Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Am I grumbling?

I've been taking a break and wondering if I should continue grumbling and getting it off my chest on this blog. I would have taken a longer break if not for the caring comments I received.

Life is worth living when you know that people care! I'm touched and grateful for the concern that some of my readers have shown me. My sincere thanks to Hazel Poa Koon Koon, the Monk and Shrimp for your kind concern and I want you to know that I'm well. There are good days and there are bad days. Having knocked on Heaven's door with a damaged heart, I've learned to make the best of each day.

As 'Singaporeans are champion grumblers" [Link] and
[Link] , I'm glad to be back being a champion :) MM Lee said that he allows foreigners to be PRs and citizens of SinCity so that Singaporeans can be "kept on their toes" maybe "with spurs on their hinds"!

It's a pity that we do not have foreigners to compete with politicians and ministers in SinCity. If we have, they may have "kept" the hotshots in GIC and Temasek "on their toes" too. If we had "the spurs on the hinds" of the chairmen, directors and executives of GIC and Temasek, the performance of these elites may have been much better! Do their 'high faluting' positions and connections absolve them from the responsibility and accountability expected of them? Or are they above fair play and moral human standard? Are we finally having a "bad dose of government" even though we are paying king's ransom for their services? The sound of silence for those responsible for the losses is most deafening. Like the increase of GST to help the poor (or ministers), have we been had again?

Here's the latest on the haemorrhage of GIC at Stuyvesant Town [Link] With so much talk of "paying for the best" maybe those big guns at GIC and Temasek deserve something more drastic than "spurs on their hinds".

Yes, Singaporeans are champion grumblers and the #1 Elite grumbles that we do not work hard enough. “We tell them look they have got to work harder or they’ll become stupid. It’s just that they don’t see the point of it." The man keeps grumbling that his daughter is a spinster. He grumbles that his granddaughter should be husband-hunting instead of titles-hunting and he grumbles again on the same issue of a 32-year-old physiotherapist who's lucky (or unlucky) enough to treat him :)

So apart from "Stopping at Two" then and "Wanting us to get screwed and give more births" now, what does the MM expect of us? What do we expect from him? Depending on his audience and mood and the occasion, it can be anything!

On the subject of screw and sex, it may be good to visit Sin City's history. . .

“Repression, Sir is a habit that grows. I am told it is like making love-it is always easier the second time! The first time there may be pangs of conscience, a sense of guilt. But once embarked on this course with constant repetition you get more and more brazen in the attack. All you have to do is to dissolve organizations and societies and banish and detain the key political workers in these societies. Then miraculously everything is tranquil on the surface. Then an intimidated press and the government-controlled radio together can regularly sing your praises, and slowly and steadily the people are made to forget the evil things that have already been done, or if these things are referred to again they’re conveniently distorted and distorted with impunity, because there will be no opposition to contradict.”
-Lee Kuan Yew as an opposition PAP member speaking to David Marshall, Singapore Legislative Assembly, Debates, 4 October, 1956

…you attack only those whom your Special Branch can definitely say are communists. Then you attack those whom your Special Branch says are aiding communists. Then finally, when you have gone that far, you attack all who oppose you.”
-Lee Kuan Yew as an opposition PAP member speaking to David Marshall, Singapore Legislative Assembly, Debates, 4 October, 1956

Maybe we should be grateful for grumblers. They are safer than those mayhem seekers who hit the streets each time their leaders spew rubbish and make derogatory remarks of their own citizens.

Stay safe, stay healthy.

Thanks again to my readers who help me make it a good day!

feedmetothefish