A picture of truth

This picture is posted in Yahoo News.

As they said, a picture is worth a thousand words, or a picture does not lie. Take this picture as a mental exercise on the perceptions it creates on the readers and also the intent of the people putting up this picture. One can draw many conclusions from looking at it. Let me just throw up a few interpretations of this picture of members of the Select Committee on fake news.

A casual observer looking at this picture could form many impressions. One, the Indian community in Singapore is the majority ethnic group, or the Indians are the most powerful political community in Singapore. Chinese is a minority in Singapore. The readers could also be wondering why 3 Indians, highly qualified, a top lawyer and minister, another lawyer and a doctor, are just member of a committee headed by an aircraft technician/engineer. Should not the top notch lawyer/minister, the most qualified and most clever, the most powerful, be the chairman instead?

Of course a reader who is not informed of the big number of committee members may get away thinking that the Committee is small and likely be made up of the 4 members in the picture. The whole truth is that there were at least 13 members in the Committee.

A picture lies or can lie depending on the intent of the people putting up the picture and it can show half truth, select truth or to mislead the readers by what is being shown or what is being cropped out from the full picture. Remember all the pictures and articles about North Korea as recent as before the Kim Trump Summit, all telling a story of abject poverty, North Koreans dying of famine and under nourishment. Compare those sinister pictures and articles with what you see on Channel News Asia, the sparkling high rise buildings that put a shame to many Asian countries, and the well planned road network, parks, commercial and residential buildings.

The truth of a picture is as good as the saying, statistics lie and lie and lie if this is what the person behind them chose to do so.

And readers may even have different inferences from the expressions of the people in the picture to infer what is in their heads or from their eyes what are their agenda or intent.

The picture reminds me of a pic someone sent me recently. It was about a turtle sitting on top of a tall pole. It could not climb up the pole on its own. Someone had to put it there. The turtle also did not know why someone would put it on top of a pole and why it was there, to do what? It had no clue of what was happening around it.

China making amendments to BRI plan

The original Belt and Road New Silk Road Plan includes high speed train cutting down from southern China through Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Malaysia to Singapore. Its west bound line cuts through Myanmar, Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, the Middle East towards Turkey and Europe.
This Plan is now modified taking into consideration the choice of Vietnam and India not to participate in the BRI. The southern line would now commence from Kunming, China through Laos, Cambodia and further south to Singapore bypassing Vietnam completely. The west bound line would also by pass India as well as India has decided to build its own Silk Road with Japan, starting from east India and ending in west India.
 
When the BRI is completed, goods from Vietnam and India to and from Europe would have to go by air or by sea, not by train, unless they build their own high speed or snail speed train to connect with the Chinese high speed train lines.
 
A third amendment is in the making with Mahathir cancelling all Chinese high speed train projects in Malaysia. It is likely that the southern point of the Chinese high speed train would end in Bangkok, Thailand and missing Malaysia and Singapore altogether. Goods from both countries to and from Europe and China would likewise go by air or sea. The heavy stuff that would be too expensive to go by air would have to go by sea in snail speed to Europe and China by then.
 
A fourth possible development would be for Singapore, Malaysia, Vietnam and India to build their own high speed train network starting from Vietnam down to Singapore and back up west to India.
There will then be two Silk Roads by land, one built by China and one by India, to transport goods to the various countries along the New Silk Roads. India may want to call it the New Sari Road. Oh it can extend all the way to Japan as well.

There is no need for China to beg the unconvinced to join the bandwagon if they chose to be left out of the game plan.

National plan to fight fake news

The Select Committee has come out with a national strategy ‘to combat fake news campaigns run by foreign operators to safeguard its sovereignty and security. The focus of the Committee is foreign operators and social media. The problem is that local operators and main stream media are not saints and angels either and did not conduct campaigns to undermine the country’s and national interest. This point is not addressed by this Committee or only superficially.
 
The Committee claimed that they have ‘evidence suggesting that “a range of state and non state actors” are engaging in disinformation operations here, and that these operators have used online news articles and social media to influence Singaporeans and legitimize another state’s international actions.’ It also mentioned that “a particular foreign state” without identifying it, had launched closed to 40,000 attacks. The identity of this state is quite obvious depending on what lenses one is wearing. Some choose to call it A state, some choose to call it B state, according to their vested interests and alignment with the respective state.
 
If one is to read the so called serious articles posted in the main media, one can easily identify the amount of falsehood and fake news used to undermine certain states with disinformation, and I quote thenewpaper report, ‘”Cyber armies” are also deployed to aid sectarian or political agendas in several neighbouring countries, and these can easily be repurposed and deployed against Singapore.’
 
How such blatant distorted fake news and political disinformation could be allowed into the main media needs no explanation. There is no need for more training for journalists or editors to make them less so stupid to miss the biased contents, agenda in fake news. Other than those that have not read history or political science, or are absolute idiots, anyone with a little common sense would be able to check the facts and distill the truth from fake news.
 
