The Anti Neo-Democracy Theorist

I found a website for all of Liang Qichao’s writings in Chinese. Pretty Cool for anybody interested in one of the key intellectuals during the 1890s reform era till the early Republican years in China.

http://www.yifan.net/yihe/novels/classic/lqcwj/lqc.html

Quote of the Day:

民族自由与否，大半原于政治，故此二者其界限常相混。

- 梁启超在论自由（1902年5月8日、22日）

Whether a nationality (or people) are free, largely depends on Politics (or Politicking), thus it is
no wonder that these two elements' boundaries are often blurred. 

- Liang Qichao on "Discussing Freedom" (May 8th, 22 1902)

“She’s likeable enough” - Barack Obama to Hillary Clinton

“How do we beat the bitch?” - Someone asking John McCain at a campaign event

Excellent article in the NY Times on sexism in  this rancorous Democratic primary- I wonder if Singapore will ever see a women Prime Minister or a non-Chinese PM?

Gender Issue Lives On as Clinton’s Hopes Dim

By JODI KANTOR

With each passing day, it seems a little less likely that the next president of the United States will wear a skirt — or a cheerful, no-nonsense pantsuit.

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton is now in what most agree are the waning days of her bid for the Democratic presidential nomination. To use her own phrase, she has been running “to break the highest and hardest glass ceiling” in American life, and now the presidency — even a nomination that once seemed to be hers to claim — seems out of reach.

Along with the usual post-mortems about strategy, message and money, Mrs. Clinton’s all-but-certain defeat brings with it a reckoning about what her run represents for women: a historic if incomplete triumph or a depressing reminder of why few pursue high office in the first place.

The answers have immediate political implications. If many of Mrs. Clinton’s legions of female supporters believe she was undone even in part by gender discrimination, how eagerly will they embrace Senator Barack Obama, the man who beat her?

“Women felt this was their time, and this has been stolen from them,” said Marilu Sochor, 48, a real estate agent in Columbus, Ohio, and a Clinton supporter. “Sexism has played a really big role in the race.”

Not everyone agrees. “When people look at the arc of the campaign, it will be seen that being a woman, in the end, was not a detriment and if anything it was a help to her,” the presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin said in an interview. Mrs. Clinton’s campaign is faltering, she added, because of “strategic, tactical things that have nothing to do with her being a woman.”

As a former first lady whose political career evolved from her husband’s, Mrs. Clinton was always an imperfect test case for female achievement — “somebody’s wife,” as Elaine Kamarck, a professor of government at Harvard and a Clinton supporter, described her.

Still, many credit Mrs. Clinton with laying down a new marker for what a woman can accomplish in a campaign — raising over $170 million, frequently winning more favorable reviews on debate performances than her male rivals, rallying older women, and persuading white male voters who were never expected to support her.

“She’s raised this whole woman candidate thing to a whole different level than when I ran,” said Geraldine Ferraro, a Clinton supporter and the first woman to be the vice-presidential nominee of a major party, contrasting her own brief stint as a running mate in 1984 with Mrs. Clinton’s 17-month-and-counting slog.

Ms. Goodwin and others say Mrs. Clinton was able to convert the sexism she faced on the trail into votes and donations, extending the life of a candidacy that suffered a serious blow at the Iowa caucuses. Like so many women before, she was heckled (in New Hampshire, a few men told her to iron their shirts) and called nasty names (“How do we beat the bitch?” Senator John McCain was asked at one campaign event).

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Her victory speech after winning Penn with a 9 points victory over Senator Obama: 

What surprises me not the most are the calls (and counter-calls) for Minister Wong to resign over the MKS incident but more that PM Lee actually actively pursue that line in parliament. By even rhetorically mentioning it, does it only show that PM is trying to actively quell the online cries?  Or could it also be a rhetorical form of (hidden transcripts of) power struggle within high politics in Singapore? How can we read between the lines unless a PAP insider spills the beans? Also, LTK’s silence, while interpreted by PM Lee as an assent to the point that WKS should not resign, was quite indicative as usual. The silence speaks volumes of the contradictions within the very viable opposition Workers’ Party (will my calling for resignation set a precedent for the WP to resign if we do badly in the future)?

