BLOGGING CROSSROAD

When I started blogging, I just wanted to write about the good old days and a few experience in trading in stock market. Only lately I started writing about some political situation in Malaysia, which I slowly found to be petty and boring. Issues brought by the opposition are petty, response by the ruling coalition are petty and highlights by a few bloggers are also petty. I don't have to add myself and my blog to the list and therefore I will try not to write about politics anymore.

God bless our country.

THE CIRCUS IS IN TOWN. ACT 1 - KHALID IBRAHIM, TERESA KOK AND THEIR PIG FARM

Khalid Ibrahim and Teresa Kok had proudly announced the development of the biggest pig farm in the country, probably the biggest in the South East Asia. It is very clear that they are implementing the concept of ‘Malaysia Boleh’ that was incepted by Mahathir Mohammed quite some time ago, which made me wonder if there is any different between the BN and the PR. The pig farm is claimed to set an example for other states in Malaysia to follow. Wow, a grand PR vision, probably bigger than Vision 2020.

Well now it is clear that the first priority of the PR government is to have a mega modern pig farm and Selangor is taking the lead. Probably more to come when Anwar becomes the Prime Minister.

The play will become more interesting soon when the reaction of the local residence fell into deaf ears of the PR leaders. If they don’t listen, they too would become just like the BN, out of touch with the people.

The next time Teresa having a roast party, please don’t forget to invite Anwar Ibrahim, Khalid Ibrahim and all the Tuan Gurus from PAS. The more, the merrier. After all there are a lot more roast to come after the project is completed.

What a circus. A good show Pakatan Rakyat.

IT IS SNOWING IN APRIL

Last week we had just adjusted our watch to add one hour ahead, for the daylight saving time, which mean spring is already here. But today, yes.... today we have snow fall......... in April? Whatever happened to mother nature. It was not snowing in winter, but it is snowing in spring.




The tulips that came out are covered by snow. I hope the tulips will still be there tomorrow.

The front neighbour's children are playing in the snow. They must be missing the snow for the last whole year. Noticed the little girl with a pink teddy bear, she is cute.

A visitor came by in the snow. This shot is dedicated to Ms. Foxy who despised the 'musang'.

The view of the house from the backyard in snow.

This would be my final year enjoying the snow here.

KLSE, A VERY WEIRD AND STRANGE MARKET

Have you noticed the behaviour of KLSE lately? Noticed that there are a lot of companies with a good returns, but their share prices are cascading down. MAS has returned to the black, but its share is going down. Air Asia's profit and its fleets are increasing, but its share is going down. Even the house itself, the Bursa Malaysia Berhad has made 123% profit for the year 2007, but its share too is also going down. Likewise to all other profitable companies.

When the rest of the Asian's markets are going up, KLSE is going down. So, what is happening? Is it in any way related to the non-confidence of the government? The political uncertainty? Or Malaysia is no longer attractive politically and economically to the international financial community, which resulted the foreign funds just stop pouring in?

Or because everybody are busy reading Khir Toyo's blog?

A NON RACE-BASED POLITICAL CLIMATE IN MALAYSIA?

Politics in Malaysia has long been dominated by race-based political parties. To be cynical, probably Malaysia is the most racist country in the world where the racial difference and tensions are at the highest hierarchy where people are separated by their race-based political masters. The question now is whether we can have a true non race-based political climate in Malaysia, especially after the shocking outcome of the General Election 2008.

Well, first we have to categorize the percentage of certain ethnicity in a party to determine weather it is a race-based on not. I think we should agree that any party with more that 85% controlled by the specific ethnicity is categorized as a true race-based.

Now, lets have a look at the major political parties in Peninsular Malaysia.

• UMNO (100% Malays) – definitely race-based.
• MCA (100% Chinese) – definitely race-based.
• MIC (100% Indians) – definitely race-based.
• PAS (100% Malays) – definitely race-based, hiding behind religious ideology.
• DAP (more than 90% Chinese) – definitely race-based, hiding behind democracy and meritocracy ideology.
• PKR (probably between 50% to 80% Malays) – lower rank of race-based.

UMNO, MCA and MIC in the National Front admitted that race-based is good and they have proved that they can work together for a long time. They say they have served their race well, until recently proven by the elections result that they are no longer serving their people except for themselves. They are no longer in touch with the people.

