A new US President.

20.1.2009.

In a matter of hours the new Black President of the USA will be inaugerated. In fact it would mean a quantum leap in the progression of the Greatest Nation of the Modern Era in seeing a member of the race who were slaves just slightly more than 130 years ago move into the twice burned down and aptly named White House. I eat humble pie for predicting that another Clinton would win the US Presidential race. I couldn't be right in my prediction because I was going against a movement, not a straightforward national election.

The huge number of first time voters who were youthful and college educated put paid to the theory that racial sentiments and history would dictate events. The battle cry was "Change". No one could go against that. 

After the Gaza slaughter in front of a 21st century world of instant news and instant everything. Except in doing the decent thing in stopping an inhumane slaughter of a people by another that claims to have been wronged in WWII. We should wait and see if the Black President would walk the talk.

From early utterances reported from him, including "Israel is sacrosanct", I have my doubts. So, while the rest of the world watch the $200 m festivities in Washington, the Gazans mourn their $2 billion loss in property and 1,400 women and children and other lives snuffed by the US backed Jewish troops. 

The filthy rich Arabs are still in their endless meetings, pledging $2billion in reconstruction aid but unable to even agree on the m.o. and that after comfortably watching the slaughter across their borders from their air conditioned palaces while slumped on their comfortable divans with their water pipes fingering their prayer beads and doing absolutely nothing until the smoke cleared from the raped grounds of Gaza. 

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Kuala Terengganu II

17.1.2009.

Saturday 17th. Jan. 9.36 p.m. It's official ! Just 10 minutes ago RTM telecast live from KT - PAS wins with more than 2,000 majority. So my prediction a full 6 days ago was correct. One more win for "irrelevent" Mahathir against Lame Duck Dollah! He handpicked the candidate and campaigned personally (unlike Permatang Pauh, where "even his shadow was not seen" as the Malay saying goes) defended the candidate frantically, even going to the extent of saying this BN win is "for continuity". Mahathir said if Dollah & S.I.L. don't show up in KT, it might improve BN's chances. 

Well, Mahathir is right. Poor Najib valiantly said he'll continue Dollah's "good work". Good work, indeed. You mean "good sleep" Najib ? And for "continued" idiocy at the UMNO's helm ? Once again the UMNO members are showing that Dollah & S.I.L. are no good for the Party. Can't the two bang their hard heads together to get some sense into them and accept the reality? Just quietly go, Dollah, and don't throw anymore tantrums, against Mahathir or Muhyiddin or Rafidah or the bloggers. Now the Scomi crap is catching up on you. What about the Food for Oil scandal ? And the Slime Darby crude attempt at highjacking IJN ? Who's behind the Labu airport ? What single piece of good have you done when holding O.I.C's chairmanship ? You slept in office for 5 years, and now suddenly you are feverishly busy doing all kinds of underhanded things ? Do you imagine that your 5 worthless years of zero legacy could cover up all the shit when even Mahathir's 22 busy years couldn't stop you and your cohorts from demeaning him, never mind that he personally picked you to be PM over the "more qualified" Najib ? 

Then maybe Muhyiddin and Mukriz can put Humpty Dumpty together again.

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Kuala Terengganu.

11.1.2009.

Dollah  said UMNO must work together to win the Parliamentary seat this weekend. All the Party's big wigs are in KT. But they're not campaigning for Wan Farid, Dollah's choice as candidate - they're campaigning for themselves for the March General Assembly. Poor Dollah. He still doesn't get it ! 

Rumours have it that the candidate was not even discussed by Party Leaders - it was Dollah's pick alone. After Mahathir said this was a bad choice and after Dollah responded that Mahathir is irrelevent, it is clearly a proxy fight between the two. Up to this point Mahathir has the advantage in all previous proxy fights. 

A Chinese friend was informed by his Chinese friend in KT that the Chinese votes are going PAS's way. The reasons given are not high brow. When PAS ruled it still gave out Karaoke licences but stipulated the Muslims must not be allowed in the premises. The sale of pork and alcohol were not banned to non-Muslims. When UMNO regained control, the practice continued, but there was "consideration" demanded by UMNO officials. 

An UMNO delegate just back from KT told me that the main issue raised by voters in most of the door-to-door campaigning has been the accusation that Wan Farid is haughty (sombong). They are having a hard time with this one simple issue. Mahathir has said the same thing. Dollah himself has had to mention it  to deny it, but his arguement is as stupid as his management-style. "If he's "sombong" I wouldn't have taken him." Indeed. 

Most striking to me was the tv interview of the two UMNO-PAS candidates. I thought the PAS candidate spoke well. The UMNO candidate was trying hard to show resolve. I thought he came out showing muscle. The arithmetic, however, is the most convincing arguement. All but one of the DUNs were won by PAS in the March 08 GE, when everybody was attending to their own turf. This is now a bye-election, when all can throw their weight behind their chosen candidate. 

