Rudyard Kipling"
“When 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 soldier”
General Douglas MacArthur"
“We are not retreating. We are advancing in another direction.”
“It is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it.” “Old soldiers never die; they just fade away.
“The soldier, above all other people, prays for peace, for he must suffer and be the deepest wounds and scars of war.”
“May God have mercy upon my enemies, because I won't .” “The object of war is not to die for your country but to make the other bastard die for his.
“Nobody ever defended, there is only attack and attack and attack some more.
“It 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."
Malaysiakini : MP SPEAKS | Last week I said former
prime minister Najib Abdul Razak was making a complete fool of himself
by showcasing how financially illiterate he was, after claiming that the
government could redeem 1MDB bonds early to save on interest.
This,
as I have previously responded, is not practically possible as bonds
are structured very differently from loans taken from banks. Yesterday,
Najib claimed that 1MDB could have instead made RM9.7 billion in
profit. This statement only confirms that our former finance minister is
indeed financially illiterate.
Najib wrongfully argued that,
since there were only RM17 billion of debts to be repaid, if we were to
sell Bandar Malaysia for RM12 billion, and enforce the Abu Dhabi
guarantee of US$3.5 billion (RM14.7 billion), 1MDB would make a profit
of RM9.7 billion. Firstly, a first-year accountancy student will be able to educate
Najib that the latter has completely confused a company’s ‘balance
sheet’ with its ‘profit and loss’ statements.
A ‘balance sheet’
typically records a company’s assets and debts, while the ‘profit and
loss’ talks about 1MDB’s accumulated revenue (very little) and cost
(including massive interest expenses) over the past 13 years. Najib has
completely messed up the two.
Guarantees don’t work like that
Secondly,
it is utter stupidity to say that if the Abu Dhabi guarantee of US$3.5
billion could be enforced, and that’s a very, very big ‘if’ – the matter
is in UK courts at this point of time – then 1MDB gets away scot-free,
and will get to keep its remaining assets. Guarantees don’t quite work
that way. Najib has perhaps forgotten that he, as the former
finance minister, signed a back-to-back guarantee with Abu Dhabi, on
behalf of the Malaysian government.
This
means that if 1MDB failed to repay the US$3.5 billion bond, and Abu
Dhabi was required to fulfil the guarantee, then Abu Dhabi can make the
claim against both 1MDB (whose current assets don’t add up to anywhere
near US$3.5 billion) and the Malaysian government. So the rakyat would
have to pay, regardless of the guarantee. Yes, that is the extent of Najib’s idiocy.
Bandar Malaysia land
Thirdly
(do I really need a thirdly?), he also seems to have forgotten that the
Bandar Malaysia land was owned by the government, even before it was
sold to 1MDB for a song (at RM72 per square feet).
Hence if the
Bandar Malaysia land can indeed be sold for RM12 billion, the entire
proceeds should be kept by the government for other development projects
and welfare benefits. Why should it be used to pay 1MDB debts when 1MDB
had added zero value onto the land?
Sizeable chunk ‘misappropriated’
Najib
has shamelessly ignored the fact that the reason the remaining debts
that the government still has to repay is ‘only’ RM17 billion, is
because after he was deposed in 2018, the subsequent governments
successfully recovered a sizeable chunk of the money Najib
“misappropriated” (diseleweng) – to quote Finance Minister Tengku Zafrul Abdul Aziz’s reply in Parliament yesterday.
Will
Najib please respond to the fact that he “misappropriated” the tens of
billions of ringgit which the Pakatan Harapan and subsequent government
successfully recovered from those who were complicit in his crimes
against the Malaysian people – Goldman Sachs, Low Taek Jho, better known
as Jho Low, and his friends, Ambank and even auditors, KPMG and
Deloitte Malaysia.
What about the fact that the United States FBI investigator testified
in former Goldman Sachs employee Roger Ng’s corruption trial yesterday
that Najib received US$756 million from the funds stolen from 1MDB? Or is Najib going to continue to give his hilarious excuse that it was “donations from Arab royalty”?
Or
better still, that he didn’t know where the money was from, or why it
was deposited, but he spent some of it anyway, reportedly on expensive
jewellery, birthday presents for his wife, or luxury holidays as well as
buying political support in Umno and for elections.
