Prospective and Retrospective Blackmail.

When Nixon was being investigated by the FBI for bugging the office of the democrats, he knew he had to come up with some sort of defence. His method is replicated many times. It’s even being done right before our eyes in our own country.

What did Nixon do? He instructed his chief of staff, Haldeman, and his FBI contact, Deke DeLoach, to unmask the bugging to which his own campaign had been subjected in 1968. He was trying to show, that he himself was bugged by Lyndon Johnson. The aim was to show that "everybody does it." So in Washington the slogan "they all do it" was used as a slogan for the defense rather than, as one might hope, for the prosecution.
So today, it is Mahathir did it, is  being used as a defence.If Mahathir had kept quiet, would the dirt he created be unearthed? He is now being demonised and even labeled as suffering the mad leader's disease.

This tactic is now used by all the sycophantic and brown nosed supporters of our own PM. Mahathir did it, so it is no sin if the current PM does it. Mahathir it is said, had squandered RM100 billion and distributed them through his proxies. If what Mahathir did was accepted, using the same principle, what Najib does, ought to be accepted as normal.

However, a problem presents itself at once: how to reveal that what took place during Mahathir’s time must also reveal what the ministers under Mahathir did. Well, all the ministers made hay while the Mahathir sun shone.  That would have to include  the current PM too.

What do we call this approach? I.e. justifying what Najib and his underlings do is justifiable because Mahathir and his underlings did the same during his 22 year reign?

We look again at the history of American politics. Now, I am sure many have read books written by the historian and writer, Professor Stephen Ambrose. He has written many excellent books such as Nixon: The Ruin and Recovery of a Politician, 1973-1990, Eisenhower: Soldier and President, Nixon: The Triumph of a Politician, 1962-1972 and many more.

How did Professor Ambrose tell it? He characterised the 1973 approach to Lyndon Johnson as "prospective blackmail," designed to exert backstairs pressure to close down a congressional inquiry.  

This is currently being done. The same prospective blackmail- to shut us up by warning that they will stir up the shit done by Mahathir in the past. 
Don’t let us stop you. Please stir it. So that people will know what UMNO really stood for.   We love this country more than we love UMNO. That was why I was laughing when Mukhriz said he did not take a certain course of action because he loves UMNO.

Well, we love Malaysia more than we love UMNO.

In order to stop people from asking and investigating further, we are told that Mahathir stole this and that. By unearthing what Mahathir did, it is hoped that further unearthing of what Najid did, will stop.

But we forgot one thing. Nixon wanted to exert pressure on Lyndon Johnson while carelessly ignoring that Jonson may have some blackmailing material on Nixon himself.

So while Najib’s boys want to crucify Mahathir, the man who can walk on water, they forget that old man Mahathir may have even further damaging material on their boss.  

So we hope Dr Mahathir will come out with new fireworks. After all he has said, he has never given up his efforts to kick out Najib.

The problem is, the thieves under the current regime cannot use Mahathir as a shield. Because the man of the hour isn’t Mahathir. It is Najib. The whole world is investigating and closing in on Najib, not Mahathir.

What Mahathir did-1001 of them, ought to have been unearthed and laid bare by soldiers of the current regime, BACK THEN. I suspect, they can’t, because as I have said above, they all made hay while the Mahathir sun shone. 
So the dirty job is left to the night soil collectors in the form of cybertroopers paid for and patronised by UMNO. 

The scandals of the Mahathir era ought to have been exposed during Pak Lah’s time. Najib has succeeded Pak Lah. It would be strange for Najib’s people to leapfrog one leadership era, to justify what they are doing now without dragging in sleepy Pak Lah. The insertion of one leadership era, ie Pak Lah’s was the cut-off point that cannot be used to carry out, prospective blackmailing.

The other side of prospective blackmailing is retrospective blackmailing. This approach admits and acknowledges the wrongs and excesses of the current regime but asserts and insists, that if a new government comes into power, they will do the same.

So why rock the boat? Why want to replace Najib as those who come after him will do the same and perhaps even worse things?

The answer is they won’t, at least not a few decades. By then we would have put a system that will now allow the excesses and transgressions to repeat.

Why? Because the people will not allow a new incoming government do it.  Armed with a heightened political awareness and reasserting new found rights, they will not allow a new government repeat the same excesses. The new government too, riding on the tide of a revulsion against injustices, will be disciplined by its own internal values from doing what the replaced administration did.To borrow a legal concept, they will be estopped from doing so.

Two things must take place. First, the people must never stop their inquisitorial and prosecutorial mindset; they must reject any attempts to prospectively blackmail us. 
And two, members of the new incoming government must take notice of that.