Low Thia Khiang is a disappointment

News this morning tells of a landslide win for the Japanese opposition party, which leads me to think about the possibility of a PAP defeat at the polls in Singapore. Then I thought about who would be our new Prime Minister... there is only one likely candidate, but forget about it. Low Thia Khiang is not PM material.

It took me some time to catch up with NMP Viswa Sadasivan's speech in parliament, and I struggled to find anything incendiary. While the Minister Mentor seemed to have grossly overreacted, one has to remember that he is haunted by his long legacy of "pragmatism". Generals are always fighting the last war, and this old general still sees the world through 1950s lenses.

What is genuinely disappointing is Low Thia Khiang's response. At first sign of trouble, he chooses to wash his hands clean. The Pledge should not be brought up in parliamentary debates? Then when should the Pledge be used? In political rallies like he did during the last General Election? How many times have we seen him in parliament, on the verge of asking really piercing questions, only to back away at the last minute? I think he has done an excellent job in Hougang, *if* he thinks his role is just that of a very well paid village elder.

But as an opposition MP in the parliament, he has only done his job with only occasional brilliance, and even then, with great reluctance. Instead, we have to rely on PAP MPs like Tan Soo Khoon to play the role of opposition in the parliament.

If ever Singapore has a freak election, I seriously doubt he will even want to try to be Singapore's PM. I think he will wash his hands as quickly as he did with NMP Viswa's speech, and declare he will have nothing to do with it.

Despite widespread panning of PM Lee's electoral reforms to expand the number of Non Constituency MPs (NCMP), I think it is a constructive and necessary step.

We need new faces at work in parliament to give the electorate options, even if they have to start as powerless NMPs and NCMPs. (After watching Ling How Doong at work in parliament, who will want him to run a town council again?)

If we have to choose between the insipid and disinterested like Mr Low and Mr Chiam See Tong, or radical liberals like the SDP, it simply makes Singaporean democracy a bigger and more frustrating joke than it needs to be.


PS I am not related to any political party and will probably spoil my vote if I am forced to vote today.

What is that?

God works in mysterious ways

Singtel: Singapore's impotent corporate giant

According to this article dated 8th June 2009, Starhub gently twisted BBC's arm last year, and BBC yielded immediately.

Singtel, can you at least be an honest eunuch and dont con subscribers into signing up two year deals with mioTV only to enjoy what they want for only three months? You already knew since LAST YEAR. It's one thing to cheat adults, it's quite another to cheat preschoolers.

Singtel, with your level of competency, why don't you just give up the whole mioTV business? It's inevitable you will be squeezed out, so why make Singaporeans suffer while you live in denial? Waiting for the regulator to intervene and save you from the abusive monopolist?

MDA is too busy funding businesses selling things nobody wants. And rapping, apparently.

Although only just announced, the decision to move from mio TV, which has around 53,000 subscribers, is believed to have been taken up to a year ago.BBC Entertainment's future on StarHub TV looked to be in jeopardy when the channel was omitted from StarHub TV's repackaging at the end of May 2008.

Mid-July 2008 saw the matter resolved and the following explanation issued jointly: "StarHub and BBC Worldwide Channels were finalising terms for the continued carriage of BBC Entertainment on StarHub Digital Cable. Negotiations have recently concluded, and we are pleased to inform viewers in Singapore that BBC Entertainment will continue to be carried by StarHub and is presently available as part of the Lifestyle Basic Upsize Group."

It is thought that BBC Worldwide Channels' commitment to bring BBC Lifestyle, BBC Knowledge and CBeebies to StarHub TV upon the expiration of the two-year exclusive deal with SingTel mioTV may have contributed to ensuring BBC Entertainment's future with StarHub.

I owe Professor Thio an apology

Before my discussions with Fox, I had not directly seen or read Professor's Thio presentation in parliament, having only heard from second hand sources about her "flawed logic", which I assumed is of the same category as whybegay or SoloBear. Now that I have seen it for myself, I have to say I find nothing objectionable in what she said. She did not use the Bible to justify anything, and engaged a secular law in secular terms. She correctly predicted that homosexuals will infiltrate mainstream human rights organisations like AWARE, and try to impose the gay agenda onto our school system. I should have known better than to trust Singapore's "alternative media" to be objective. See it for yourself. She puts forth good arguments. No wonder the Gay Lobby is so terrified of her.