The Malaysian Insider

NOV 15 — Why do our politicians say the darnedest things? For instance, Home Minister Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein was reported to have said that public vilification of government institutions is a factor contributing to the country’s rampant crime.

That’s Terminator-esque logic, that one; I’ll see if I can spell it out. Is Hishammuddin saying that our experience of being robbed, and the subsequent inability of the police to apprehend the bastards who robbed us, thereby leading us to think them (the police, not the thieving bastards) an irritatingly unhelpful bunch of twats, the reason why we were robbed again? If that is so: James Cameron, eat your heart out.

I’m a simple person. I like to see the reason why we have more crime as being down to the simple fact that we have more criminals. And the reason why we have more criminals is that the people responsible for catching these thieving bastards and locking them away aren’t doing so.

NOV 8 — Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad, the man behind Proton, infers that without the national car company, there would be no car industry in Malaysia. Can that really be true? And can it really be so simple? No Proton equals no automotive industry? After all, it wasn’t as if Malaysians only walked before the Saga came along.

On the flipside, we also have people who continue to spend time trying to determine if, had there never been a Proton, we would not be better off than where we are right now. The answer from them, as I’m sure you can imagine, is often a resounding yes.

The problem is, however, people generally suck at determining causality. Whether you choose to view it as an inherent human flaw or endearing characteristic, people are prone to seeing what they choose to see. Sometimes even to the point of doing so in the face of contrary evidence.

NOV 1 — MCA’s larger crisis, no small thing considering the ongoing hydra-headed leadership wrangle, is that the Chinese community no longer cares who wins and, ultimately, what happens to the party as a whole.

It’s a fair assumption to make, given how far removed politicians can be from their communities. Once every four or five years, they reappear pretending to be your best friend and neighbour, as though a handshake and photo-op makes up for years of absence. They don’t seem to care about us, so why should we care about them?

OCT 18 — I always get nervous when people start spouting terms like “dreams”. “Vision”. “Golden opportunity”.

But for Lotus F1 technical director Mike Gascoyne, they seem to be so much stock in trade. It’s strange to hear them coming from Gascoyne.

From a public relations representative, sure. But from a technical director? Curious, to say the least.

OCT 11 — Some of you wanted to be firefighters. Others wanted to be policemen. The more starry-eyed dreamt of being astronauts while the truly depraved already knew they would be lawyers. Not me. When I was a kid, all I wanted to be was the prime minister of Malaysia.

You can hardly blame a young ’un, can you? In-between watching bouts of Ultraman vanquishing whatever scaly, slimy lizard that crawled out of the gutter, the shuttered television set flashed scenes of a flash-looking Mahathir stepping out of planes, waving all regal-like to a huge welcoming party that even included a brass band. And it happened no matter where he went.

That, I told myself, was the life.