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10-09-2015, 05:40 AM
An honorable member of the Coffee Shop Has Just Posted the Following:
http://www.tremeritus.com/2015/09/09...he-opposition/ (http://www.tremeritus.com/2015/09/09/lee-hsien-loong%e2%80%99s-two-challenges-to-voters-and-the-opposition/)
Lee Hsien Loong’s two challenges to voters and the
opposition (http://www.tremeritus.com/2015/09/09/lee-hsien-loong%e2%80%99s-two-challenges-to-voters-and-the-opposition/)
http://www.tremeritus.org/simages/dmca_protected_sml_120n.png?0e7b8e http://www.tremeritus.org/wp-content/themes/WP_010/images/PostDateIcon.png?0e7b8e
September 9th, 2015 | http://www.tremeritus.org/wp-content/themes/WP_010/images/PostAuthorIcon.png?0e7b8e
Author: Contributions (http://www.tremeritus.com/author/contributor/)
http://www.tremeritus.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/lee-300x183.jpg?0e7b8e
Lee Hsien Loong
Watching Lee Hsien Loong at his lunch time rally on 8 September, I deduced
that he has issued two challenges. The first challenge was to voters, the second
was to the opposition parties.
His challenge to the opposition parties: “Don’t go into Parliament to check
us. If you want, dare to govern, or else don’t bother“.
On all counts, this is a fair challenge. Governing means going through all
the data, information, sentiments of the people (if it does exist), etc, with
the civil service machinery, to develop policies. Plenty of pain, anguish,
frustration, sleepless nights and not to mention sheer hard work to deliver
policies, implement them and make them work. Is the opposition ready for that or
do they just want to check and balance?
The opposition is not without any alternative policies, they have it. The
weakness is not whether they are workable or not. If you don’t try, how will you
know it will work or not? Do we just compare it with other countries? How can
you compare when Singapore is a “unicorn”? How do you know (for yourself) that
durian actually tastes good although it smells terrible? You have to crack one
open, take one piece and taste it. There’s no “bao jiak”. So what’s really wrong
here? It’s us, the voters.
We want PAP policies, but moderated. We want the promises of better pay,
jobs, houses, cars, you name it – minus the extremities of the consequences that
come with it. In short, buy two (PAP and the opposition) and hopefully get one
free. Fat hope.
Yes, policies can be moderated. But when they do, the outcomes are also
moderated. It is the same with everything else you decide in life. If you choose
the safe route of working for others, instead of taking the huge risk of
starting up your own business, be prepared to lose your job when the company
folds. If you start your own business, be prepared to fold if you mismanage. If
you want to be clever by doing a job and start your own business at the same
time, be prepared to not get anywhere. There’s inherent risk in everything.
The majority of Singaporeans might not understand how policies come about
unless they are directly involved in the policy formulation process. Governments
do not pluck data, information, analyses, assessments from out in the open and
hammer out a policy. There’s a lot more going on in the data and information
gathering phase. Most of it, you never get to see, you may never even know. It’s
a black box. It exists but you don’t know what goes in there. If you ask the WP
MPs who have been in Parliament for the last four years how much data,
information and analyses they have seen that we, the public are not privy to, my
guess is their answer might be “zero”.
There are infinitely many ways to interpret data and piece information up to
develop a narrative. If you don’t know the 5Ws & 1H of what the building
blocks are, it’s like having a hammer, but no wood and nails to create anything,
even though your party may have a fairly large hammer.
It is little surprise, then, that when opposition parties ask for the data
and information that went into the policy, they often get only two
responses: Silence from the government, or “we cannot release the information”.
On certain areas such as security, revealing sources and information compromises
both the collector and country itself. But does that bear true in all areas?
As such, it is actually very commendable that opposition parties can
formulate alternative policies with the limited resources they have, since the
civil service obviously doesn’t work with them. Sure, the Internet is a great
leveller but it doesn’t have all the data, information and analyses. It’s all
coming from somewhere which they have no access to, now and forever, if they
remain just the checker.
We need to get off our circular reasoning. If the opposition wants to govern,
they will fail because they have no experience. They are best suited to be
checkers. So if the opposition wants to govern, I won’t vote them. In which
case, they will never govern and PAP will either give you a lot of moderated
policies, which delivers really nothing concrete or gives you something concrete
that breaks you, and your checkers will be nullified by the parliamentary
vote.
That’s how stupid it can get and for 50 years, we have been doing it. More
does not mean more effective. More just means more debate and horse trading,
which eventually still goes to a vote. Depending on how “balanced” the
Parliament is, we might not get anywhere at the end of the day. They get
frustrated, you get frustrated, we all get frustrated. The divide will only
deepen.
The PAP was an opposition party with no governing experience when they
started but to their credit, they dared to govern. I think this is the lesson
opposition parties must learn or else they lose their relevance. Anyone can
check – you, I, anybody really. We mark their report cards and at the end of
five years, we decide if they did their job right and if the price for that is
right.
