Rudyard Kipling"
āWhen you're left wounded on Afganistan's plains and
the women come out to cut up what remains, Just roll to your rifle
and blow out your brains,
And go to your God like a soldierā
General Douglas MacArthur"
āWe are not retreating. We are advancing in another direction.ā
āIt is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it.ā āOld soldiers never die; they just fade away.
āThe soldier, above all other people, prays for peace, for he must suffer and be the deepest wounds and scars of war.ā
āMay God have mercy upon my enemies, because I won't .ā āThe object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his.
āNobody ever defended, there is only attack and attack and attack some more.
āIt is foolish and wrong to mourn the men who died. Rather we should thank God that such men lived.
The Soldier stood and faced God
Which must always come to pass
He hoped his shoes were shining
Just as bright as his brass
"Step forward you Soldier,
How shall I deal with you?
Have you always turned the other cheek?
To My Church have you been true?"
"No, Lord, I guess I ain't
Because those of us who carry guns
Can't always be a saint."
I've had to work on Sundays
And at times my talk was tough,
And sometimes I've been violent,
Because the world is awfully rough.
But, I never took a penny
That wasn't mine to keep.
Though I worked a lot of overtime
When the bills got just too steep,
The Soldier squared his shoulders and said
And I never passed a cry for help
Though at times I shook with fear,
And sometimes, God forgive me,
I've wept unmanly tears.
I know I don't deserve a place
Among the people here.
They never wanted me around
Except to calm their fears.
If you've a place for me here,
Lord, It needn't be so grand,
I never expected or had too much,
But if you don't, I'll understand."
There was silence all around the throne
Where the saints had often trod
As the Soldier waited quietly,
For the judgment of his God.
"Step forward now, you Soldier,
You've borne your burden well.
Walk peacefully on Heaven's streets,
You've done your time in Hell."
Harapan's gathering storm - Commander S THAYAPARAN (Retired) Royal Malaysian Navy
Wednesday, May 22, 2019
Malaysiakini : āThe only real radicalism in our time will come as it always hasā
from people who insist on thinking for themselves and who reject
party-mindedness.ā ā Christopher Hitchens, Christopher Hitchens and His Critics: Terror, Iraq, and the Left
COMMENT
| Ronnie Liuās piece about the raging storm dividing Pakatan Harapan
partisans is interesting, but not in the way people think. When Liu (above)
writes that Harapan supporters are divided on the Chinese schools'
issue with regard to comments made by Education Minister Maszlee Malik,
and then goes on about how the education minister should be a minister
of education for āallā Malaysians, he is missing a very important point.
When
support is divided, there are generally two broad sides. In this issue,
for instance, there are Harapan supporters who value issues regarding
Chinese schools and who are offended by the education ministerās
remarks, and there are Harapan supporters who support the education
minister and have their issue with vernacular schools or place such
issues lower down on the scale of priorities.
Liuās call to the
prime minister that Malaysia needs an education minister for āall
Malaysiansā is the kind of inept politics that he is accusing Maszlee
of. How does an education minister for all Malaysians differ from what
Maszlee has been doing? Beyond his public gaffes, what is Maslee not
doing in terms of policy that reflects a new Malaysia policy shift? Liu
does not tell us.
First off, by prioritising one side over the
other, in this case those Malaysians who value issues related to Chinese
schools, and implying the other side is not part of the Bangsa Malaysia
agenda, is self-defeating. Liu makes the same mistake that P Ramasamy
made in his criticisms of the education minster: āWhile P Ramasamy is
correct to point out that Maszlee is behaving like an Umno clone, what
he fails to highlight is that the entire Harapan government is behaving
like the BN regime. This Malay/Chinese narrative is still defined along
the same old lines instead of the promised egalitarian policies that
Harapan campaigned on.ā
Hectoring Maszlee (photo, above)
for what he said about the matriculation quotas is only a valid
criticism if Liu can demonstrate what the ānew Malaysiaā agenda is, with
regard to education. Can Liu point to any policy decision by Harapan
that is egalitarian, merit- or needs-based when it comes to education,
that differentiates it from BN policies? If Liu cannot do this,
calling for the removal of Maszlee is disingenuous and hypocritical -
and which only feeds into the far right narrative that the DAP is
pulling the strings in Harapan or is after Malay politicians who are
parroting traditional Malay political narratives.
Liu says the
Harapan government is attempting to promote Bangsa Malaysia. Fair
enough. Please give us policy decisions and initiatives which are the
opposite of what BN did when it was in power. Please give us an example
of how the Bangsa Malaysia agenda has replaced the so-called
power-sharing formula BN shoved down our throats for decades.
What
of the Harapan supporters who support Maszlee? Are their views not
important? This is what happens when Harapan made a pact with Mahathir
and reaffirmed BN era politics with the inclusion of Bersatu into its
ranks. You have Umno/BN supporters who believe that Harapan is the new
BN and who never subscribed to the Bangsa Malaysia propaganda that the
opposition ā mainly the DAP ā propagated. What about their views? I may
not agree with their views, but for non-Malay Harapan politicians to
dismiss them, after relying on their support, is a politically dangerous
move to make.
As far as they are concerned, someone like Maszlee
is articulating the kind of mainstream politics that sustained BN for
years before it was bogged down with the corruption scandals of
successive Umno potentates. What does this mean? It means for these
supporters who were willing to give Harapan a chance, they were signing
up for the kind of racial politics that sustained BN all those years and
which got wide-ranging support from all the communities.
Instead
of recognising the divisions among Harapan supporters and discovering
ways to bridge the gap between non-Malay and Malay supporters, Liu
merely replays the same talking points that Malay and Chinese
politicians have been regurgitating for years. It would have been
so much simpler if non-Malay politicians would just state their stand
clearly and say they believe that education policies, for instance,
should be needs-based, and reject racial quotas outright, instead of
contorting themselves and attempting to justify the propaganda of Bangsa
Malaysia when the reality in terms of policy is exactly the opposite.
Another
way is to concede that the Bangsa Malaysia propaganda is bull manure
and acknowledge that Harapan wants to maintain the BN system without the
rampant corruption. To some Harapan supporters, this may be anathema,
but to others, especially the āconservativeā Malay base of Harapan, this
may be welcomed.
Targeting Maszlee because some people in Harapan
lack the cajones to acknowledge that all those promises Harapan made
cannot be fulfilled because these would āspook the Malaysā. Targeting a
Malay minister using dodgy logic and hypocritical arguments is more
damaging politically than not fulfilling promises.
The funny thing
is that Harapan can dig itself out of this mess. I am fairly confident
that no matter what the DAP does, it will not lose non-Malay support ā
but then again who knows, maybe the non-Malays are capable of much more
in how they hold their elected representatives accountable than what I
give them credit for ā but Harapan, because of the hypocritical nature
of how some non-Malay politicians behave, could weaken the Malay support
for Harapan.
Donāt confuse winning the social media game as
translating to electoral gains. People are not stupid. Non-Malay
politicians have to commit to a truly egalitarian agenda or concede that
their Bangsa Malaysia propaganda has come back to bite them on their
behinds.