s allow the opposition to take one step at a time.

Whatever.

We make excuses for them. We apologize for them.

That’s why they will never be more than mediocre.

Update: This really should be the last post on these sort of matters for some time.

Update 2:

This post was written by xizor2000. I’ll just assume the first part on City Harvest Church (I think it would be a fair assumption that’s the church in question) was just a convenient coincidence. Nothing having to do with xizor2000 trying to be snide and doing a cheap left-jab-right-hook. He’s got to be better than that.

On to the second part.

What I am trying is this: be realistic and not idealistic. Many people who achieve greatness or their objectives in the end normally do not let his opponents or any other people determine how it should be done or what the rules of the game is. They look at the reality at that time to make the best of it, or redefine what the rules should be and work towards their ideals one step at a time.

In short, to ask for certain plans to be revealed before the person is given a task is an absurd proposition which only the Tali-PAP Men-In-White can devise to fxxk up the opposition. I don’t even know what to think about the people who would accept that!

Why, oh why, do we always present such false dichotomies? Be Realistic And Not Idealistic? Why not be both realistic and idealistic. They are not mutually exclusive. In fact, if there is any advice, it should be ‘Be Idealistic, but temper it with Realism’.

Now, I don’t disagree with xizor2000’s point about redefining the rules and working towards ideals one step at a time. That sounds like a plan. A damn good plan if you ask me.

The question of course is whether the opposition is doing that. It is of my opinion they aren’t. They are still very much playing by the rules of the PAP. They exist and carry out their actions very much in the context of the PAP. Just look at how they always complain PAP do this, PAP do that so we can’t do this, we can’t do that. Of course, there seems to be an inevitability about their situation. PAP is after all the proverbial immovable object. Sadly, our opposition is far from an unstoppable force.

Like xizor2000 said,

Many people who achieve greatness or their objectives in the end normally do not let his opponents or any other people determine how it should be done or what the rules of the game is.

Sadly, our opposition is letting that (i.e. letting others determine how they should be and what the rules of this political game in Singapore is) happen to them. I call bullshit if you say it isn’t happening. I think xizor2000 is right in saying that’s one way to achieve greatness and objectives – a necessary but not sufficient condition – which really begs the question, where do our opposition stand when measured against this condition.

The last part about,

In short, to ask for certain plans to be revealed before the person is given a task is an absurd proposition which only the Tali-PAP Men-In-White can devise to fxxk up the opposition. I don’t even know what to think about the people who would accept that!

You do realize that it is perfectly normal for one person (e.g. Individual A) to expect another person (e.g. Individual B) to have plans for a task before the task has been given to Individual B. What is crazy is to ask Individual B if he or she has any plans if they don’t even know what the task is. That is hardly the case when it comes to the opposition and the tasks needed to be done for Singapore to make it a better country for its citizens and people who choose to setup shop here.

If you really want an analogy, a company has a desire to construct a new office. The task is to build a sprawling campus the size of 10 football fields. They ask for tenders. What happens then is other people find out the task, come out with a plan and pitch the plan to the company. The guy with the best plan to fulfill the task gets the job.

Happens all the time. And if you are wondering what to think of such people, well, don’t worry your brain cells about that, I’ll just give you the answer here – normal.

I was reading a newsletter about a speech that was recently given at an investing conference. Anyway, the speaker said this,

Power does not corrupt. It attracts the corrupt.

Not everyone who is powerful is corrupted. Not everyone who eventually gains power will become corrupted. But we can be sure of this, power will always attract the corrupt.

Power is useful. Without power, the good cannot do anything.

But, like the speaker said, power attracts the corrupt.

Sadly, no one lives forever. Power will eventually need to be passed on.

Wolves know how to be like sheep until the time is right.

Not every man is worthy with a pure heart.

Not everyone can pierce into the heart of a man and see the darkness that lies within.

One day, someone will slip through the cracks.

Someone will eventually deceive his way pass the gatekeepers into the halls of power.

Then what?

How can you tell if a girl can be a good wife? Well, see how she performs when she is married to another guy, if she is good, then steal her from him. Or date her long enough until you feel comfortable she can be a good wife. But then that doesn’t really work. Right? Because when you are dating her, she is only acting in the capacity of a gf. So, what she has proven is that she can be a good gf, and possibly a good wife, but you can never really tell for sure. Right? But a close approximation is really better than nothing.

