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."
Right now, this
government is attempting to replicate the strategies of the BN regime.
Non-Malay power brokers know their place and the entire system of
government is used to reinforce the ideological foundations of race,
religion, and royalty that worked well for Umno/BN for decades.
Anwar seemed to be channelling the old maverick when he reminded that young woman of the social contract. He seemed to be outplaying Hadi when he presided over the conversion ceremony of that young convert.
And by reinforcing the funding of the religious bureaucracy, he wants to define the religious narrative of this country.
PM Anwar Ibrahim
The problem with Anwar’s Islamisation is that it gives cover to PN
when it decides to do the same thing. If PN eventually comes to power,
what it will rely on is the blueprint set out by Anwar and the support
of the non-Malays who did not raise any objections to Anwar’s Islamic
agenda.
This is already peddled to the base if people are actually
paying attention and not merely getting their news from the echo
chambers of the Pakatan Harapan support system.
Can you imagine how much easier things would be for PAS if it was part of this unity government?
Act 355
Take
the proposed amendments to the Syariah Courts (Criminal Jurisdiction)
Act (Act 355), for instance. When PAS was going around touting this as a
major step for the agenda of Islamisation in this country, it received
pushback from Harapan and DAP.
PAS not only vilified DAP for this
but also questioned the Islamic credentials of any Malay political
operative who opposed this policy. Indeed, so vehement were the
objections from DAP, PAS had a field day attacking Malay political
operatives who are now their allies.
When PAS was in power with PN, they conveniently forgot about it as Anwar rightly pointed out.
The
decision of this government to table Act 355 after it passes cabinet
approval and the silence of DAP would be made worse with PAS in the
government.
Now of course they would determinedly pursue such agendas because PAS has demonstrated they have no real policy agenda beyond religious ones.
“If
we (PN) become more extreme, it will be difficult to form a federal
administration because it requires the cooperation of all races,
including the Borneo bloc, which has many non-Muslim natives as well as
moderate Muslims,” said former Bersatu supreme council member Muhammad Faiz Na’aman.
Blutund boden
Forget about who is saying it but does anyone really think that PAS will moderate its behaviour if it joins Madani?
Now the rhetoric from PAS has entered overt blut und boden
(blood and soil) territory which was always there but now has become
unhinged with Kedah Menteri Besar Muhammad Sanusi Md Nor wanting the
Federal Constitution changed so Kedah could annex Penang
and PAS claiming that Malay land in Penang has been “systematically
seized” like Muslim land in Palestine has been seized by the Jews.
What
are we really talking about here? What is the deliberate imagery being
engineered by PAS? What are the emotions PAS is trying to stoke by comparing
Muslims in Penang to Palestinians? PAS is implying that the leadership
in Penang - Chinese leadership - is akin to the Jewish state.
And
please don’t gaslight people into thinking that PAS joining the unity
government is some sort of cunning strategy. Or maybe it is only the
non-Malays being played.