ANWAR GIVING VOICE TO THE PERIPHERY IN THE END, WHO’RE ALL LOSERS

When one is tainted and carry a lot of baggages of course one’s back bone will be affected and then will have to rely on others for support and strength. This is when the sources of support will take advantage and dictate things one doesn’t want to listen or see. So you are at their mercy, you see. Evil forces are at play and one has always got to check one’s back in order to survive. Even when one has all the power and strength one becomes weak when a complete dossier on one is kept by evil forces to hold one to ransom. This is what is happening in the case before us.

Endgame:

So,the corrupted to core ,the devil we know is the one actually still at the helm

A vote for BN is a vote for the return of the devil we know.

Prime minister and Umno president Najib Abdul Razak dropped Dr Mahathir Mohamad’s name during the Umno general assembly because he “does not have the clout” to enforce his own views.

Najib on the hot plate with the latest developments on Deepaks deal that when sour which is linked to the Mongolian lady and also the land deal . Mahathir has taken it upon himself to call the shots otherwise Najis will get burned in the hot plate. His choice of candidates againstMahathir’s choice.The ball is now withMahathir who has always been a figure behind the scenes.

“May 13th, Lost of Power, Ketuanan,” nothing of real substance came out of the UMNO General Assembly.

What policies and direction did the largest political party in government proposed to address the rising cost of living, disparity in income between the wealthiest and the poorest, our falling value of the ringgit, lack of development in Sabah and Sarawak, influx of illegal immigrants, degradation of the environment, institutionalized discrimination, corruption, nepotism, cronyism and a host of other issues?

Nothing. Nothing new, status quo, everything is alright as it is. A responsible party in power should have delved on the issues above than talk only about retaining power. What good being a ‘tuan’ in a poor land when your neighbours are powering ahead and prospering? Just goes to show how short sighted these people are. If they had offered any solutions, at least I would have listened.

Anwar said today that Umno’s boast was not surprising, pointing out that the proceedings of the assembly showed that the party’s only tactic was to use the racial and religious card as a way of “divide and conquer”.

He gave a reminder of Wanita Umno chief Datuk Seri Shahrizat Abdul Jalil’s use of the “May 13 tragedy” during the wing’s meet to frighten PR’s Malay supporters, and accused the former minister of attempting to sow animosity between the Malays and the non-Malays with her threat.

“This is not only reckless but highly seditious and therefore criminal,” he said.

Anwar said this “fear-mongering” was Umno’s way of scaring Muslims into thinking that a government under PR would mean that the non-Malays would rise to usurp the power of the Malays to turn the country into a Christian state.

“Should the rakyat continue to bear with leadership of such calibre?” he asked.

He repeated his debate challenge to Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak, saying this was still the best platform for the latter to convince Malaysians of his credibility.

Everything is fine in Malaysia, and I am using my freedom of speech to say that. The other day I was asked to pay bribe at a government office, but then, it’s fine. There is nothing wrong with that. Bribes are part of life and in fact, should be part of your monthly household budget.

A few weeks ago, I was stuck up for day due to a famouse Nong Chik traffic crawl, but I am quite happy with that too. I have lost nothing really. In that half day, I could have paid so many bills; met so many people, for official as well as personal work. But it’s fine, I am still using my freedom of speech to say that I am quite happy about it. I won’t post any protests on Facebook, or Twitter, or even forward cartoons of bandh, bribes, corruptions… I will just remain silent and enjoy my freedom of speech.

A friend said that he had missed a flight because of the bandh. Another could not take an ailing relative to hospital as there was no transport available. Both said that they won’t speak about it. They too, like me, want to enjoy their freedom of speech in silence.

If I see some Khari’s Mad misbehaving with helpless folks on the road, I will just walk away. If in my opinion a government official is corrupt, I will just turn a blind eye. And if I feel I am being cheated, I will gladly accept it without a word. I will not go to the police, or any other government agency.

If I protest againstUMNO , my house could be vandalized. I could be beaten up on the street. And if I go to the police, I might be thrown into the lockup for disrupting peace. If under some compulsion, the police are forced to accept a case against the people who have vandalized my home, they will do so against a few unknown people, whose identity will remain unknown for the next 999 years. Even if I recognize my tormenters, some political leader will fetch up at the right time to ensure that his boys still remain unidentified. For all you know, a counter-case might be filed by these unknown men against me for beating up a hundred of them. In such a case, the police would show their effectiveness in arresting me and burying me under hundreds of sections , most of which would be unfathomable to me.