Ok.

Let’s flip it around. How do you let a gal you really like know that you can be a good bf or a wonderful husband?

One way is to woo her. But what if she rejects your efforts in courtship. Then what? Do you repeatedly keep trying to woo her?

Think about it. The objective is to be the bf because you want her as a gf as well as you think you can be a wonderful bf, possibly the best. Note, both motivations can be mutually exclusive.

The thing is, you don’t need to be a bf before you can show you can be a good bf.

Courtship is really about getting the status to then have a chance to prove that you can be good in that status.

Yet, there are many ways a guy can prove to a gal he can be a great bf without having to be the bf.

He can do well in school. Pursue a career with dedication. Be a loving son. Help out in the community. Have a vision greater than just earning buckets of money. There are many many things an individual can do outside of a relationship to actually show his potential as a good bf.

Which now brings me to this post made by xizor2000.

None of the opposition parties are in any position to take over. In other words, stop asking the baby to come up with a plan to fly like Superman, when the baby isn’t even given the chance to walk. And by that I mean, if you don’t even vote – or trust – the opposition parties in to let them manage your own constituency and town council, why the hell are you even asking them for a plan when they are in no condition to, anyway? Is trust not built bit by bit?

I agree with xizor2000. Trust is built bit by bit. However, this trust doesn’t need to be built only once the opposition enters the government. They got to build it now. And frankly, they aren’t doing it. They are saying, let us in. We show you what we can do. I’m saying, you can show us what you can do even before you get into Parliament. But they aren’t doing that. In my opinion, their only goal is to get more opposition into Parliament. They think they can only show us what they are capable of once they enter Parliament. Which is nonsense. There are so many things an individual or a group can do to make Singapore better without being in Parliament. The opposition should take the lead on that count.

For example, Indignation 2008. The people behind this are trying to make a difference for a segment of Singapore’s society. Actually, scratch that. They are trying to make a difference for Singapore’s society – we all benefit if we can learn to treat these individuals with more respect, value their rights and include them as equal members in our society (although, frankly, they would be lowering their standards to be at our level).

The opposition can take a lead in more of such stuff. But wait! Didn’t they try to protest over rising prices. Those are just side shows. Nothing lasting was created. That’s just protesting instead of working towards a solution independent of government’s efforts.

I made this statement:

‘No use talking about it. You want to fix things then come out with a concrete plan to fix it’

And here is what I meant by it. Plurk isn’t really a good place to convey the idea.

Say you live in an estate. You pay for cleaning but it never happens. You can keep complaining to management why the estate isn’t cleaned. You can talk about all the problems that can happen if the estate isn’t cleaned.

Or you can take a broom and do the sweeping.

Look. I know technically it isn’t your job. You aren’t the one being paid to solve the cleanliness problem. And I’m not asking you to do the management’s job or the cleaner’s job.

I’m just saying when the shit is going to hit the fan, and no one else can take care of you and family, then maybe it is time to come up with a plan to fix things on your own.

Now, when it comes to our government, I’m not saying we should come up with plans for our government to fix things. Xizor2000 is right. They are paid enough to do it and do it well. But if they don’t. Then what?

The citizens should make our own contingency plans. I’m not talking about migrating. I’m talking about us organizing ourselves to fix things on our own.

Small example: I hate traveling back during peak hour. No matter how much noise I make, the transport companies aren’t going to fix things in the short term. So I make my own plans to ensure that my own commuting experience is a pleasant one.

Which brings me to the last point. I truly believe the way things are going, if we vote the PAP out just to get them out, our country has a high chance of dying. Sure, things arguably may not be too awesome at its current state, but if the PAP is out, things will get much worse.

When I say the above, it is not because I think the opposition is truly incompetent that they will lead us to hell. It is because I think they haven’t figured out how to secure the other power bases in Singapore once they get control of Parliament. Those other power bases will still be secured by the PAP and the government would be operating in a hostile environment.

Of course all this is just talking strategy on paper. It is of no use.

But I’m just going to say, if we truly want a better watchdog or a new government or push the PAP to be better than they currently are, we need an opposition to think bigger than their issues with the PAP.

Interesting article over at Today Online. Won’t be linking to it because it seems links to articles suffer from link rot over at the online properties of our newspapers.

