"By doing one act of random kindness at a time."
From Evan Almighty.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Monday, August 18, 2008
On The Pleasure of Hating
by William Hazlitt (excerpt)
The pleasure of hating, like a poisonous mineral, eats into the heart of religion, and turns it to rankling spleen and bigotry; it makes patriotism an excuse for carrying fire, pestilence, and famine into other lands: it leaves to virtue nothing but the spirit of censoriousness, and a narrow, jealous, inquisitorial watchfulness over the actions and motives of others.
What have the different sects, creeds, doctrines in religion been but so many pretexts set up for men to wrangle, to quarrel, to tear one another in pieces about , like a target as a mark to shoot at? Does any one suppose that the love of country in an Englishman implies any friendly feeling or disposition to serve another bearing the same name?
No, it means only hatred to the French or the inhabitants of any other country that we happen to be at war with for the time. Does the love of virtue denote any wish to discover or amend our own faults? No, but it atones for an obstinate adherence to our own vices by the most virulent intolerance to human frailties. This principle is of a most universal application. It extends to good as well as evil: if it makes us hate folly, it makes us no less dissatisfied with distinguished merit. If it inclines us to resent the wrongs of others, it impels us to be as impatient of their prosperity.
We revenge injuries: we repay benefits with ingratitude. Even our strongest partialities and likings soon take this turn. "That which was luscious as locusts, anon becomes bitter as coloquintida;" and love and friendship melt in their own fires. We hate old friends: we hate old books: we hate old opinions; and at last we come to hate ourselves.
Courtesy of Bluepete
The pleasure of hating, like a poisonous mineral, eats into the heart of religion, and turns it to rankling spleen and bigotry; it makes patriotism an excuse for carrying fire, pestilence, and famine into other lands: it leaves to virtue nothing but the spirit of censoriousness, and a narrow, jealous, inquisitorial watchfulness over the actions and motives of others.
What have the different sects, creeds, doctrines in religion been but so many pretexts set up for men to wrangle, to quarrel, to tear one another in pieces about , like a target as a mark to shoot at? Does any one suppose that the love of country in an Englishman implies any friendly feeling or disposition to serve another bearing the same name?
No, it means only hatred to the French or the inhabitants of any other country that we happen to be at war with for the time. Does the love of virtue denote any wish to discover or amend our own faults? No, but it atones for an obstinate adherence to our own vices by the most virulent intolerance to human frailties. This principle is of a most universal application. It extends to good as well as evil: if it makes us hate folly, it makes us no less dissatisfied with distinguished merit. If it inclines us to resent the wrongs of others, it impels us to be as impatient of their prosperity.
We revenge injuries: we repay benefits with ingratitude. Even our strongest partialities and likings soon take this turn. "That which was luscious as locusts, anon becomes bitter as coloquintida;" and love and friendship melt in their own fires. We hate old friends: we hate old books: we hate old opinions; and at last we come to hate ourselves.
Courtesy of Bluepete
PERSONALITY OF THE MONTH
I have decided to chose Richard Nelson Sokial as my personality of the month. He owns sabahwarriors.blogspot.com. He blogs about architecture and how it relates to the history and culture of the local people.
He writes regularly for the Daily Express Sabah.
I have just sat down for work, and skimmed through the papers. As I saw his piece, it struck me that here is a guy who is above the fray. When everyone is blogging about the flavour of the moment, namely politics, here is one guy, who is above it all, talking about something that will touch us for the rest of our lives. There is a freshness about him and his writing.
I have read many of his pieces, and I enjoy his insights. It is seldom that we find somebody who loves his history and his architecture, and he uses very fine English too.
As we approach the anniversary of our Independence, we are emboldened to know that there is someone among us who cherishes the past, and at the same time is the symbol of a new generation of confident, knowledgeable, honest and brave people. I am sure there are others who contribute in their small unobtrusive ways to the betterment of our society, and probably we are better off because of their unheralded contributions. But today, Mr Richard Nelson Sokial, I salute you.
He writes regularly for the Daily Express Sabah.
I have just sat down for work, and skimmed through the papers. As I saw his piece, it struck me that here is a guy who is above the fray. When everyone is blogging about the flavour of the moment, namely politics, here is one guy, who is above it all, talking about something that will touch us for the rest of our lives. There is a freshness about him and his writing.
I have read many of his pieces, and I enjoy his insights. It is seldom that we find somebody who loves his history and his architecture, and he uses very fine English too.
As we approach the anniversary of our Independence, we are emboldened to know that there is someone among us who cherishes the past, and at the same time is the symbol of a new generation of confident, knowledgeable, honest and brave people. I am sure there are others who contribute in their small unobtrusive ways to the betterment of our society, and probably we are better off because of their unheralded contributions. But today, Mr Richard Nelson Sokial, I salute you.