The Alternative Front is also race-based. PAS has been saying that they would have the representatives from other ethnicity, while we know very well that the statement is just a mere gimmick. They are all Islam and of course all Malays. DAP is also trying to project that they are multi-racial, and yet their speeches campaign are still in Chinese. Democracy and meritocracy are just an excuse to break the Malays special rights. The alliance of PAS and DAP is actually a marriage made in hell. Sooner or later the cracks will appear and the internal squabble will escalate and hell would break loose. Just wait and see. For a start they just can’t agree on the Perak’s MB as yet.

The best bet is PKR. They are trying to be a non race-based albeit the fact that the majority is still the Malays. They have a term until the next General Election to prove that they are non race-based and to serve all the races. They can have a good start, with Selangor as the most modern state in Malaysia in their hand. Do not mess it up.

Despite all the fiery speeches that all Malaysians are one race and the PKR is serving all Malaysians regardless their race, can PKR’s Anwar Ibrahim guarantee that his party is a true non race-based political party? To have a true non race-based party, can he guarantee that the followings are met?

• The Prime Minister to be chosen from any race.
• The Malay Special Rights to be abolished.
• The Chinese and Indian vernacular school to be abolished and be replaced with a Malaysian school for all. Other than National Language, Mandarin and Tamil to be made compulsory subjects in school.

If he can’t guarantee these, just shut-up. He is no different from all those above.

LOCAL GOVERNMENTS, THE FORGOTTEN REPRESENTATIONS IN THE MALAYSIAN ELECTIONS

So we are going for the 12th General Election on March 8, 2008. The war drums has started. Offensive attacks will begin between ruling coalition and the oppositions. War of posters and war of words will intensify until the day of casting votes. Of course money would flow to fish for votes as what is acknowledged by Khairy Jamaluddin. The general election in Malaysia is just like another festival. People are making money in various ways, bloggers included on the increased traffic to their sites.

But lest we forget, there is another branch of the government, another type of representatives we have not elected since the days of Sukarno’s confrontation on Malaysia, the local government representatives. They are representatives from the posts of the councillors to the highest post of mayors, from ‘Majlis Perbandaran’ to ‘Dewan Bandaraya’, who are being appointed to the throne by the state government. These representatives were once called The Little Napoleons.

When the Prime Minister complained that there are a lot of Little Napoleons in the government agencies, we were unsure which agencies he was referring to. He did not mentioned the local government straight away to avoid arousing people to pressure the government to re-enact local government elections again. But everybody knows that it was the local government representatives that make the biggest bulk of these Little Napoleons, his very own.

Originally elections in Malaysia exist at three levels, national, state and local level. National level elections are for the membership of the lower house of the Parliament, the Dewan Rakyat, state level elections are for the membership in the various State Legislative Assemblies and local level for the membership of local, town and city councils. Unfortunately the local government elections were suspended after the Indonesia-Malaysia confrontation in 1964. The suspension was never lifted and instead made permanent under the Local Government Act 1976. Under the Act, or laws of individual states where relevant, local government members are appointed by the state government, mostly by the respective Chief Ministers.

Why local elections would not be brought back? The answer is very simple, the ruling government knows from the worldwide experience that the oppositions tend to dominate the councils as the electorate desires for checks-and-balances on them. They would never allow this to to happen and they know very well that they are in control as amendments of the Local Government Act 1976 to re-enact local government elections would require constitutional two third majorities in the parliament, an advantage that they always have. Cost factor was added that holding additional elections are expensive affairs, to discourage its revival.

Do we really need local elections? The answer is a big yes. I pay all sorts of taxes and local taxes ranging from council tax, assessment tax, land tax and etc. I do not want an appointed representatives messing around with my money. I want to elect my own representatives to handle my money and provide the services that I deserve. I do not want Zakaria Mat Deros’s saga to happen again and I definitely do not want the Bukit Cerakah ecological destruction to repeat again, a blame I point direct to these appointed 'Little Napoleons'.

I do not want the appointed local representatives. I want the elected local representatives, elected by the people and answerable to the people. If they do not do their job, be sure they won’t be elected by the people in the next term. I do not care much about the national and state level representatives, they are not handling our daily affairs, they are useless anyway.

Ironically, none of the oppositions fought for revival of the local elections in their manifestos, none heard from Anwar Ibrahim, to my greatest frustration. Probably he will appoint his very own Little Napoleons, if he ever gets the top job.

LOOKING FOR FREE PDF CONVERTER

I am in a dire need of a pdf converter and I was told by my IT friend that I can get a free version of it in the internet. So the search began. After wasting so much time, I still couldn't get the free version that I was looking for. The price of the paid versions ranging from US17.00 to US250.00.

I am now turning to my friends in the blogging world, if anybody out there know where to get the free and good version of pdf converter. Please let me know ya guys.....