Anyway, the article is about the PAP, our Ministers and MPs increasing their presence online.

Two interesting parts:

But while it would seem reasonable to keep a finger on the pulse of the wired citizen, just how much of the “flash and bang” of the Internet translates into real life — particularly votes?

MP Baey Yam Keng (Tanjong Pagar GRC) agrees on the latter point. “There is still a big proportion of Singaporeans who do not rely on the Internet as a source of information.”

Here is the thing. Sure, there is a big proportion of people who do not rely on the internet as a source of information. But the internet isn’t just a place for us to get information. It isn’t just a place for us to waste time. It isn’t just a place for us to give feedback that you can pretend to be interested in. It isn’t just a place for us to ‘debate’.

It is a place where we organize, manage and coordinate.

The article makes it seem that the population online are a frivolous bunch with the label “YouTube generation” (thanks to a plurker for this point). How condescending.

The truth is there is a lot of excess attention, time and energy that is being diverted online. This attention, time and energy can be harnessed.

And no, it isn’t just to get votes.

Here is the thing, engaging us just to make sure you don’t lose votes or even win votes is crass.

Be our leaders. Set us on fire with a vision. Realize that the Internet can be a more effective tool for us to fulfill that vision.

When I read that article, it just seems that our leaders are trying to figure out how to use the Internet to manage us.

ZZZ…

Why not use the Internet to inspire us.

And you know, lead us.

Just finished a rather heated discussion with a colleague about the US Presidential Elections. Actually, more specifically, about the Democratic Party’s nomination for candidate. And I realized why the PAP might just want the ordinary people to stay out of the way.

We (i.e. a lot of the people desiring change in our current system) assume that people have the desire to be informed, and if not, have the ability to seek out information and the facility to take that information, digest it, analyze it, interpret it and then make informed, well reasoned decisions.

But is that really the case?

Is the average Singaporean, or for that matter, is the average individual in the world like that. We all have our bias, we all have our preferences and a lot of us, if not all of us, are susceptible to let emotions overrule our logical facilities.

More importantly, none of us will ever have the complete view of the world, nor ever understand what we see even if it is everything.

And if there is one thing about people, we like to experience instant gratification as opposed to strive for long term satisfaction. This is a problem when a group, society, organization or country needs to solve problems – a lot of the times, the right solution is not obvious and if it is, it is usually painful for those involved.

So politicians pander to the worse in human nature – fear and greed. Give the people their regular goodies. Throw gold off the wagon. Make people fearful they will lose out to others, that their estate will not be upgraded and they lose out in the race. Play to the lowest common denominator, stay in power and then do what’s needed to fix the problem.

Of course, power tends to corrupt and good intentions is never a justification for bad actions, and sometimes the best laid plans of man fail.

But do we want to trust the average individual?

Are the average individual even willing to accept that arguments for any issue are nuanced – there never ever is a clear line between one side and the other. Are they willing to invest time and effort to understand every aspects of the issues that concern them. Or are they just ever too willing to just look for convenient signposts.

Or is it just plain arrogance to think that one group of people, while having themselves an incomplete view of the world and with that a incomplete understanding of the world, might just have a better view and the rest should stay out of the way.

Do we dare trust our fellow citizens?

Or is that too much to ask.

Which demands the greater price? Which gives the greater rewards?

To trust and maybe fail. Or not to trust and maybe fail.

Knowing human nature, which choice has the greater probability of failure?

Knowing human nature, is failure an inevitability in either choice?

And if failure is always an inevitability, which gives us a better chance of renewal.

Comic book fans will probably know of the big stuff happening in the Marvel Universe now – the Skrull’s Secret Invasion. Here is an interview with one of the guys responsible for this story arc.

In any case, from SingaporeDaily, I learned about ‘PAP’s infiltration’ into the Singapore blogosphere.

Big deal…

But since everyone is speculating, I thought I would just throw in one comic book reference. It has long been speculated that Iron Man was for Registration during the whole Civil War story arc because he knew or kind of suspected the Skrull’s infiltration and being pro-registration would allow him to infiltrate whatever the Skrulls were trying to do and bring them down from within. Or something like that. I haven’t been able to follow what’s going on because of work and a lack of time.

But maybe, just maybe TOC is engaging in a counter-intelligence play.

Or whatever.

Back to watching “House”.