So mean testing is here

I only have a few simple questions to ask? Why are the hospitals insisting on providing expensive wards when many people do not want them? Are the hospitals serving according to the needs of the people or dictating their needs to the people? Why can't or won't the hospitals provide more C and B2 wards when the demands are there? This is another case of who is determining what is good for the people. Unfortunately the people have very little say in this. And the hospitals are determining what they should pay. You got money you must eat in restaurants.

Fair to who?

HDB has replied to See Leong Kit and again said that market pricing is the fairest way to go, but fair to who? Would the new buyers buying the same batch of flats and paying another $180k or $200k think that it is fair? There are many questions to be asked. What is the mission of HDB? Where are the statistics to show that there is a big market subsidy? What are the comparable flats that HDB is using to compute these new prices? Are the pricing static or forward looking? Or are they pegged in a similar model as electricity prices? With the property markets coming down rapidly, would the current pricing be fair to the new buyers? Actually these questions are unlikely to get a reply. The HDB has replied and case is closed. Those new buyers in the second batch should blame it on the market prices and accept the fact that they have to buy the flats from HDB at the new inflated prices. They must pay the higher prices to be fair to other buyers of other HDB flats. I don't buy the logic. But what is fair to one may not be fair to another. Who is to decide what is fair? Equal pain or equal gain?

Madoff With Hedge Funds' Money

By ALEN MATTICH A DOW JONES NEWSWIRES COLUMN LONDON -- ....According to press and blog reports, the SEC never investigated Bernie Madoff, never even put him through routine checks, because, well, he was too cuddly. And too well respected by his peers. OK, not quite never, back in 1992 they had a sniff about suspicious goings on in an unregistered Florida trading scheme, which they traced back to Madoff. But none of the accusations stuck and Madoff was left to make off with investors' money, unhindered forever after. Made all the more invulnerable by his status as a Wall Street institution. Because if Bernie Madoff, ex-chairman of Nasdaq, boss of one of its biggest market makers and manager of the most solid, long lived and steadily performing of all hedge funds wasn't purer than Caeser's wife then who was? Who indeed? 'This is how reputation and track record can blind people into complacency. - Redbean'

Myth 202 - Let the experts manage your money

I am sure many of you must have heard of this advice. It is an advice based on track records and experience. The experts must be the experts. Let the experts manage and invest your money and you can sleep well. You can see all the adverts in the trains and on TV as well. Wow, let other people manage your money. Have faith in the experts. Singaporeans are sooooo trusting. Actually so gullible. We have the minibonds. Hopefully no one puts money in Madoff's fund.

Myth 201 - PAP is the only party that can run Little Red Dot.

Myth 201 - PAP is the only party that can run Little Red Dot. By Green Peas Present and past PAP leaders have been trying to inculcate into our mindset that without the PAP, Paradise will not be paradise any more. There will by chaos, riots, unrest, serious unemployment and our mothers and sisters will have to go to foreign land to become maids. They want to make us all believe that PAP is the only party that is capable of running the Little Red Dot. See what has happened in Thailand. Thaksin's party has been changed from TRT to PPP and now to PT. So what is in a name? It is not the brand name that counts. Names can be changed over-night at whims and fancies and expediency. It is the people who really counts, not the name of the party. And who are the people who really counts that we depend upon to run the Little Red Dot? The civil servants, the administrative service, the police, the armed forces and civil defence, as well as the quasi-govt staff who draw a salary every month. These are the people who actually run the country. Heads (not leaders because we don't have real leaders) can come and go, but the permanent staff are always there. I have been in a govt dept where scholars just come in and warm the seat as my boss for two years and then off they go after stirring up some shits without having to care who would do the cleaning up for them. Oh wait a minute. But people say they are there to plan and give guidance. Sure they seems to be there to plan and give guidance. But the next guy that comes in would turn the previous guy's plans and policies upside down. So what guidance are we talking about? Confusion! Disruptions! Discontinuity! So what is the remedy for the permanent staff? We continue to "run" the country the way we know too well, with or without the scholars. Scholars come, scholars go. They never last more than two years. Remember, they need to chase and climb the ladder up the hierarchy of their own selfish progress and promotion. Oh, yes! Didn't somebody said, "Meritocracy"? So, is PAP the only party that can run Little Red Dot? Or is it only a myth to cast fear and create a dependent mentality?