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
You Can Check Out Anytime You Like
But you can never leave. (Lyrics of a song by the Eagles)
This is what religious freedom means in Malaysia.
By and large "freedom" still hold competing meanings in the mind of Malay Muslims. You are free to walk but you must wear crutches. You are free to chose but the choice is not yours. This is basically how the religion is being taught. You cannot be making your own interpretation of the Holy Book. You must leave it to people who have studied what the ancients have said about it.
The forum on conversion to Islam organized by the Bar Council was opposed by the Malays. One would be right in saying that the mob that came to oppose it being held were Muslims, but one must not forget that in Malaysia, being Muslim is to be Malay. They opposed the forum because intrinsically it was a forum about the Malays.
The issues arising out of conversion are of the utmost relevance and must be resolved, and resolved quickly. The government must take the lead in resolving them instead of reducing itself to being a mere spectator.
It is a Malay issue after all. It will not resolve itself. Why, because the Malays tend to think that the issue is their issue exclusively. They cannot see that others who are affected by our practice of the religion has the moral right to be heard.
The organizer could even have been more brash by calling it the apostasy issue, and in essence that is what this whole thing is about. This issue is sensitive and we cannot just wish for it to resolve itself. The government must step in to show the way.
This is what religious freedom means in Malaysia.
By and large "freedom" still hold competing meanings in the mind of Malay Muslims. You are free to walk but you must wear crutches. You are free to chose but the choice is not yours. This is basically how the religion is being taught. You cannot be making your own interpretation of the Holy Book. You must leave it to people who have studied what the ancients have said about it.
The forum on conversion to Islam organized by the Bar Council was opposed by the Malays. One would be right in saying that the mob that came to oppose it being held were Muslims, but one must not forget that in Malaysia, being Muslim is to be Malay. They opposed the forum because intrinsically it was a forum about the Malays.
The issues arising out of conversion are of the utmost relevance and must be resolved, and resolved quickly. The government must take the lead in resolving them instead of reducing itself to being a mere spectator.
It is a Malay issue after all. It will not resolve itself. Why, because the Malays tend to think that the issue is their issue exclusively. They cannot see that others who are affected by our practice of the religion has the moral right to be heard.
The organizer could even have been more brash by calling it the apostasy issue, and in essence that is what this whole thing is about. This issue is sensitive and we cannot just wish for it to resolve itself. The government must step in to show the way.
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Chandra Muzaffar to Anwar: Don't Use The Back Door
KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 8 (Bernama) -- Political scientist Dr Chandra Muzaffar said that Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s attempt to become the prime minister through the "back door" by instigating massive crossovers is both unethical and undemocratic.
"A Cabinet established through such an avenue will lack moral credibility. Parliament itself will be tarnished. Both the Executive and the Legislature –- two vital arms of governance -— will be perceived by the people as institutions that are bereft of integrity," he said.
In a nutshell, acquiring power through the back door would demean and denigrate politics, he said, adding that Anwar also had no mandate to oust the democratically-elected government of the day.
Anwar, he claimed, was consumed by a single-minded obsession to become the country's prime minister in the shortest possible time.
Hence his concerted endeavour to persuade Barisan Nasional (BN) lawmakers in Parliament -- at least 30 of them -- to cross over to Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) immediately, the former PKR deputy president said.
"The size and scale of the crossover he envisages is mind boggling. Has there ever been an instance anywhere in the world where a government which has 58 seats more than the combined opposition is under the constant threat of imminent collapse simply because an individual --- who is not even in Parliament --- boasts continuously that a certain number of MPs are going to switch sides by a certain date?" Dr Chandra asked.
He said it was this incessant drive to topple the government through crossovers that had created so much uncertainty in the country in the last few months.
"If the threat of crossovers hangs like a Sword of Damocles over the nation’s head, it is partly because many Malaysians know that Anwar as a BN and federal government leader at one time had played a pivotal role in the overthrow of the democratically elected PBS state government in Sabah in 1994," he said.
Dr Chandra stressed that although Anwar had stated that his enticement did not involve money or other allurements, it would still be morally wrong for a legislator to cross over since it would be a betrayal of the voters’ trust.
"In a democracy, a legislator elected on a particular platform should return his mandate to the people and resign his seat before he switches sides. That is what respect for the dignity of the voter means," he said.
Dr Chandra said that it was a pity that such despicable politics has been condoned by so-called principled politicians and committed human rights activists around Anwar.
"They should have tried to convince him that it is more honourable to enter Petrajaya through the front door. This implies winning the 13th general Election at the federal level and forming the government through legitimate, ethical means," he said.
Dr Chandra said that if Anwar were to enter Parliament after the Permatang Pauh by-election, he should try to bridge the gap that separated the Pakatan Rakyat parties and provide them with a unifying vision and programme of reform that would go beyond clichés and platitudes.