If I turn to any of the social network sites to express my anguish, similar fate would await me. And if I simply pass on an innocuous cartoon, I would have committed a terrorist act. I would be handcuffed and paraded through my neighbourhood like a thief, before being thrown into a cell with hardened criminals.

TO ALL MALAYSIANS: DO YOUR DUTY AND MAKE A DIFFERENCE

From Yeo Yang Poh*

Dear Fellow Malaysians

It is true that there are things that we Malaysians should be proud of, and be thankful for. It is equally true that many things are not well in our country. They have not been well for some time now.

Matters of safety and security, price hikes, education, issues of equal opportunities and equal treatment, constriction of various forms of freedom, marginalization of several segments of society, the failing justice system, corruption in the public sector, the rising denial syndromes, the arrogance of wrongdoers nourished by their repeated ability to get off scot-free, and the numbness of the public reaction towards misdeeds and the lack of accountability, just to describe a few.

Many of the ills that we complain about in our society are the symptoms of the underlying causes. Some of the major root causes are:

(a) epidemic corruption in a system that does little to prohibit or redress it,

(b) lack of a system of transparency and accountability;

(c) the suppression of various freedoms so as to turn a silent majority into a silenced majority;

(d) a Government that is more interested in commanding than serving;

(e) a Parliament whose overwhelming majority cares more about power-consolidation than nation-building; and

(f) a weak “last bastion” in the form of a failing justice system.

Can things be allowed to go on this way? Can we afford to do so? Should our future generations suffer the consequences of our permissiveness? It is quite obvious that we need a better Government and a better Parliament.

But that will not happen if we, the citizens of Malaysia , do little more than blaming the Government and criticizing our Members of Parliament. It is we who put our MPs in the Parliament. It is we who must take the ultimate responsibility.The buck stops at each and every one of us.

My earnest appeal to everyone is, therefore, as follows:

- discuss the need for a better Parliament and a better Government, with your family members, colleagues, friends and persons close to you;

- make it a point to go and vote in the next election, and to vote for change and for betterment; discard the notion or excuse that your single vote will not matter;

- discard the notion or excuse that politics is dirty and all politicians are the same, and therefore that there is no point in voting;

- influence and encourage as many of your family members, colleagues, friends and persons close to you as possible, to come out and vote for change and for betterment in the coming election.

It is meaningless for us to complain about our Parliamentarians and the Government, if we do not first discharge a simple but sacrosanct duty of choice.

Let us all take the time to look into the beautiful but expectant eyes of our children, and of the children of many others for whom we care. The future of our nation is meant for them. But millions of them cannot vote. They put their fate in our hands. They rely on us not just for their present living and support. They rely on us, too, to vote for a better future for them.

And after discharging our duty to vote, we must continue to be vigilant, and ensure that our elected representatives account for their actions, and make good their promises.

I humbly suggest to you that change and betterment are not empty dreams, if all of us play our respective parts. I invite you, and I urge you, to answer my appeal as set out above.

*Yeo Yang Poh is former Malaysian Bar Council President

Freedom of speech is my constitutional right and I am quite happy to enjoy it in silence.

For life is, and should be, a constant process of reinvention. A child gradually increases his field of activities and fires his ambitions as his mental, physical and spiritual faculties build up. Similarly, with waning strength and faculties, we should learn to adapt our lives to activities that the present reality allows. The most successful people in the world are those who have learnt to walk with change and adapt themselves to circumstances. Keeping yourself abreast with the latest technology and relevant news is just as important as being flexible in your personal life — in your relationships as well as the demands you put on your body, mind and the people around you.

Constant reinvention at all stages of life is the only way to stay afloat professionally as well as personally. Being on a constant learning curve is also a great way to bring in some healthy excitement into life. Look around; movement attracts energy, happiness and prosperity, while stagnation brings in depression and a stalemate. Flowing water is clean and useful; stagnant water gets polluted and breeds diseases. Keep a house shut for a long time and it acquires negative vibes; open the windows and allow fresh breeze to swish through, and a new life force seems to take over the same environ.

Similarly, we all need to keep the life force alive and moving around us all the time, and the only way to do that is constant movement — onwards and upwards, no matter what your age. Reinvention is not just about learning new processes and techniques; it is also about changing one’s outlook and changing interests, hobbies, relationships and job profiles. It’s about shifting your goalposts, and even your goals and targets with time. Even if you do not seek change, change will find you. And when that happens, you had better be prepared!

