myth 42

'Paying high salaries, but with a cap, is good' How can I call this a myth? The justification for such a policy of paying high salaries to public office holders is to prevent corruption at high places. Then why is this no good? Yes it is no good, but not because it does not prevent the ills of corruption. There is no corruption at high places. It is no good because it puts a cap on the real income of super talented individuals. It is very unfair to restrain what a supertalent can earn by articificially limiting it with a cap, by pegging it against some subjective numbers. And then we tell these talents that they are doing national service, and that they must sacrifice for the country. Now you see how unfair this policy is. And all the supertalents would have to apologise to their wives and kids that they could not afford the additional resort bungalows in Europe, US or Australia because there is a cap on what they could make in the private sector. Hopefully they don't fill too bad about being shortchanged. Or else they would not be doing their very best. Put it the other way, men of integrity and honesty will not be corrupted even if they are paid less. And if we pay them their true worth, their market value, they will be so motivated that they could move mountains. And it is only fair that they received their due rewards. Then when they have made their billions, one day they might woke up and said, what the shit do I need $50 billions for when $1 billlion they could not even finish using. And they might donate $30 billions to a trust to help the unfortunate. And we can have a few Warren Buffetts and Bill Gates among us! See, artificially capping the income of supertalents is bad. It is artificial and restrictive and unfair to the incumbent. It does not reward talents fully. It shortchanged the talents. It is against the philosophy of paying people their worth, their market value.

all quiet in cyber ghost town

after the brown incident, an eerie silence has fallen onto cyberspace. most of the forumers have disappeared together from all the forums. the postings were pathetically low. even my www.redbeanforum.com regulars have mostly disappeared. could you fellas help by contributing some posts over there. you only need to copy and paste your posts from here. i still can't figure out why you fellas find it more comfortable to post in a blog. i have to search high and low to retrieve your posts when it is further down and lost among the older threads. try posting at redbeanforum and find out how convenient it is. all the new posts are automatically thrown up at the beginning of page. cheers

myth 41

'131th saddest nation' How can that be, we the 131th saddest country in the world? We are so rich, so smart, so first class, number one this and that, and so happy. Who did that survey? We are going to prove the survery wrong. Come Sept, all 4 million Singaporeans will be smiling. We are going to show to the world that we are a happy country with 4 million happy smiles. I think that should do the trick to dispel the myth that we are a sad country.

remove taxi surcharge?

There is a call for the removal of taxi surcharge. At a time like this, it is quite timely to lower taxi fares to encourage more commuters to use cabs as a means of transport. But would this not remove the benefits of fare hike introduced just a few days earlier to defray the cost of higher petrol prices? Then everything is back to square one with the taxi driver absorbing all the increases in petrol cost. Why the need to remove surcharge at this time when commuters are already getting use to the higher taxi fare? Many commuters obviously are very comfortable with what they are paying and will continue to use cabs. And, oh I remember, our taxi fare is among the cheapest compare to all the great cities. We can afford to charge a bit more. It is still very affordable. In fact the surcharge and kilometre rate should be increase to reflect the value of the taxi service and bring us closer to first world taxi fares. It is a luxury that people who want it should pay for it. Then taxi driving will be an attractive vocation and more quality drivers will join the profession. And with higher income, they would be encouraged to drive more and maintain their taxi in tip top condition. If taxi fare keeps coming down, then the drivers would not find it attractive as a vocation and the quality of service will drop as well. Taking into consideration all the factors, a decent income for the drivers, affordability, quality of service, employment, etc, it is better to keep raising taxi fares to make this a preferred choice of employment. And taxi drivers can also upgrade their skills to provide in cab entertainment and double as tourist guides. Pay for quality services.

Magdalene or Saint John or Mona Lisa

The recent commotion about the Da Vinci Code and the controversy of Magdalene must have taken many by surprise. And all the media networks were a hive of activities trying to churn out more documentaries to satisfy the thirst for more information on the code and Magdalene of course. I chanced upon the documentary aired by Channel News Asia on the same issue and all the amazing paintings of Leonardo Da Vinci on the Last Supper. And there was this famous face of Magdalene or Saint John. Da Vinci Code sold the story that it was the face of Magdalene, Jesus trusted companion and wife. But to the believers, it was a young Saint John, a bit effeminate though. He was the only clean shaven and angelic looking guys among all the bearded men in the Last Supper painting. The documentary went further to describe the picture of Magadalene or Saint John as having a face that was similar to Mary the Virgin. There were some resemblance, but when look carefully, not really that much. What is astonishing is when I came face to face with Mona Lisa. That face, I have seen it somewhere. And when I retrieved my taped copy of the documentary and compared the two faces, I must say there is a 90% resemblance. The eyes, the mouth, the chin and that elusive smile which came through in the Last Supper as an elusive doubt. Magdalene is a replica of Mona Lisa! Go take a look at the two pics, if you can get hold of them and judge yourself.