"One hopes that he will also, as the Leader of the Opposition, establish a shadow Cabinet that cajoles and coaxes the BN government to introduce much needed changes.
"This is what the people would want him to do. Anwar has no mandate to oust the democratically elected government of the day through the back door." BERNAMA
"A Cabinet established through such an avenue will lack moral credibility. Parliament itself will be tarnished. Both the Executive and the Legislature –- two vital arms of governance -— will be perceived by the people as institutions that are bereft of integrity," he said.
In a nutshell, acquiring power through the back door would demean and denigrate politics, he said, adding that Anwar also had no mandate to oust the democratically-elected government of the day.
Anwar, he claimed, was consumed by a single-minded obsession to become the country's prime minister in the shortest possible time.
Hence his concerted endeavour to persuade Barisan Nasional (BN) lawmakers in Parliament -- at least 30 of them -- to cross over to Parti Keadilan Rakyat (PKR) immediately, the former PKR deputy president said.
"The size and scale of the crossover he envisages is mind boggling. Has there ever been an instance anywhere in the world where a government which has 58 seats more than the combined opposition is under the constant threat of imminent collapse simply because an individual --- who is not even in Parliament --- boasts continuously that a certain number of MPs are going to switch sides by a certain date?" Dr Chandra asked.
He said it was this incessant drive to topple the government through crossovers that had created so much uncertainty in the country in the last few months.
"If the threat of crossovers hangs like a Sword of Damocles over the nation’s head, it is partly because many Malaysians know that Anwar as a BN and federal government leader at one time had played a pivotal role in the overthrow of the democratically elected PBS state government in Sabah in 1994," he said.
Dr Chandra stressed that although Anwar had stated that his enticement did not involve money or other allurements, it would still be morally wrong for a legislator to cross over since it would be a betrayal of the voters’ trust.
"In a democracy, a legislator elected on a particular platform should return his mandate to the people and resign his seat before he switches sides. That is what respect for the dignity of the voter means," he said.
Dr Chandra said that it was a pity that such despicable politics has been condoned by so-called principled politicians and committed human rights activists around Anwar.
"They should have tried to convince him that it is more honourable to enter Petrajaya through the front door. This implies winning the 13th general Election at the federal level and forming the government through legitimate, ethical means," he said.
Dr Chandra said that if Anwar were to enter Parliament after the Permatang Pauh by-election, he should try to bridge the gap that separated the Pakatan Rakyat parties and provide them with a unifying vision and programme of reform that would go beyond clichés and platitudes.
"One hopes that he will also, as the Leader of the Opposition, establish a shadow Cabinet that cajoles and coaxes the BN government to introduce much needed changes.
"This is what the people would want him to do. Anwar has no mandate to oust the democratically elected government of the day through the back door." BERNAMA
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
Some Hard Truths for Gloabal Warming Alarmists
NASA image
Carbon dioxide has a 'greenhouse effect' in our atmosphere, and we are responsible for 0.28% of it. The best explanation for how an atmosphere's "greenhouse" effect acts, is it increases the planet's heat capacity (i.e. it holds more energy and thus takes longer to heat up and cool down) and thus makes the climate more gentle and hospitable.
The Vikings were settling and farming Greenland from the 9th to the 13th century, in places now covered with permafrost and ice.
In fact, 450 million years ago when we were in the depths of the coldest period the Earth has had in half a billion years, CO2 levels were 10 times above today's! 65% of the warming this century occurred in the first three decades, and then, while CO2 levels continued to rise, temperatures fell for four decades in a row.
Another misconception that seems to be rife at the moment is that some how CO2 is a pollutant. Commercial growers deliberately generate CO2 and increase its levels in agricultural greenhouses to between 700ppmv and 1,000ppmv to increase productivity and improve the water efficiency of food crops far beyond those in the somewhat carbon-starved open atmosphere.
CO2 feeds the forests, grows more usable lumber in timber lots meaning there is less pressure to cut old growth or push into "natural" wildlife habitat, makes plants more water efficient helping to beat back the encroaching deserts in Africa and Asia and generally increases bio-productivity.
By far the most hyped consequences are increasing intensities of weather storms, and rising sea levels. Global storm intensities are dominated by the temperature difference between the equator and the poles, and it really is that simple.
Since the last ice age 18,000 years ago the global sea level has risen by 130 meters, and is still doing so at a current rate of around 20cm per century, which is dwarfed by local tectonic movements.
Dramatic pictures of breaking seasonal ice is just patent propaganda, the reality is that Antarctica’s ice mass has now been growing for the last 30 years against a 6,000 year trend of melting, and it contains over 90% of the world’s land ice (sea ice, by Archimedes’s principle, does not affect sea levels).
Our climate is changing, just as it has always done, and always will. In fact, the only constant about our climate is that it changes, which makes you realise the term "climate change" is at best meaningless, and at worst intentionally ambiguous.