Amitabh Bachchan is a good example of a man who has constantly reinvented himself — from a bank employee to angryyoung-man actor, to superstar, to TV anchor, grandfather and general patriarch. He has worked passionately on each reinvention and taken care to stay true to the image he has adopted. There have been times when life has thrown him googlies, but AB’s greatness lies in his being able to get up and climb new heights in yet another role.

Most of us postpone dreams to a later stage; we wait for the ‘right’ time in life. Women look forward to a time when their children are settled, and they finally get a chance to do what they have “always wanted to do”; men wait for retirement.

The only ‘right’ time is here and now. While it may not be the right time to fulfil certain dreams, that doesn’t mean we should not always be mentally prepared to receive that dream. Nor does it mean that in looking towards that dream, we forget the relevance of the present moment. Every present moment offers a chance to learn and reinvent. As beauty expert Shahnaz Husain said the other day, “Life forces us to make choices; but if we are alert and empowered, we can create our own choices and be in charge of our own lives. Isn’t it exciting that God gives you a chance to reinvent yourself every morning?”

As with the elderly men, why should life be waiting for anything at any stage? It should be a constant process of reinvention and relevance. We have to ensure a constant release of any stagnant energies, and learn to age gracefully and accept life. For life reveals its beauty at every stage. Life gives us indications that it is time for change. Learn to recognise them and focus on what you really want to do. Don’t just do things the way they have always been done, nor live life the way it is ‘meant’ to be lived.

Break the barriers, challenge yourself, innovate and constantly reinvent yourself. Be aware, stay focussed and ride the change in your life. As American writer and futurist Alvin Toffler said about what lies ahead, “illiteracy will not be defined by those who cannot read and write, but by those who cannot learn and relearn”.

A democratic protest never gets a hearing in the government. The government only responds to violent demonstrations. This has often been said about the government and most often this has been true. Late though this post is by a couple of weeks, it just had to be put on record that at least one ministry had acted differently for a change.

Exactly, two weeks back, the ministry of social justice and empowerment was facing flak from the disability sector. There were only four people with disabilities in a 27-member panel constituted to work on drafting a new legislation to replace the earlier law on the rights of people with disability. Disability sector activists protested against this committee’s constitution which they said went against the basic tenet of the disability rights movement – ‘Nothing about Us, Without Us’.

Four letters were written to the minister in the month of May expressing the sector’s concern over the lack of adequate representation of people with disabilities in the committee. On May 29, a candlelight vigil was organised outside the residence of the minister Mukul Wasnik. Getting no response from the minister’s office, the activists believed that the minister was being insensitive to their concerns and ignoring their demands, quite a common occurrence, especially when the protests are peaceful.

The activists decided to go on an indefinite hunger strike in front of Shastri Bhawan. The day before the hunger strike, the joint secretary of the disability bureau in the ministry, when contacted, informed that the ministry had added six more members to the panel working on the new legislation. Of the six new members, three were people with disabilities and three were from the disability sector, taking the total number of people with disabilities to seven and those from the disability sector to nine in the 33-member committee.

While it might not have been the ideal representation expected by the sector, 16 members from the sector out of 33 does not seem bad; it amounts to almost 50% representation from the sector and a fifth of the panel for people with disabilities. A token hunger strike did take place the next day, but was called off the same day.

For once, a ministry had actually pre-empted a protest from getting out of hand and had responded to the demands of people who protested for a just cause. For once, the government proved that democratic protests do get a hearing in this country.

The fate of Susan Rice is, of course, in your hands. But allow me to offer my encouragement to remain deliberate in selecting her as the next Secretary of State. Do not buckle to the absurdities of Washington gossip.

While I do not know her personally, I am familiar with her education, her professional skills and performance in Africa, as the U.S. ambassador at the United Nations, a member of the Brookings Institute and the National Security Council.

Based on my experience of more than two decades as a foreign correspondent, covering more than a dozen wars, I had a close familiarity with dozens of U.S. ambassadors and their support staffs in Asia, South Asia and Latin America. As a result, I came to recognize the skills and professionalism of those men and women diplomats. Susan Rice strikes me as a real deal. With graduate degrees from Stanford University and a Rhodes Scholarship from Oxford she has not suffered fools easily. You might describe her as blunt or outspoken when she encounters some of the games being played at the United Nations or in Washington.

Let’s add some perspective to this controversy that seems to tittilate the press corps in the nation’s capitol. On Friday, the Washington Post on Ms. Rice’s lack of tact in dealing, both with her colleagues at the United Nations and by insinuations, Republican Senators John McCain and Lindsay Graham.