Clinton’s convincing victory at the polls in PA have not be celebrated much by the American press. The NYT downright criticized her negative tones and columnists have been hinting that she should go. Quite a wonderful representation of what the press would be when she becomes President or when Obama becomes the nominee. “Hail McCain and Obama, the two honest maverick independent candidates that would restore America’s greatness!” Says the CNN, foxnews and MSNBC. Now, that’s scary.

The SDP’s revamp of its website in terms of design and accessibility is really quite good for a political party. Almost comparable to my favorite political website of the British Conservative Party (But their standards seem to also have decline quite a bit) Maybe the PAP and the NSP needs to up their web design skills a bit?

A most interesting article in the Straits Times. Also see SDP’s letter to Obama. Obama actually talked about Singapore education system much earlier, as seen in my March 06 2007 post on a video of Obama talking about this issue. Also, it appears that Obama has slowly become a metaphor of political change in Singapore.

Feb 16, 2008
Will politics here throw up an Obama?
By Lynn Lee
BY 2030, will Singapore have a Barack Obama, the presidential-hopeful seen by backers in the United States as an agent of change?

It’s possible, but such an individual will come from outside the ruling People’s Action Party, according to Nominated MP Siew Kum Hong.

His reasoning last night: ‘It comes back to the PAP’s style of leadership renewal. It’s a controlled process, they look for certain traits. If you’re charismatic, it’s a bonus, but not a requirement.’

He was speaking at a forum on Singapore politics, where a student asked if a politician with the charisma of Senator Obama would ever surface.

The question was in keeping with the forum’s theme - Singapore in 2030 - and was a follow-up to an Institute of Policy Studies conference this month, where issues like the future political landscape and challenges to continued economic growth were raised.

The six panellists touched on these topics during a three-hour session. But in responding to the nearly 300 students present, they also shared their concerns about the values and sense of identity that would prevail among Singaporeans two decades from now.

For instance, NUS researcher Karyn Wang felt that people’s apathy was a problem that had to be solved. The lack of engagement would hinder them from taking an active part in national issues and helping shape Singapore’s future.

Writer Catherine Lim said the current political environment - where economic development is prized over political openness - was dampening young Singaporeans’ sense of identity.

‘If their loyalty is to the good life, then it can also shift with the good life, and it will not stay with the country,’ she said, echoing a point she also made at a Singapore Management University talk earlier in the day.

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Ironies and sensibilities as spoken by the Singapore Ambassador to the United States while attending a democracy conference. Very interesting interview by I-citizen.

Peace, Freedom and Happiness to one and all!

Not quite sure what to make of this 10 billion rescue package given by GIC to UBS? Is it really worth 10 billion to obtain a 9% share in UBS, given that the GIC might not be able to get even one person on their board? Shouldn’t there be parliamentary debate at least on such a huge package? Would a debate in parliament not clarify some of the issues that people might have? For example, the relationship between the sub-prime crisis, the long term prospects of UBS and such a bailout by GIC? More clarification could be the key to understanding this bailout of the Swiss Bank. In addition, would people try to link this $100000,00000 package to the less than $300 given to low income households? That would be unfortunate considering that some of my friends in the financial sector considers this a pretty good deal and argue that not much debate is needed at all. I personally hope for more data points by the government and even UBS to “understand the extent of the goodness of the deal.” Blind faith might not be as good as informed faith. 

Wall Street Journal

Singapore to the Rescue
December 11, 2007

UBS yesterday announced the biggest loss by a European financial house from the subprime shake-out, and brought on a sovereign wealth fund to save the day. The Swiss house’s stock went up. As in Citigroup’s similar recent deal with Abu Dhabi, we don’t find a whole lot to cheer here.

The mortgage crisis makes for strange bedfellows. In the latest installment, GIC, the Government of Singapore Investment Corp., offered up 11 billion Swiss francs (€6.6 billion or $9.74 billion) to UBS. If shareholders sign off in February, GIC’s current 1.1% stake in UBS will rise to about 9%, making the fund probably its largest shareholder and possibly landing Lee Kuan Yew, Singapore’s founding prime minister, or his son, Lee Hsien Loong, the city-state’s current leader, on the bank’s board. The men are, respectively, chairman and deputy chairman of GIC. Another undisclosed Middle Eastern investor will inject an additional two billion francs.