The second challenge by Lee Hsien Loong to voters is probably the more
ingenious one: “It’s either the PAP or not, meaning either we are all in
or we are not.”
I believe he knows what we the voters are like. Buy two, get one free. He’s
literally calling us out. He’s basically offering you either carrot or stick. In
reality, Singaporeans are caught between the carrot and stick. Sure, we will get
carrots but we will also get whipped. We have a modern, clean, safe and secure
country but we also pay the costs for it. Really, it’s our decision. Just don’t
complain if the carrot wasn’t large or sweet enough and certainly don’t complain
when you get whipped real hard.
Lee mentioned one united people, but throughout his speech, he
asked you to consider your and your children’s future. He’s actually
appealing to your selfishness.
His intended message was: Don’t worry about anybody else, we will take care
of it. Don’t worry, just make sure you vote us, you get all your stuff (and of
course the token sacrifice), you will be ok.
Do you buy it? Is it really ok for us to go along with that? Is it ok that I
have enough for me and my family while my neighbour starves? His vision of one
united people is that of those united with the PAP. Whatever happened to
unity regardless of race, language or religion? Or is it that the PAP is all of
the above and perhaps beyond race, language and religion? It’s a moral question
that you have to answer yourself.
So there you go – two challenges, and less than three days to figure it
out.
If we have a “freak” result – that is, PAP becomes the opposition – it is
most likely that the 13th government will be a coalition one. I much prefer it
that way, as there won’t be just two egos fighting it out. They will have no
choice but to work together. In that scenario, who is going to check them?
Us. We will be the checkers because anytime they get it wrong, they know that
they are on their way out. Why are we the best checkers? Because we are on the
ground, their policies will affect us the most and our children.
And I don’t think they are going to be just popular. Dr Chee Soon Juan has
already dropped a large hint when he read the letter to JB Jeyaretnam in one of
his rallies. Note that they are from different parties and they had their
disagreements and arguments, but fundamentally they shared one purpose – for the
people and nothing else.
I wonder if any of the rest of the opposition parties noticed, or if they
were they too self absorbed that this isn’t a race that they are running on
their own.
It’s time to wake up and we must wake up.
by Reperio Simon
* Article first appeared on TOC.
Click here to view the whole thread at www.sammyboy.com (http://www.singsupplies.com/showthread.php?215640-Lee-Hsien-Loong’s-two-challenges-to-voters-and-the&goto=newpost).
http://www.tremeritus.com/2015/09/09...he-opposition/ (http://www.tremeritus.com/2015/09/09/lee-hsien-loong%e2%80%99s-two-challenges-to-voters-and-the-opposition/)
Lee Hsien Loong’s two challenges to voters and the
opposition (http://www.tremeritus.com/2015/09/09/lee-hsien-loong%e2%80%99s-two-challenges-to-voters-and-the-opposition/)
http://www.tremeritus.org/simages/dmca_protected_sml_120n.png?0e7b8e http://www.tremeritus.org/wp-content/themes/WP_010/images/PostDateIcon.png?0e7b8e
September 9th, 2015 | http://www.tremeritus.org/wp-content/themes/WP_010/images/PostAuthorIcon.png?0e7b8e
Author: Contributions (http://www.tremeritus.com/author/contributor/)
http://www.tremeritus.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/lee-300x183.jpg?0e7b8e
Lee Hsien Loong
Watching Lee Hsien Loong at his lunch time rally on 8 September, I deduced
that he has issued two challenges. The first challenge was to voters, the second
was to the opposition parties.
His challenge to the opposition parties: “Don’t go into Parliament to check
us. If you want, dare to govern, or else don’t bother“.
On all counts, this is a fair challenge. Governing means going through all
the data, information, sentiments of the people (if it does exist), etc, with
the civil service machinery, to develop policies. Plenty of pain, anguish,
frustration, sleepless nights and not to mention sheer hard work to deliver
policies, implement them and make them work. Is the opposition ready for that or
do they just want to check and balance?
The opposition is not without any alternative policies, they have it. The
weakness is not whether they are workable or not. If you don’t try, how will you
know it will work or not? Do we just compare it with other countries? How can
you compare when Singapore is a “unicorn”? How do you know (for yourself) that
durian actually tastes good although it smells terrible? You have to crack one
open, take one piece and taste it. There’s no “bao jiak”. So what’s really wrong
here? It’s us, the voters.
We want PAP policies, but moderated. We want the promises of better pay,
jobs, houses, cars, you name it – minus the extremities of the consequences that
come with it. In short, buy two (PAP and the opposition) and hopefully get one
free. Fat hope.