This duo of a “truth squad” seems determined to block President Obama’s nomination of Rice as the incoming successor to Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State. But it conveniently ignores what happened when the previous Rice, that is the unrelated Condoleeza, the deputy National Security advisor under President George Bush, broadly declared that Sadaam Hussein, the dictator of Iraq, possessed “weapons of mass destruction,” implying he had nuclear weapons. George Tenet, the CIA director, supported her by claiming that the evidence “was a slam dunk”– in other words, a certainty. Not only was the so-called evidence exposed as a lie or a fraud. it was used by Bush to justify a war againt Iraq that resulted in the deaths of 5,000 American soldiers. Now which is more grevious–the lies of Condoleeza or the candor of Susan Rice? Case closed.

By Manuel Roig-Franzia

Susan Rice was miffed, all right. Her frequent foil, the Russian ambassador to the United Nations, Vitaly Churkin — an outsize personality whom she might be yelling at one moment, then laughing with the next — was at it again. This time, he was mocking her pet project to let youths from around the world ask the U.N. Security Council questions via video link-up.

If Churkin was going to play goad the ambassador, Rice would, too.

Sen. John McCain, Sen. Lindsey Graham and Sen. Kelly Ayotte are not satisfied with their meeting with U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice about the attack on the U.S. Embassy in Benghazi.
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A Rice staffer superimposed Churkin’s face on the cartoon body of the Grinch — the one who stole Christmas. Rice loved it. This, she had to share. And so the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations decided to plop the doctored image onto the big screen in the Security Council’s consultation room for all to see.

But first, a bit of diplomacy. She showed it privately to Churkin. The “huge bear laugh” that staffers heard through the closed door signaled that this wouldn’t become a nuclear incident. Eventually, the Russians backed off their objections.

Still, Rice’s prank in December 2010 annoyed some in this ever-cautious, often-cryptic, inscrutably-polite-yet-clandestinely-rude ministerial universe. Was she being undiplomatically inappropriate or unconventionally charming?

Every little thing about the 48-year-old Rice matters now that she’s the presumptive front-runner to replace Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of state. Every question large and small demands answers. This child of Washington finds herself in the capital’s vise, a pressure point between Congress and the White House.

She got here by pinch-hitting for Clinton one tightly scheduled Sunday morning in September, five days after the attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya. Racing through five Sunday talk shows in a matter of hours, she parroted intelligence-community talking points that the attack was a spontaneous response to a film that mocked the Muslim prophet Muhammad; a group of Republican senators and conservative commentators accuses her of intentionally misleading the public to hide intelligence assessments that it was a terrorist attack.

Senators crowd before microphones to condemn her. President Obama talks tough, saying her critics should come after him — not her. At times, the whirling drama takes on elements of a theater of the absurd. Read the cable news chyron! “Sticky Rice.” Read the reporters trade quippy headlines on Twitter! “McCain throws Rice in the cooker.” “Rice on Ice.” “Obama wants Benghazi, Rice on Back Burner.”

It’s Susan Rice’s home town in its fullest flower, a swirling drama for the woman who described herself in an interview Thursday as “a D.C. girl through and through.”

She grew up minutes from the nexus of her present-day political saga, in Shepherd Park in Northwest Washington. Her father, Emmett Rice, was an economist who in 1979 became the second African American appointed to the Federal Reserve Board. Her mother, Lois Dickson Rice, was a corporate executive and a longtime member of the College Board. Rice’s parents divorced when she was 10.

They circulated among the city’s elite. Rice attended fancy schools — Beauvoir and the National Cathedral School. Rice, who played point guard on the basketball team, was such a jock that her family called her “Spo,” short for sport, a nickname that some family members still use. (Rice says she has not played hoops with Obama. “I know I can’t hang with him,” she says in an interview.)

Her parents’ friends were people such as Madeleine Albright, the future secretary of state, who served on school boards with Rice’s mother, and whose former husband played tennis with Rice’s father.

Albright became a mentor, helping to elevate Rice to assistant secretary of state for African Affairs when Rice was 32. They have been so close that people assumed Rice was her godchild, Albright said in an interview. She isn’t. But Peggy Cooper Cafritz, a wealthy D.C. art patron, was a kind of surrogate godmother. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton took Rice to lunch when she was deciding whether to attend law school.

When asked, Rice estimates that only 10 percent of her high school graduating class was African American. But race was something that her parents didn’t want her to dwell on. “They taught me never to use race as an excuse or a crutch,” she said Thursday.