UBS Chairman Marcel Ospel said he’s “delighted to welcome these new long-term strategic investors.” The markets seemed equally so as the bank’s shares ended up 1.4% in yesterday’s trading. But the problem for UBS and other big financial institutions is that sovereign wealth funds are no ordinary investors. State-controlled and often opaque, they are driven by different motivations than private investors. Politics may trump business interests. Who knows.

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Is the silence from Singapore officials and even ordinary Singaporeans deafening?

ASEAN under pressure to act as Myanmar protests mount

19 hours ago

KUALA LUMPUR (AFP) — Southeast Asian nations have long been reluctant to confront their reviled neighbour Myanmar, but as protests mount in Yangon, observers say they risk losing credibility if they fail to act.

In the 10 years since it joined the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), Myanmar has proved a major headache for the budding democracies of the region, who have been admonished by the west for failing to press for reforms.

“By any normal global international standards, ASEAN hasn’t done much. I suspect many of the policymakers in Kuala Lumpur or Singapore or Jakarta or Manila will admit to that,” said Hiro Katsumata from the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore.

“But this is not surprising because ASEAN needs Myanmar more than Myanmar needs ASEAN,” he said, adding that the region feared the resource-rich nation could turn its back on the grouping in favour of closer ties with China.

In the face of the bravery of more than 100,000 people who stood alongside Buddhist monks in the streets of Myanmar’s biggest city on Monday, regional governments are now facing loud calls to show their support.

“ASEAN can obviously do a lot more — it’s just a question of whether they want to. And with this internal protest and defiance of the people, it would be shameful if they kept quiet,” said Malaysian lawmaker Zaid Ibrahim.

“They should use all their diplomacy and power and influence to pressure the regime,” said Zaid, president of the ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary Caucus, which was formed in 2004 to push for democratic reform in Myanmar.

Zaid said he was sure that although the ruling generals had not yet done anything to halt a week of street protests led by the revered monks, they would eventually “hit back” and that lives would be lost.

“I would expect some severe reprisals and crackdowns and more brutality from the regime. I think this is inevitable and I think the people of Burma know this and I hope they will not be deterred by it.”

So far there has been little response from regional governments except the Philippines, which said Monday it wants to see democracy flourish in Myanmar.

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It is interesting that the ASEAN secretary general, who is a Singaporean and former aide to SM Goh, urging the Burmese government not to crack down on the protests in Rangoon.

BBC News

Burma march largest in 20 years

Burma’s largest anti-government protest in nearly two decades has taken place in the former capital Rangoon, led by Buddhist monks and nuns. Up to 20,000 people took to the streets on the seventh day of protests calling for an end to the “evil dictatorship”.

Unlike a day earlier, police barred a group of monks from entering the road that leads to the home of detained opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi.

The rallies began last month when the government doubled fuel prices.

BBC South East Asia correspondent Jonathan Head says every day the protests are growing in size - the campaign the monks began just six days ago is now openly challenging the military, urging all citizens to join in.

A huge column of demonstrators made its way through the heart of the city, following an identical route to that used during the failed anti-military uprising in 1988.

There are no exact figures but the rally was estimated to be 20,000 strong.

Our correspondent says the mood was relaxed, even euphoric, with thousands of civilians joining Buddhist monks and nuns, and chanting the key demands of this campaign - reconciliation with the opposition, the release of political prisoners and lower prices.

Apparently unsure what to do, the security forces appear to be standing back for the moment and the next act in the drama is impossible to predict, says our correspondent.

Speaking on the sidelines of a UN meeting, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said America was “watching very carefully” the protests and denounced Burma’s “brutal regime”.

“The Burmese people deserve better. They deserve the right to be able to live in freedom, just as everyone does.”

The head of regional grouping Asean, Ong Keng Yong said he hoped the Burmese authorities would not take any strong action “and turn the protests into a big confrontation”.

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