The main determinant of our climate is not some gas, which comprises 0.038% of the atmosphere, but the Sun, the planet's orbital eccentricities and axial wobble, cosmic ray flux, and other celestial factors.
Greenhouse gases play an important role, but a passive one. It should not come as a surprise that our entire solar system has been warming for the last quarter century, or that the most accurate weather forecasts come from algorithms that concentrate on solar fluctuations and cosmic rays. Cosmic rays are responsible for cloud formations, which are central to the overwhelmingly most important greenhouse gas.
Water vapour accounts for 95% of the ‘greenhouse effect’ and, apart from the elaborate positive feed-back systems in their models that have no actual basis with reality, the global warming alarmists have completely ignored it. This is staggering because H20, by a country mile, in its gas, liquid, and solid form dominates all other terrestrial climate factors.
Condensed from Fighting the State by Edward Townes
Monday, August 4, 2008
Would we vote for a man with the following biodata?
Zuma and crony
Name: Jacob Zuma
Position: President ANC
Wildly Popular in His Country. Could Be the Next South African president.
Wives
Jacob Zuma is a self-proclaimed polygamist and has been married at least four times.
- Sizakele Khumalo, whom he met in 1959. She lives at his home at Nkandla, KwaZulu-Natal. They have no children.
- Foreign Affairs Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, with whom he had four children, but from whom he is divorced.
- Kate, with whom he had five children. She committed suicide on December 8, 2000.
- Mantuli Zuma married Mr. Zuma five years ago. She has a five-year old daughter and a seven-month-old son with him.
- Nompumelelo Ntuli, the mother of two of his children, married on January 8, 2008. Ntuli, born 1975, is a resident of KwaMaphumulo near Stanger and has two children with Zuma -- Thandisiwe, born 2002, and Sinqobile, born February 2006.
- Zuma paid lobola to the clan of Thobeka Stacy Mabhija, 35, with whom he has two children. The second is three months old. Ms. Mabhija works at a mobile phone company.
- Zuma paid 10 cattle as lobola for Swazi Princess Sebentile Dlamini in 2002.
- Lobola has been paid for Bongi Ngema, with whom he has a 3-year-old son
- He reportedly has 18 children, including one resulting from an affair with Minah Shongwe, sister of Judge Jeremiah Shongwe, who asked to be recused from Mr. Zuma’s rape trial because of the liaison. She has a son, Edward, 30, with Mr. Zuma.
Charged for Rape .......
On the morning of December 6, 2005, rape charges against Zuma were formally filed. He vehemently denied the charges, and affirmed his political commitment to oppose sexual violence. The accuser, the young daughter of a deceased friend of Zuma's from during the years of the struggle against apartheid, was known by Zuma to be HIV positive.
On May 8, 2006, the Court dismissed the charges, agreeing that the sexual act in question was consensual. During the trial, Zuma admitted to having unprotected sex with his accuser but claimed that he took a shower afterwards to "cut the risk of contracting HIV". Zuma at the time headed the National AIDS Council. This statement has been condemned by the judge, health experts, AIDS activists as well as ridiculed by the public in general. The popular South African comic strip, Madam & Eve, and well known political cartoonist, Zapiro, have repeatedly lampooned the matter.
Charged for Corruption .......
On 28 December 2007, the Scorpions served Zuma an indictment to stand trial in the High Court on various counts of racketeering, money laundering, corruption and fraud. Zuma's appears in court on 4 August 2008. The charges are believed to be linked to the $5bn arms procurement deal by the South African government in 1999.
Can You see any similarities any where?… read on.
With the ANC President Jacob Zuma's corruption trial having resumed at the Pietermaritzburg on Monday, the party has voiced its undying support for their leader. Zuma, through his legal team, is to ask the court to drop his prosecution on fraud, corruption, money-laundering and tax-evasion charges.
Against all odds, it is evident, the party is behind their leader, supporting his "conspiracy" allegation against the state.
Ahead of the trial, the ANC Youth League has ratcheted up its rhetoric, slamming Zuma's prosecution as a "grave political injustice" and saying "no stone must be left unturned in his defence".
By Fundile Majola http://www.iol.co.za
More on the 150,000 illegal immigrants
Harris: Malaysia doomed to fail if steps not taken
Kota Kinabalu: Malaysia risked being trapped among a group of failed nations if the Government insists on continuing to dwell on the country's past greatness instead of making changes to expand its
Presenting a talk titled "Contribution of BIMP-EAGA Manpower Malaysia's Economic Development: Historical Perspective and Building the Future" at the BIMP-EAGA Youth Seminar in UMS, Saturday, he said Malaysia has no choice but to re-develop its natural resources and agricultural plantations. economic growth horizon.
Read it in full here
Read my blog for July 21.
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