I predict Dollah will be given a farewell slap in Kuala Terengganu.

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If there is no breeze, the leaves won't ruffle.

5.1.2009.

So ! Yang Teramat Mulia Dato' Lela Maharaja Undang Luak Rembau has deigned to speak up to the press about the "non-existence lobbying" for the Crown of the 11th. Yam Tuan ? If this was an attempt at clearing the name of the MB, it was sloppy and the classic case of being too little too late. As a certain politician so cleverly puts it, this stinks to the high heavens. The idiom of equivalence is "you can't cover carrion with a rice strainer." 

My first question is, who put the poor Undang to it ? My 2nd. question is, shouldn't the most senior Undang, the one who proclaimed the new Yam Tuan, Dato' Kelana Putra Undang Luak Sungai Ujong, make this press statement ? My 3rd. question is, why drag an Undang in and dignify a rumour in the first place ? 

If the objective was to silence the talk of the town, it was a complete flop. On the contrary this has not only enhanced the controversy, it brought a hitherto word-of-mouth slander into the open. Now everybody knows. As the Malay saying goes "if there is no breeze, the leaves won't ruffle." 

The sayings of Adat Perpateh state: 

"The Custom is on its development,

Resolution is on its compromise. 

The custom has evidence, The law has witness. 

The custom is based on law, The law is based on the Book of Allah. The just Crown is honoured, The cruel Crown is dishonoured. When you speak at daylight, look around, When you speak at night, 

listen well. 

Follow your heart, and you die, 

Follow your whim, and you perish. 

As far as the eyes can see, Swiftly the horse gallops, 

The beaten snake should die, The beating stick shouldn't break, The ground shouldn't buckle. 

The heavy load is lifted together, The lighter load is slung together, The hill is climbed together, The valley is descended together, The spoils are shared, The losses are shared, The liver of germs are shared, The liver of elephants are shared. 

Look at the custom, The village with its borders, The rice-fields with their bunds, The houses with their stacked steps, The rooms with their noises, 

When the state is big, When the people are many, The custom is set, the laws are ordained, 

The young has aged, The aged have titles, What do the elders say ? In the world rules a king, In the "Luak" rules a headman, In the "suku" rules a "lembaga", To each his own, To each his right, 

What belongs to another, do not take, What belongs to you, do not give, 

Living in harmony, Neighbours between homes, village sidling to village, That you can borrow from each other, That you visit in sickness, Playing in the same fields, Bathe in the same wells, Share the same lavatories,

Where the land is undulating, the water is clear, The counsel is united."

Study the sayings.

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The plight of the Palestinians. The genocide continues.

3.1.2009.

No word suffices in describing what is right now happening in Palestine. Maybe somewhere down the line in the course of history the real story will be told. How the Europeans persecuted the Jews, even as the Arabs were willing to tolerate them and give them shelter, and after WW2 how Europe and USA cunningly deceived the World into creating Israel, in fact making the now arbitrarily displaced Palestinians pay for the European's sins. 

The holocaust occurred in Germany and Poland and Hitler's Third Reich. Now a new holocaust is taking place in Palestine right before our eyes, when the whole human race has said, after the crimes committed in the name of misguided politics in the Modern Era, "no more !" 

As you watch tv and see the stupid, meaningless deaths on our roads because of the stupid, meaningless craze of our spoiled drivers, it srikes your heart in a chilling, sobering way that the 60-year sufferings of the Palestinians is no nearer to its end than ever before, even as their people continue to fight and die for their homeland.

And to think that all this continues because of the blind and insanely bias support of the US. Until this moment nothing that the US has said and done merit the least humanely possible condonement. What possible comparison can be drawn between the millions of betrayed Palestinians and the sustenance of an artificial Jewish state at any cost ? And at any cost here really means that - any amount of money, any life of any Palestinian, young, old, women or children.

What moral high ground can the only remaining super-power in the world take now ? Fighting for the US brand of democracy ? For the US brand of civilisation ? The US is less than 300 years old. Palestine was there 2,000 years ago. Israel was arificially inseminated in 1948. The out-going US President has come out strong and clear, not on the cheap Palestinian lives that have been snuffed for daring to fight for their homeland, but in support of the Jewish aggressors. That was no surprise, coming from the Chief Murderer of the the Iraqi people. But even the President-elect, with his message for Change, has come out in defence of the Jewish state, not even wanting to wait for his turn to turn the screws tighter on the miserable Palestinians. And to think that his father was a Muslim !

As far as Palestine is concerned there will be no change. As far as Obama is concerned he has already said US support for Israel will not change. It looks like it's up to the Palestinian youth to fight with sticks and stones their Jewish invaders with their tanks and planes and bombs. It looks like their Muslim brothers can only offer them their pitiful prayers. From a safe distance.

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