She took her father’s death last year hard, friends say, and worries about spending so much time away from her family in Washington, as well as her mother, who has battled health issues. She has remarked that “somebody can take your place at the Security Council, but nobody can take your place in the hospital room.”

There was never any doubt that Rice would make her home in Washington. She “never wanted to live outside the city,” she said. She lives in Northwest Washington, with her husband, Ian Cameron, a television producer she met while attending Stanford University. Inheritances from Cameron’s and Rice’s families, as well as her own investments, are chiefly responsible for her $20 million-plus net worth, which has drawn attention this week because she holds stocks in Canadian oil companies that could benefit from construction of the Keystone Pipeline, a project that she might have some influence over if she were named secretary of state.

Rice was aware that some might look askance at her and her husband because Cameron is white and she is black. “But why the hell should I be constrained by prejudices with which I totally disagree?” she said in a 1998 interview with The Washington Post. “That doesn’t mean that I’m less of an African American.”

At dinner parties in the couple’s home, the music invariably gets turned up and Rice, whose public persona can be so deadly serious, will laugh and dance, says her former chief of staff, Brooke Anderson. Rhythm and blues will pour out of the speakers. “I like old-school,” Rice says.

That smiling, gregarious Rice is the one her close associates like to talk about. But a meme has chased Rice through much of her steep and speedy rise, and it is more present than ever as her name dangles out there as a possible secretary of state. She is the sharp-elbowed one, the brusque one, the one who flipped off the famed diplomat Richard Holbrooke, the one who likes to cuss.

“She’s not a typical diplomat,” says Ed Luck, a former special adviser to the U.N. secretary-general. “She doesn’t suffer fools gladly, and I don’t see why she should.”

Luck said he had his doubts when Rice was named U.N. ambassador four years ago. He wondered whether her style would chafe, but he was pleasantly surprised and, at times, moved, particularly when Rice gave stirring remarks commemorating the Rwandan genocide and acknowledging that the United States did not do enough to stop the killing. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen quite such a personal and emotional account given by a diplomat at the U.N.,” Luck said.
Rice viewed the Rwanda tragedy close up as a young National Security Council staffer and it plays a complex role in her public identity. She often cites her trip to Rwanda, where she saw evidence of unspeakable tragedies, as a major influence on her attitudes toward humanitarian intervention. But in a 2001 Atlantic Monthly article, the journalist Samantha Power — now an Obama administration adviser — seemed to portray Rice as favoring political concerns over humanitarian issues.

“If we use the word ‘genocide’ and are seen as doing nothing, what will be the effect on the November [congressional] election?” Power quoted Rice saying. In the same article, Rice said she didn’t recall the remark and said it would have been “inappropriate.”

At the United Nations, Rice can sometimes startle or annoy with her penchant for showing up at meetings and dominating the conversation. She’s blunt to a fault sometimes, can lecture to her peers and bugs other diplomats by over-scheduling them, leading them on endless excursions during foreign trips, prompting some to derisively refer to her as the “headmistress.”

“You’re not our schoolteacher and we’re not your students,” a Security Council diplomat remarked in reference to Rice.

Rice speaks often about her commitment to human rights, a cause that allies say is central to her worldview. Yet, one of the world’s leading human rights advocates has been a frequent critic. “She tends to be strongest when the human rights violations involved are committed by U.S. adversaries,” Kenneth Roth, the executive director of Human Rights Watch, told Foreign Policy. “But she is less strong when violations are committed by U.S. friends, like Rwanda or Israel, or by governments more in the middle, like Sri Lanka.”

Rice has been frustrated in efforts to get the Security Council to back resolutions calling on Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad to end that nation’s civil war. But she has been able to help secure U.N. sanctions against North Korea and Iran. And, in the precarious days of the Libyan conflict, she persuaded the Security Council to back a resolution allowing airstrikes. The decision was reached as Col. Moammar Gaddafi was threatening to kill thousands of Libyans and has been touted by the Obama administration as being responsible for saving countless lives.

“These just wouldn’t have gotten done if this caricature of what she’s like was actually true,” said Anderson, Rice’s former chief of staff.

In September, Rice gave the convocation address at Howard University. After her remarks, she walked to a private office trailed by VIPs and a few dogged students. One was a shy but persistent young woman who wanted desperately to meet Rice, says a person who was in the room at the time.

The normal protocol would have been for Rice to give face time to the assembled muckety-mucks. But she sat instead for a long time, listening to the woman tell her story. The VIPs had to wait.
Colum Lynch contributed to this report from the United Nations.