What is so frightening about the White Paper

The indigestion caused by the White Paper is there for all to see. No to 6.9m population, no to bigger population. Is this so difficult to understand or can be plainly ignored by the Govt? The Paper was whitewashed by the Govt that has absolute majority in Parliament. A vote for such a Paper is really a non issue and to claim that it has been read, debated and passed by Parliament, I really dunno what to say.

Given the shocking opposition by an erstwhile docile people, with various polls conducted officially or unofficially, the Govt is still in a state of denial, that the people will agree and support the Paper if they have read the details in the Paper. Isn’t this dangerous?

What is more frightening is that many on the side of the Govt are saying, it is only a matter of communication. If the Govt could have communicated better, explained to the people better, there would be no issue. The people will go with the Govt. Really ah?

Such thinking is really lame. It thinks that the people are so dense and could not understand the implications and consequences of dense population.  It also reassures the Govt that actually the people are just angry for the wrong reasons, nothing to bother about. The people will get over it in time, will come to their senses. The Govt is always right.  Or it is only 4,000 or 5000 people that are not happy, never mind. The majority of the people will eventually agree to it, and if better communicated.

Is this frightening, or something else? What if the 4,000 people become 10,000, 20,000 and then more and more? Would it make any difference?

Raising children is a losing economic proposition

The cost of raising children here is easily half a million by the time the child graduated from university, and that is a local university. A foreign university could add a couple of hundred thousands more, depending on the type of courses and which country he went to. Just talk economics, as a digit in the GDP number game, the returns must be profitable for the whole process, minus all the emotional and other considerations.

For an outlay of half a million, the child must at least bring in an income of the same amount just to break even. Then include the cost he/she would need to incur, excluding his personal expenses to keep him alive, say housing and car, both items would cost him easily two to three millions more. Simply, the child must bring in an income of $2 ½ or $3 million to make the whole effort worthwhile.

Assuming a productive life is 30 years and additional work years are for retirement expenses, one would need an income of $100k on the average. Anyone earning less than this amount is a losing proposition, a losing investment. And not having a child, a couple could save a million or two for their own. Would that be a better option than to bring up a child or two? If one just thinks economic, the answer is obvious.

Kishore Mahbubani - Asia West divide disappearing

In his latest book, Kishore is saying that the Asia West divide, or the poor Asia and rich West divide is diminishing with more Asians joining the ranks of middle class. The dominance of the West will fade and they will have to accept the rise of the East to meet somewhere in the middle, a convergence of sort, so he said.

During a launch of his book in Shangri La he took questions on his book. One question stood out and deemed important enough to be quoted in the ST. NUS Law Dean, Simon Chesterman, wondered why Kishore ‘seemed’ to be ‘too soft’ on the East but ‘approriately harsh’ on the West’s foibles. It was a common and accepted position that it should be the other way. And I like Kishore’s reply. ‘That’s because there is still no level playing field,… and unless you get into the West’s face, you will not be heard.’

The question and the answer told a lot about the biases of the two men, one basically a westerner who still sees the world with the West as the dominant partner and another wanting to tell the West that this cannot be anymore. The West has been talking down to the Asians, lecturing them with their biased version of the truth or what is reality. If you read what is being churned out by the western media, you cannot get away from this simplistic mindset that the Asians are all dull, stupid, belligerent, corrupt, naïve and incapable of looking after themselves and needing the West to save them. And the West will be the master to tell the Asians who is the good guy, who is the bad guy and these will be confirmed by the thrash they printed through their media agencies as intelligent stuff from intelligent or intellectual jokers, a lot from the academia as well.

Kishore said it right. The Asians would have to crawl their fingers through the weaterner’s faces to open their eyes and ears to listen to the Asian’s point of view. They have been drowning out the voices of Asians for too long and thinking that all their rubbish would still be swallowed, hook, line and sinkers. Unfortunately they are still allowed to do so in our media.

Also unfortunately, there are not enough of Asians like Kishore to fill our academia and we are still importing a lot of pseudo western intellectuals and booting out Asians as NG. And we are using taxpayers’ money to pay them generously while our local academics ended up driving taxis. And also unfortunately the realities in the way we pay the western talents as if they are the only talents in this world negates whatever Kishore is writing in his book. The Asia West divide is still there and it is the silly Asians that is making this divide happening by worshipping the Great White Gods. Don’t blame the West, and not so fast, the Asians are still inferior in their thinking and thinking that they are inferior to the West and are happily sucking up to the West. Only one Asian, other than Kishore, would dare to lecture to the West. Also unfortunately he often sees the world like he is a westerner with western world view and interests as the basis for what is good or bad.

Sorry Kishore, your book is a bit ahead of time.

Singaporeans are racists, xenophobic!

I think it will be good to keep hammering the Singaporeans as racists and xenophobic. I do not know who started branding Singaporeans as such and what is their motive? All I know is that Singaporeans just ‘lan lan’ when attacked and be accused of being racists and xenophobic. And they feel guilty about it, like they are really racists and xenophobic.

If this message keeps going for a while, soon many Singaporeans will be hiding in their toilets to avoid being called racists. Soon they will be very apologetic to foreigners. Soon they will invite foreigners to their homes, pull chairs for them, open doors for them and buy them drinks, so that they would not feel guilty about it.

The Sinkies are simply daft. Sorry, I tried very hard not to call them Sinkies but they are so deserving of such a tag. They allowed the racists to hang a label on them and they unashamedly wear it as if it is the right thing to do. Do they think, are they capable of thinking? Are they capable of defending themselves when they are wronged?

Fortunately there were some brave Singaporeans who stood up and blasted the racists for trying to tag Singaporeans as racists and xenophobic. Think what, if this silly and mischievous tag is not removed, people will think Singaporeans are really racists. And after a while the Sinkies will also believe so.

Who are the defenders of Singaporeans? Who are accusing Singaporeans of being racists and xenophobic?

China fires at Vietnamese vessel

It was reported that Chinese ships fired and chased away Vietnamese fishing boats in the Paracel Islands. This is exactly what a super power should do when little countries tried to be mischievous and to infringe on its territories. The Americans will do so, the European powers will do so, the Indians too will do so. It is a simple and clear message to Vietnam and little countries like the Philippines that China would not tolerate their nonsense and stupid claims against its territories.

China cannot continue not to act in the face of repeated challenges, incursions and violations by these little pesky countries. The more it tries to appease them and restrain itself, the bolder will these countries be and the more incursions will take place. A tight slap is all it takes to put them in their right place. Not doing anything will be seen as a sign of weakness and the Americans and its proxies will say, see, the Chinese are weak, keep going at them.

Big powers must behave like big powers to be respected, if not, to be feared. Only then would China have peace in its islands in the East and South China Sea.