The PM and the Black Art of Goebbelsian Propaganda

I hope the Malaysian public will retain their sobriety. Please avoid getting infected with one peculiar strain of epilepsy. In the history of Malaysian politics, I am aware of only one time previously when one VVIP pronounced his wife has epilepsy in order to justify his philandering ways. He was cavorting with somebody’s wife then.

The point is: don’t cover up your own incompetence and gross error of judgement by diverting the issue.  The issue was, is and will be the incompetence of this government that has caused unnecessary deaths. The world is laughing at how inept out political leadership is- we allowed invaders to come into the country and we responded by negotiating first. 

Mahathir had the brazenness excusing the delay being the consideration that the invaders were Muslims. Muslims have been killing other Muslims under all sort of pretexts. Remember Ibrahim Libya of Memali incident? He was leading a group of people armed with parangs and hoes and sickles. Mahathir did not delay the execution of the group. I believe Ibrahim Libya was a Malay and a Muslim.

Nowadays, only mad people listen to Mahathir. He’s changing goal posts all the time. Anyway- he is talking about his UMNO of which we are not interested. He is flattering himself by saying that many people are uneasy that he’s still active in politics. We actually want him to be more meddlesome, quarrelsome, belligerent because that will hasten the demise of his UMNO.  

The ship is sinking and one boatswain comes along and suggests, let’s form a committee to discuss about the sinking ship. The Chinese captain would have ordered the crew to save whatever valuables are on board; the Arab captain would have asked the crew to save the women on board, the Malay captain says lets form a committee.

Because the Malay captain wanted to form a committee , we ask how many died on our side? Please read carefully- OUR side. Not UMNO’s side. So far, we know 8 people from our side. If the fallen were Muslims, it’s customary for other Muslims to say a prayer for them. If the fallen include non-Muslims, our intensity in feeling sad over the senseless deaths is no less either.

The fact is- empathy, expression of sadness and togetherness in the hour of bereavement is not the monopoly of UMNO people. Yet there are certain people who are actually pompous braggarts at heart making a spectacle of claiming they grieved more than others.  I mean if you are a Muslim, and it’s time for you to pray, must you announce- gotta go, it’s time for me to pray? You are a better Muslim by bragging about it?

Selangor and Penang have set aside funds to assist the family of the fallen. Any amount will never bring the dead- but it will at least lighten the sadness knowing that some people care about what happened. This has more value rather than going on the streets demonstrating against Tian Chua for something he did not say.

All he said was this whole thing could be a sandiwara ala wag the dog’s tail movie. Even an NGO of women entrepreneurs is planning to make a police report against Tian Chua. If Tian Chua can be proven not to have uttered such words, then will the NGO be sued for making a false police report? Or has any ministry got a specific budget allocation to help UMNO linked NGO from court litigations?  

Why not make police reports against the incompetence of the government and the imbecility of the Home Minister?

What has caused our soldiers and police to be in harm’s way? There is no such thing as a bad soldier, only a bad general. In this case, there were so many generals.

The thing that has placed our security forces in harm’s way isn’t the alleged statement by Tian Chua. He did not belittle the capacity and capabilities of our fighting men. It’s the government’s incompetence and gross error in judgement. Perhaps the generals were too busy being restrained by political considerations rather than being allowed to operate as professional soldiers or police.

But we will certainly want to ask, whether these fighting men were equipped with superior equipment or substandard material? 
Even the man on the Clapham Omnibus is asking why didn’t the government use sufficiently big firepower immediately to weed out the invaders or quickly cordon off the area so that no one can go and come in. we have had the experience dealing with communist insurgents didn’t we. General Briggs cut off supplies to communists during the emergency years and something like that could have been adapted.

Instead you allowed the intruders to adapt for 3 weeks in an area the size of Singapore  where ingress and egress by people, food and sympathisers are unhindered. These people who came for a picnic are battle-hardened dry-hearted ( hati kering is a Malay expression denoting a person is completely devoid of fear) combatants who can easily blend with the local population, become one of them only to resurface later to create all sorts of mayhem.

No one in his right mind will deprecate the efforts and sacrifices of our security forces. Before any army veterans go into the streets to do a butt dance, please establish whether Tian Chua actually said what he was alleged to have said. Why is it sloth-like for the Police to establish whether Tian Chua actually said what he was alleged to have said, rather that allowing crowd frenzy prompted by Goebbels like daily doses of lies and fabrications to build up to uncontrollable levels? It was certainly quick for the Police at one time to declare nothing was remiss about the dealings of the Shahrizat family?

Now, our custodian of internal peace would be failing in its duty, if crowd and herd irrationality  build up to uncontrollable levels. Don’t replicate the slowness of the military top brass and Rambo Hisham in dealing with the Sulu invaders.

We know Najib is not beneath adding fuel to the fire when he goes around saying and insinuating that its not right for people to belittle our security forces. Najib is a liar.  But then, Najib has never placed the priority of the nation on top of his list. Top on his list, is how to retain power and be the PM forever.

Najib has shown, when it comes to the black art of deception, he is a superb practitioner. If you repeat a lie often enough, it becomes the truth. ” “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”