Often the fake news in the main media is done in collusion with foreign states to disparage and attack other states. Main media is as guilty or more guilty than social media in the spread of fake news and disinformation for political agendas.
 
So, where are we heading in this witch hunt? How real is the effort to fight fake news?

Who is paying for Trump’s trade war?

Trump is happily raising tariffs after tariffs and the Chinese reciprocating as much as they could on American exports. So, who is paying for all the tariff hikes? It was reported that American trade deficit with China for the month of Jul/Aug actually gone even higher after the tariffs. What does this say about the effectiveness of the trade war?
 
American exports to China are not only going to be more expensive, China has even stopped buying from American farmers and looking for other alternative sellers. When alternative sources are found, there would be no need to go back to buy American produce. American companies in China are also feeling the squeeze as their exports back to the US would be more expensive too. Can they afford to close their factories in China and move back to produce in the USA? For one, Boeing is losing all the thousands of aircraft that China has ordered and would be ordering. Deals cancelled.
 
What about Chinese exports to the US especially the consumer goods and home appliances, including mobile phones and computer related products? The Chinese products are so cheap that the 10% or 25% tariff would not make them more expensive than the European or Japanese made. Ultimately the American consumers would be the one paying for the tariff hikes in more expensive Chinese products that could be had cheaper.
 
Trump’s tariff hikes are actually taxes on the American people. Trump is actually raising taxes on the American people, forcing them to pay more for Chinese imports. And of course the American govt would gain from these taxes at the expense of the American people. It is all done for the good of Americans, so they said.
 
Who ends up the winners and who ends up the losers?
 
There is another big loser, another little USA, ie Australia. After trying to attack China like the Americans, banning Huawei and ZTE from 5G mobile phone operations in Australia, China has shut its door to Australian products. As of today, 480 Aussie ships, loaded with cargoes from iron ore, oil, LNG, farm produce, etc etc are circling outside Chinese ports wanting to sell/unload their goods at cheap sale price, but China is saying NO to them. Just like the American soya bean ships, they are just sailing around the Chinese ports praying for a change in Chinese policy, and an end to the trade war to let them in.
 
The Aussies may have a lot of raw material to sell. But without buyers, or big buyers like China, the raw material and commodities are worthless. The African countries are benefitting from the trade war. China is buying from Africa instead.

Ministerial pay – In the name of transparency and coming clean

The govt organ has come out to debunk the various versions of ministerial pay put up in the social media. In summary, what the social media was saying is that they wanted to know what the ministers were being paid. All the guessing and interpretations, some right, some wrong, some partially right, some partially wrong, is unnecessary if the govt would come out clean, be transparent as they used to shout about, to dispel the half truths due not of intent but lack of official statements.
 
Yes, there is a formula in the govt website site on the formula recommended by the last ministerial salary review. But the formula did not tell the whole story as the formula and practice did not seem to tally or is perceived so. Why? Simply because the govt is not telling the way it should be. Just come clean and settle this issue once for all and stop the people from guessing and speculating the worse case scenario. When everything is legal and official, there is nothing to hide. When the govt is trying to hide by not telling, it only leads to suspicion and mistrust.
 
Yes, this is the third time I am saying, parroting the govt, to be transparent, to come clean on the ministerial salary. This means telling the people what the ministers are being paid, not just basic salary and performance bonuses, give the full pay of the ministers, including other appointments like directorship, chairmanship and whatever, as long as it is income to the ministers due to his ministerial appointment. Is this too much to ask for?
 
Anyone being paid by taxpayers’ money must come clean, be transparent, the fourth time I am saying this, to account and justify for his or her income. This is basic in a democracy, in a country that prides itself that there is no corruption, no abuse of power, everything is legal and TRANSPARENT, nothing to hide, nothing to be ashamed of, nothing that is illegal, nothing that is funny and unexplainable.
 
The govt owes it to the people to settle this matter once and for all to kill all the fake news and half truths and mischievous speculations. It is for the good of the govt to make this right once and for all.
What do you think? Would there be more bits and pieces here and there and more half truths than the whole truth and nothing but the truth?
 
PS. The govt formula for minister’s pay is based on a fixed sum, eg PM’s salary is $2.2m a year based on basic salary, 13th month, a variable component up to 3 months, a performance bonus, up to 3 months and a national bonus from 3 to 6 months.
 
The PM does not get the performance bonus but can get 6 months of national bonus, ie basic salary +1 +3 +6. Other ministers would get basic salary +1 +3 +3 +3, ie basic salary +10 months. The PM is also supposed to get a basic salary +10 months to give $2.2m a year. A MR4 minister should get $1.1m a year. These are supposed to be max they could get. True, not true?
 
This looks like it, with a max of $2.2m for the PM and $1.1m for an entry level minister. But this is not the case when the performance bonus can be 4.1 average or more than 3 months. If any of the variable bonus can be more than 3 months, it means the max is not the max. So the max of $2.2m and $1.1m is not the max as provided by the ministerial review committee formula.
 
So, how many months did they get over the last 5 years. No need to talk about those earlier years before the salary revision.
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