Yes, policies can be moderated. But when they do, the outcomes are also
moderated. It is the same with everything else you decide in life. If you choose
the safe route of working for others, instead of taking the huge risk of
starting up your own business, be prepared to lose your job when the company
folds. If you start your own business, be prepared to fold if you mismanage. If
you want to be clever by doing a job and start your own business at the same
time, be prepared to not get anywhere. There’s inherent risk in everything.
The majority of Singaporeans might not understand how policies come about
unless they are directly involved in the policy formulation process. Governments
do not pluck data, information, analyses, assessments from out in the open and
hammer out a policy. There’s a lot more going on in the data and information
gathering phase. Most of it, you never get to see, you may never even know. It’s
a black box. It exists but you don’t know what goes in there. If you ask the WP
MPs who have been in Parliament for the last four years how much data,
information and analyses they have seen that we, the public are not privy to, my
guess is their answer might be “zero”.
There are infinitely many ways to interpret data and piece information up to
develop a narrative. If you don’t know the 5Ws & 1H of what the building
blocks are, it’s like having a hammer, but no wood and nails to create anything,
even though your party may have a fairly large hammer.
It is little surprise, then, that when opposition parties ask for the data
and information that went into the policy, they often get only two
responses: Silence from the government, or “we cannot release the information”.
On certain areas such as security, revealing sources and information compromises
both the collector and country itself. But does that bear true in all areas?
As such, it is actually very commendable that opposition parties can
formulate alternative policies with the limited resources they have, since the
civil service obviously doesn’t work with them. Sure, the Internet is a great
leveller but it doesn’t have all the data, information and analyses. It’s all
coming from somewhere which they have no access to, now and forever, if they
remain just the checker.
We need to get off our circular reasoning. If the opposition wants to govern,
they will fail because they have no experience. They are best suited to be
checkers. So if the opposition wants to govern, I won’t vote them. In which
case, they will never govern and PAP will either give you a lot of moderated
policies, which delivers really nothing concrete or gives you something concrete
that breaks you, and your checkers will be nullified by the parliamentary
vote.
That’s how stupid it can get and for 50 years, we have been doing it. More
does not mean more effective. More just means more debate and horse trading,
which eventually still goes to a vote. Depending on how “balanced” the
Parliament is, we might not get anywhere at the end of the day. They get
frustrated, you get frustrated, we all get frustrated. The divide will only
deepen.
The PAP was an opposition party with no governing experience when they
started but to their credit, they dared to govern. I think this is the lesson
opposition parties must learn or else they lose their relevance. Anyone can
check – you, I, anybody really. We mark their report cards and at the end of
five years, we decide if they did their job right and if the price for that is
right.
The second challenge by Lee Hsien Loong to voters is probably the more
ingenious one: “It’s either the PAP or not, meaning either we are all in
or we are not.”
I believe he knows what we the voters are like. Buy two, get one free. He’s
literally calling us out. He’s basically offering you either carrot or stick. In
reality, Singaporeans are caught between the carrot and stick. Sure, we will get
carrots but we will also get whipped. We have a modern, clean, safe and secure
country but we also pay the costs for it. Really, it’s our decision. Just don’t
complain if the carrot wasn’t large or sweet enough and certainly don’t complain
when you get whipped real hard.
Lee mentioned one united people, but throughout his speech, he
asked you to consider your and your children’s future. He’s actually
appealing to your selfishness.
His intended message was: Don’t worry about anybody else, we will take care
of it. Don’t worry, just make sure you vote us, you get all your stuff (and of
course the token sacrifice), you will be ok.
Do you buy it? Is it really ok for us to go along with that? Is it ok that I
have enough for me and my family while my neighbour starves? His vision of one
united people is that of those united with the PAP. Whatever happened to
unity regardless of race, language or religion? Or is it that the PAP is all of
the above and perhaps beyond race, language and religion? It’s a moral question
that you have to answer yourself.
So there you go – two challenges, and less than three days to figure it
out.
If we have a “freak” result – that is, PAP becomes the opposition – it is
most likely that the 13th government will be a coalition one. I much prefer it
that way, as there won’t be just two egos fighting it out. They will have no
choice but to work together. In that scenario, who is going to check them?
Us. We will be the checkers because anytime they get it wrong, they know that
they are on their way out. Why are we the best checkers? Because we are on the
ground, their policies will affect us the most and our children.
And I don’t think they are going to be just popular. Dr Chee Soon Juan has
already dropped a large hint when he read the letter to JB Jeyaretnam in one of
his rallies. Note that they are from different parties and they had their
disagreements and arguments, but fundamentally they shared one purpose – for the
people and nothing else.
I wonder if any of the rest of the opposition parties noticed, or if they
were they too self absorbed that this isn’t a race that they are running on
their own.
It’s time to wake up and we must wake up.
by Reperio Simon
* Article first appeared on TOC.
Click here to view the whole thread at www.sammyboy.com (http://www.singsupplies.com/showthread.php?215640-Lee-Hsien-Loong’s-two-challenges-to-voters-and-the&goto=newpost).