Commentary from the office desk: 2 cents worth of political events (Part II)

I discover that it is easy to criticise and comment on some things, while it is tougher being on the ground and having to make hard decisions that will not be seen as rational until hindsight... But that does not mean that one is not allowed to express his view...

As usual now, (and I hope this can be maintained for as long as it can be), Part II of the comments from the resident political couch is here...

Now the most important thing is probably, for here at least, the attempted burning and scarring of an MP during an event organised by a community centre. For those who might see it as making it a mountain out of a molehill, I will not say that this qualifies as a molehill - indeed, this could be the tip of the iceberg of increasing discontent by groups of people who are hit the worst by the economic recession and may be very unhappy with government measures in relieving their situation thus far. Indeed I might be inclined to agree that such resent is simmering, but for such a person to act beyond rationality is a sign and a warning of how badly things have hit here - indeed there is a realisation that majority of Singaporeans are quite ambivalent about those. I may be wrong of course, but my opinion is that most Singaporeans take their current living for granted and think that they would be the last ones to be hit by it - highly to the contrary when considering actual events on the ground of course.

Of course now on the ongoing invasion (I refuse to say clash as it is a totally one sided invasion by the Israelis) in Gaza. Strictly speaking attacking is fine in the nature of self defence, and if it is justified of course, but even that becomes blurred when the UN is attacked not once, but twice. From a neutral's perspective, it could be that Israel is taking a pot shot at telling the UN to mind its business and hit whoever their intelligence determines Hamas' rockets are coming from. That, of it, is purely hypocritical - I may be totally wrong of course. But no one will disagree that this invasion has totally violated all forms of international law. That - is extremely regrettable. Make no mistake - it is totally right to react in self defence - but as Sun Zi himself mentioned, to kill the civilians is the most despicable form of war.

Part 3 of this commentary is on the focus of the fuel squabble between Russia and Ukraine over the payment of gas and subsequent boycotting. This sadly is a preview of what happens when natural resources get increasingly tight in supplies and more countries fight over it. Cue - China, which everyone on Earth will know will be the one big consumer of all resources even outlasting the Russians themselves. The problem over the current spat is that the EU is suffering as a result due to Ukraine being the outlet to where gas reaches them - so now there is the scenario of two men fighting over the same thing which their clients suffer. Those who pay attention to European politics of the last decade would know the ongoing sensitivities and even tensions of relations with Ukraine and Russia, as there is much at stake - not just the gas, but political and strategic implications as wel. I am quite sure that this will be resolved soon, but how soon is a big question mark.

And finally, who can forget the fact that this week is the last week of the reign of President George W Bush? Now of course there were critics who mentioned just after Bill Clinton's terms that George W's term will be less positive, if not rocky - come to think about it, that's about the same thing that can be said of his reign. However, of course to just say that would be too sweeping a statement - a better way to put it is that the negatives happen to be more serious than the positives of his 2 terms in the White House. For the positives of engaging the PRC, Russia and traditional American allies, and reacting in the right way towards global terror, the negatives which include a misled invasion of Iraq, worsening relations between Iran, DPRK, Russia, African and Southeast Asian nations have overwritten all of that. What Obama can do now, sadly - is to do damage limitation. What Ma Ying Jiu did after Chen, Obama will have to do that - and more in order to write over the mistakes of Bush Junior. Now that takes some doing, and the world waits in bated breath over his appointment next week.

One parting shot amongst all of this, has to be back to soccer again. And any soccer fan who has the slightest idea of international football will surely be aware of a crazy 110 Million pound transfer by Manchester City for Milan's playmaker Kaka. Obviously in the world of transfers and player prices, the most expensive remains one Zinedine Zidane who cost Real Madrid less than half of that bid from Juventus, so this breaks the stratosphere of football transfer dealings. What I can only comment is that while City's ambitions are well listed in this bid, the implications of player dealings if this goes ahead is that clubs will be held ransom even more than before - that of which no one wants except 'naughty' players.

There goes a very turbulent week then - but in my opinion, there are more things to expect, more things that will surprise every week - so stay tuned.

Have a nice week ahead! =)