Monday, 1st June 2009
TRUTH BE TOLD
Like many other people, I seem to have been ignoring the MEP Election a bit. I've also been ignoring you, having just noticed that the last time I blogged was last Saturday - sorry about that, you know how it is, what with Man U winning the Champions League and Joseph Muscat giving everyone a spin in his nice new car, I was a bit distracted.
I don't know why it is that the MEP thing doesn't seem to have caught my imagination. Maybe it's because I'm believing the forgone conclusion line that Labour seem to be spinning. You know the one I mean, the one that goes "we're going to whup Gonzi and we're going to whup him good".
Fair enough, perhaps they are, though for the life of me, their way of going about this seems to be peculiar to say the least. Never ones for quiet confidence and coming over all competent and the like, the cogs in the Labour machine are forging ahead blindly. This is hardly surprising, since they've got what's-is-name Micallef at the helm and, I hear, they've dispensed with the services of one of the few people who knew what he was doing during an election, Michael Falzon.
So confident are they that they're going to win, it seems, that they've come to the conclusion that they don't need Dr Falzon. Well, that's as may be, but there's a difference between winning and winning properly and - let's assume they are going to win this time, for what it's worth - simply muddling through because the voters want, for whatever reason, to give a bit of a black eye to the Government isn't going to stand them in much stead come the real contest in four years' time.
Especially if they make the sort of messes they're prone to make whenever they're being run by those rank amateurs they seem to attract to their ranks.
For instance, there's a central plank to the Labour campaign which has "the Nasty Nats are going to make you pay for health care" in letters three feet high.
Leave aside the fact that the Government has said repeatedly that this is a lie, pure and simple. Leave aside that Labour's Golden Oldie, Edward Scicluna himself has said that, actually, making health care less like giving away Smarties during a kiddies' party might not be such a horrendous idea.
Leave aside that the only people who seem to believe the Labour Party, to the extent that they've come out and asked the Government to say it ain't so is the General Workers' Union. Now there's a surprise.
Leave all these things aside.
Then answer me this question: what, in the name of the Great God Logic, does the notion that health care is - if you believe Labour, which is never a good idea - going to be charged for have to do with which candidate is to be elected to represent us in the Great Brussels Talking Shop?
I mean, it's not as if the chap at the dizzying apex of power within the Labour Party wasn't quite diligent in having been in Brussels, where he would have learnt that, actually, what national governments do is not the stuff with which European Parliamentary dramas are filled.
If this line, say, was being pushed by Glenn of the Bedding Field or John Le Cruise, then perhaps you would forgive them, the first being a rank newbie, the second hardly ever there, apparently. If the slogan was the product of the fevered imaginations of Drs Abela and Farrugia, Muscat's faithful sidekicks, then again, forgiveness and comprehension would be the order of the day.
No, Muscat should know very well that a) the whole story is a convenient fabrication in the first place and b) it has absolutely nothing to do with the EU or with the question being put to us, namely, which of these candidates do you want to represent you?
But since when did truth, relevance and consistency ever have anything to do with an election, whatever it's for? As long as the faithful can all go carcading next Sunday, that's all right then.
The rest of us will just have to bear in mind Luke 23:24 and grin and bear it.
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Comments
I already told you that mine are not allegations. I have them printed black on white and signed. Are you able to comprehend that? I have a letter sent to my father prior to the EU referendum and also prior to the election concerning hunting. I have also a copy of the email sent to GO employees (you know, Malta is such a small country that everyone knows each other). It might be difficult for you to understand that from your ivory tower.
I never said that what Dr. Muscat says is all true but when it comes to being in possession of the said letter, you cannot call it a bluff.
One does not retreat from half truths, innuendos, spin and allegations but rather ignore them otherwise one risks to lower himself to the level of the one making them.
If you are blinkered to the extreme degree, then a white cane may be in order.
What a nice tactical retreat! I guess you can’t rebut since evidence is overwhelming.
I have no spare time for you. When you decide to acknowledge the LP's past and its present lack of substance, then I may find some.
With another gaffe by Joseph I would have more to say. This guy refuses to grow up.
Just to get you going - again - another faux pas by one of Labour's papers il-Kulhadd which allegedly identified the wrong Vince Farruguia as a recipient of some gratuity from the MFSA. Another zelqa fin-niexef!?
Wait a minute, maybe those damned computers have done it again!
Some donkeys tend to roam in the same circles all the time!
is dr borg cardona living in the same country as the rest of us ?who se been governing this country for the past 20 years.?why was gonzi pn invented last year if not to make us forget the previous pn administration?who promised heaven on earth in last years election ?gonzi pn.i voted yes in the eu referendum but this is not the malta we were promised it would be.please try and see things from the common mans point of view ,but then again we all know who pull s the strings in this country and we dont want to upset the puppetter do we
Though I was enthusiastically in favour of Integration at the time I am not so sure today whether it would have been a good thing for Malta or indeed for the UK. I am not happy with the references to the subject on recent postings either.
History is history and not a jumble of myths. legends and prejudices. To say that Integration was rejected by the people of Malta is false. It was rejected by PN and the Church.
I would like to take the subject further but medication is making it very difficult to concentrate or type so I simply enter a plea for greater objectivity.
Regards to all- Peter from South Yorkshire but once of Cottonera.
Peter
When you have some spare time please go through my reply in the previous blog and let me know.
Thanks
One just has to look at Labour's past record, the present hype based on half truths and then project its future.
The present Labour Party comes not from some grand idea, but the unceremonial ousting of Boffa's Workers' Party. Then came the grand idea of Integration with Britain which would have permanently cemented us into a semi-colonial quasi entity. That idea was rejected by our people.
Then the MLP jumped on the Independence bandwagon ably driven by the late George Borg Olivier. Not the type of independence they dreamt of, but anyway, independence was their only face saving maneuver they had at the time. Then after the Nationalist government did achieve independence for Malta, the MLP started with their moronic labeling of it as 'Independenza tac-cajt' . As if there are any other kind other than what was achieved by GBO.
Fast forward to the 'Partnership' idea spun by Alfred Sant. Does that not sound like the above in reverse? Sant plying the Partnership with the EU as if such a thing even existed! And this while he was being contradicted by EU officials themselves.
Continued...
So then the MLP went all out with the LE (No 2 EU) campaign. So sure were they of an outright victory, that a defeat at the polls was not even recognized by Alfred Sant. As a matter of fact, with no regrets, the MLP supporters were let loose to celebrate, which, after all, turned out to be a referendum loss to them! It even took the present leader five years to, in hindsight, acknowledge the colossal defeat for Labour and a triumph for Malta. Still no regrets by the present, LP.
Which brings us to the present MEP elections. The LP and its many supporters still cannot distinguish between a general election and electing five (or six) representatives in the European Parliament. The Labour chiefs (in plural, because there are many) recognize the naivety of their supporters and pump them up with the idea that they will trash Gonzi by winning the majority of the contested seats. They scramble their minds by discussing everything else except Europe which is why it is still impossible to believe the LP and its candidates, that they really have embraced the European Union.
Many of them still don't.