tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13716931.post113336142981128865..comments2023-06-23T18:28:12.061+10:00Comments on Bowling for Illidan: Scrapbook: Dead Man Walkingboy_fromOzhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12354698665016613894noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13716931.post-1134534293793566532005-12-14T15:24:00.000+11:002005-12-14T15:24:00.000+11:00The easier one first. The PAP actually wear all wh...The easier one first. The PAP actually wear all white (except for belt and shoes I think) for public and official events AFAIK. <BR/><BR/>I can't speak for the rest of The Void Deck but I believe that JBJ was one of the best Spore had in terms of challenging the MIW. He is the one man army, without soliciting foreign help (unlike CSJ and SDP), who is taking on the MIW. He is still around despite the crippling lawsuits. Others dissidents could not take the heat and have gone overseas to bitch while the old guy is still around swinging his fists, albeit at a much slower pace right now. <BR/><BR/>The MIW paradoxically created and destroyed him politically at the same time. Their insistence to contain him, at times horrendously unfairly like the defamation lawsuit hurled at him in 1997 because of comments he made in a rally, only galvanised popular support for him, regardless if he was clueless about Spore's economics. <BR/><BR/>The rules that were applied to JBJ were probably harsher than those applied to other opposition politicians, partly becaue JBJ was seen as a bigger threat to the dominance of the MIW then. So in a way, he did not play the game the way the MIW wanted him to and was thus taken out of play.<BR/><BR/>In some ways CSJ and JBJ are similar - one man army sticking around in Spore to take on the MIW. In other ways, they are not - JBJ is more articulate and civilised, even gentlemanly, in his perceived rhetoric and tactics.The Void Deckhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05449537651329835195noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13716931.post-1134188936648817042005-12-10T15:28:00.000+11:002005-12-10T15:28:00.000+11:00who would you then identify as the viable Singapor...who would you then identify as the viable Singaporean opposition? <BR/>Would you say that (e.g.) Jeyaretnam's fate stemmed from a failure to play the system properly? <BR/><BR/>To me, the iconic image of Singapore politics is Jeyaratnam peddling his books at City Hall MRT station, reduced to penury by defamation suits. Generally I don't like analogies between Singapore and dynastic China, but I make an exception for this mentality of hounding political opponents to destruction (and using the machinery of state to do it). <BR/> <BR/>Btw do PAP members really still wear white, or is that just a metaphor?boy_fromOzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12354698665016613894noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13716931.post-1134037839635113192005-12-08T21:30:00.000+11:002005-12-08T21:30:00.000+11:00Hi JohnHonestly, there are some people in Spore wh...Hi John<BR/><BR/>Honestly, there are some people in Spore who back Chee partly because they see him as the sole politician who dares defy the ruling party and partly because they like his party's politics - issues and style. Fair enough. They can choose to support who they want.<BR/><BR/>Others (perhaps many others), including us, view him as politically out of touch with the very people whom he claims he wants to represent, among other faults.<BR/><BR/>He has not provided convincing proposals on how to do better than the MIW in terms of providing jobs, education, health policies etc. Besides, he is not the only one who defies the MIW as he likes people to believe. He is being picked on by the MIW mainly because he lets himself get cornered politically so as to show he is being persecuted. Members of the other opposition parties, however, have escaped lawsuits (so far) apparently because they are clever enough to criticise the petty MIW without sounding defamatory. <BR/><BR/>We could go on but here are some similar views from others.<BR/><BR/><A HREF="http://singaporewatch.org/category/politics/sdp/" REL="nofollow">Singapore Watch</A><BR/><BR/><A HREF="http://shianux.jiyuuu.org/2005/08/15/137/democracy_is_not_a_populist_whore/" REL="nofollow">Wannabe Lawyer</A>Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13716931.post-1133926559812935512005-12-07T14:35:00.000+11:002005-12-07T14:35:00.000+11:00It wasn't directly on-topic, but neither was it co...It wasn't directly on-topic, but neither was it completely irrelevant, given that Nguyen was trafficking heroin. It was a shade opportunistic in that the Myanmar fund was terminated almost a decade ago and there doesn't seem to be any subsequent evidence linking the Singapore govt with Burmese drug money, as discussed in the post. <BR/><BR/>I don't think it's fair to single out Singapore for criticims over its general approach to the Yangon regime, all the ASEAN countries have had the same policy till very recently. <BR/><BR/>I'm interested to know what the general feeling is in Singapore about Chee Soon Juan and the SDP more generally. I know that the ST and its letter-writers got stuck into him and there've been many attacks on him in Aus online forums (e.g. The Age). The Aus media spin was that they carried CSJ's views because the Singapore media wouldn't.boy_fromOzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12354698665016613894noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13716931.post-1133923237147484982005-12-07T13:40:00.000+11:002005-12-07T13:40:00.000+11:00The Burma allegation was just an inapprorpiate and...The Burma allegation was just an inapprorpiate and opportunistic argument inserted by CSJ in the death penalty debate in Spore. Instead of challenging the Spore govt on its persistance to retain the death penalty in general and not granting clemency to Nguyen in specific, he just had to bring up something that distracts from the whole effort. Wrong topic for the wrong forum. Classic clueless CSJ.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-13716931.post-1133362835628778592005-12-01T02:00:00.000+11:002005-12-01T02:00:00.000+11:00My faith in the mainstream media takes another nai...My faith in the mainstream media takes another nail in its coffin - this <A HREF="http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=75161" REL="nofollow">AFP report</A> gets the tense of Koh's letter wrong (he was referring to past, not present, Singaporean investment in Myanmar)boy_fromOzhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12354698665016613894noreply@blogger.com