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 is too pusillanimous to sack Mahathir - Commander S THAYAPARAN (Retired) Royal Malaysian Navy
Saturday, November 23, 2019
The Commander is only being polite by using the word pusillanimous, knowing the Navy I think his apt words would have been Pussy, Yellow Bellies, Lily Livered Chicken Scumbags and a whole string of same sounding epitaphs!!
COMMENT | The prime ministerās casual dare to anyone in his coalition to sack him further demonstrates how ārunning dogā Pakatan Harapan is when it comes to challenging the prime minister.
Dr Mahathir Mohamad knows that nobody in Harapan will pick up that gauntlet besides a few āChineseā politicians who would no doubt be vilified for doing so.
Even more important is that no Malay political operative in the coalition would even consider such a play because to do so would invite the wrath of the Malay political establishment. Any challenge to Mahathir always came from the Malay establishment and the most notable, because of its political terrain shifting, was PKR leader Anwar Ibrahim.
The fact that the prime minister can say this when there really has been no real challenge to him is demonstrative of how unstable Harapan is. But what more noteworthy is that the old maverick understands nobody in Harapan wants to rock his boat.
Cowardice sold as pragmatism is what the Harapan government is all about, especially when faced by acolytes of the fascist state.
And when the prime minister has the backing of the opposition, Harapan partisans should understand how screwed they are when it comes to ministerial accountability and transparency. Not to mention policymaking.
Mind you, I donāt think losing a by-election warrants sacking but let us face facts, there is conduct that warrants censure of some kind if the Harapan political operatives had any scrotal fortitude.
DAP strategist Liew Chin Tong got it wrong in his recent public comments about the internal politics of Harapan when he says, āWe might as well accept the fact that this is a Mahathir-Anwar government, as much as it is an Anwar-Mahathir government.ā
Firstly, there is no evidence that Anwar has any role in this government beyond being some sort of spare heir and this is in rhetoric only. I would argue that his role does not even amount to some sort of lady in waiting in Mahathirās court. Indeed Anwar is there mostly to give hope to some Harapan partisans that there may be a transition of power.
Secondly, has there ever been a time when Mahathir shared power?
This goes way beyond the realities of political power brokers influencing government but rather the notion that Mahathir has never considered the agenda of anyone but himself.
Another interesting point that Liew made - well, interesting for me at least as he couches it in middle ground terms when it is anything but ā is this one, āwe need both Mahathir and Anwar to consolidate our nascent democracyā.
First of all, we are not a ānascentā democracy. The reality is that we have been holding elections and the majority of the voting public voted in successive BN governments. The reality is that when DAP was the opposition before it hooked up with Malay power brokers, the Chinese community were not voting for them. When Mahathir was accused of heading a kleptocracy and described as a dictator, the majority of the electorate still voted for him.
Even PAS was part of the anti-BN movement (although not aligned with DAP until much later) and they were also part of the democratic process. I would argue that their early Mahafiraun narrative was perhaps the best propaganda they came up with, and it is really pathetic to see PAS snuggled between the old maverick and Umno.
Indeed, the Tanjung Piai by-election demonstrates how challenging it is facing a hostile electorate when it comes to the democratic process.
Hence, this idea that Mahathir and Anwar are consolidating our nascent democracy is ludicrous.
Secondly, since we are not a ānascentā democracy what Mahathir and Anwar really are there for is to consolidate the Malay vote. This was the reason why Anwar, DAP supremo Lim Kit Siang, Amanah chief Mohamad Sabu and the propagandists of Harapan claimed was the reason why an alliance was formed with Bersatu and Mahathir, right?
'Middle ground'
What I want to know is whether Mahathir and Anwar were really capable of consolidating the Malay vote.
Mahathir went to the dignity forum to demonstrate that he was still the Malay uber alles prime minister he always claimed to be. This certainly riled up Chinese voters in Tanjung Piai but meant very little to the Malay voters he was supposed to secure.
Outlier political pundits are still debating if Mahathir was even needed to put the coup de grĆ¢ce on the Najib Abdul Razak regime. There was a significant portion of the Malay electorate who just had enough of the excesses of the Najib regime and would swing to Harapan even without the old maverick.
Meanwhile, Anwar still struggles with the Malay demographic because of the hatchet job his former Umno comrades did on him. His compromise with the old maverick just makes him look weak, as does the pleas that his supporters should be patient and that he will become the next prime minister.
When people see this kind of behaviour, they see weakness. They see a ruler who did not take power but begged for it. The reality is that this is the kind of majority electorate that was created through the religion, education and bureaucratic indoctrination programmes.
All this was done during the watch of two men who Liew claims are needed to consolidate our nascent democracy.
As far as the āmiddle groundā nonsense is concerned, I think this is just another red herring. You cannot market progressive ideas as moderate, especially when you are up against a fascist coalition which you are attempting to differentiate yourself from. People need to know what makes you different, for better or worse, and understand the kind of change you are going to bring to the table.
Harapan will never sack Mahathir. I doubt if Anwar will even make an audacious play for the post of top job. I donāt blame him. It did not work out that well for him the first time he attempted it.
I guess what that elderly Chinese man in Liew's blog post really believes is that Mahathir's running dog will eventually be put down by votes from an angry public. And remember folks, Mahathir would "choose" Umno if its reputation was not in the crapper, which is strange because to any objective person Umno's ideology is toxic even without Najib and Co.
But then again, so is any race-based party. Thatās democracy for you.