Good to see Bloomberg stand up to the dynastic Lee one-party dictatorship in Singapore over the issue of ministers Shanmugam and Tan (Shanmugam being Lee attack dog in parliament and both he and Tan being Lee's pet poodles in the regime). Interesting, but not surprising that neither minister has condemned the Bloomberg article nor denied its contents. That says a lot. It says Shanmugam and Tan have egg on their faces, have been caught with their shorts around their ankles, in the matter of their multi-million property transactions while ordinary Singaporeans struggle to even buy the state-developed HDB flats, whose prices have risen an an extortionate rate in recent years. They might have thought that they could get away with with their scandalous behavior and that Brother Lee and the PAP one-party state would protect them against being caught out.
Bloomberg has practiced responsible journalism but responsible journalism isn't what the Singapore dictatorship has ever wanted. Look at Singapore's Straits Times and Business Times -- both mouth-organs of the Singapore state, which owns and controls the Straits Times stable of publications, as are all university academics). Free press in much of Northeast and Southeast Asia is anathema to the various states who rule by law, not by the application of law and justice as first, second and third principles.
Rather, the Singapore dictatorship has a historical penchant to hound its critics and nemeses. It does its damndest to rein them in by releasing its other attack dogs -- the Singapore courts, as political pliant as they are and always have been -- to bring the likes of Bloomberg, as others in the past, to heel. This is cowardly. But cowardice is what the Singapore state practices by using illiberal might over right over its critics and dissidents. It's been ingrained by Lee Kuan Yew, who had created and presided over the Singapore authoritarian capitalist state in ways not that much different to how emperor Xi Jinping has ruled China.
And it's no surprise that The Edge Singapore media has dropped its boast of pursuing "journalism" that is not hinged to the PAP's political priorities but is now kowtowing to its political masters.
The latest embarrassment come soon after the scandal of revolving around Singapore authorities (caught asleep but more likely more than that) of at first allowing and then ruling out the money-laundering families of China's criminally-minded capitalist class and their billions of dollars that bought up filthy-expensive Singapore properties, among other assets, one must start to wonder just what kind of the so-called state-led economic miracle that the authoritarian regime has been fostering since separating from neighbor Malaysia (itself a pariah authoritarian capitalist state that has long sponsored chronic state-led corruption, embezzlement and racism).
Shanmugam and Tan have heaped severe embarrassment on the people of Singapore, the ordinary, hardworking Singaporeans, by their greed for untold wealth-making under the cover of the Singapore-PAP dictatorship. There are no laurels on which Lee Hsien Loong can rest. His option now, before he too ends up with rotten egg on his face, is to publicly sack Shanmugam and Tan forthwith or for Shanmugam and Tan to publicly declare their actions which they tried to hide. No excuses.
And if Lee has the spine, he would start questioning just how many of his ministers and bureaucrats operate in a manner that is not transparent and truthful but is on the verge of behaving as notoriously as the corrupt and racist Malay-state of Malaysia. Malaysia has long practised pariah capitalism. Singapore is in danger of following suit led by its cowboy ministers and senior bureaucrats who have, over the decades, taken ordinary Singaporeans for a ride and sold them down the Singapore River.
Lee Hsien Loong is no longer PM. It's Lawrence Wong now. But yes. At the rate things are going now, the Law Minister looks to be out of anybody's control.
Yes, sorry. I knew it was somebody new and that's my fault for not checking it. But whether it's a Lee or a Wong, they're all the same, all cut from the same PAP dictatorship cloth, all pursuing the old Lee Kuan Yew agenda of authoritarian control and authoritarian capitalism, as long as that capitalism works for the political and ruling class for whom they rule the city-state. Looks like Lawrence Wong is equally spineless to act against the culprits Shanmugam and Tan for trying to fly under the public radar. So much for "Singapore transparency and good governance." Must be a PAP in-house joke. How many more Shanmugams and Tans are there that the PAP state is protecting from being exposed for their shenanigans?
Bravo, Bloomberg.
Good to see Bloomberg stand up to the dynastic Lee one-party dictatorship in Singapore over the issue of ministers Shanmugam and Tan (Shanmugam being Lee attack dog in parliament and both he and Tan being Lee's pet poodles in the regime). Interesting, but not surprising that neither minister has condemned the Bloomberg article nor denied its contents. That says a lot. It says Shanmugam and Tan have egg on their faces, have been caught with their shorts around their ankles, in the matter of their multi-million property transactions while ordinary Singaporeans struggle to even buy the state-developed HDB flats, whose prices have risen an an extortionate rate in recent years. They might have thought that they could get away with with their scandalous behavior and that Brother Lee and the PAP one-party state would protect them against being caught out.
Bloomberg has practiced responsible journalism but responsible journalism isn't what the Singapore dictatorship has ever wanted. Look at Singapore's Straits Times and Business Times -- both mouth-organs of the Singapore state, which owns and controls the Straits Times stable of publications, as are all university academics). Free press in much of Northeast and Southeast Asia is anathema to the various states who rule by law, not by the application of law and justice as first, second and third principles.
Rather, the Singapore dictatorship has a historical penchant to hound its critics and nemeses. It does its damndest to rein them in by releasing its other attack dogs -- the Singapore courts, as political pliant as they are and always have been -- to bring the likes of Bloomberg, as others in the past, to heel. This is cowardly. But cowardice is what the Singapore state practices by using illiberal might over right over its critics and dissidents. It's been ingrained by Lee Kuan Yew, who had created and presided over the Singapore authoritarian capitalist state in ways not that much different to how emperor Xi Jinping has ruled China.
And it's no surprise that The Edge Singapore media has dropped its boast of pursuing "journalism" that is not hinged to the PAP's political priorities but is now kowtowing to its political masters.
The latest embarrassment come soon after the scandal of revolving around Singapore authorities (caught asleep but more likely more than that) of at first allowing and then ruling out the money-laundering families of China's criminally-minded capitalist class and their billions of dollars that bought up filthy-expensive Singapore properties, among other assets, one must start to wonder just what kind of the so-called state-led economic miracle that the authoritarian regime has been fostering since separating from neighbor Malaysia (itself a pariah authoritarian capitalist state that has long sponsored chronic state-led corruption, embezzlement and racism).
Shanmugam and Tan have heaped severe embarrassment on the people of Singapore, the ordinary, hardworking Singaporeans, by their greed for untold wealth-making under the cover of the Singapore-PAP dictatorship. There are no laurels on which Lee Hsien Loong can rest. His option now, before he too ends up with rotten egg on his face, is to publicly sack Shanmugam and Tan forthwith or for Shanmugam and Tan to publicly declare their actions which they tried to hide. No excuses.
And if Lee has the spine, he would start questioning just how many of his ministers and bureaucrats operate in a manner that is not transparent and truthful but is on the verge of behaving as notoriously as the corrupt and racist Malay-state of Malaysia. Malaysia has long practised pariah capitalism. Singapore is in danger of following suit led by its cowboy ministers and senior bureaucrats who have, over the decades, taken ordinary Singaporeans for a ride and sold them down the Singapore River.
Lee Hsien Loong is no longer PM. It's Lawrence Wong now. But yes. At the rate things are going now, the Law Minister looks to be out of anybody's control.
Yes, sorry. I knew it was somebody new and that's my fault for not checking it. But whether it's a Lee or a Wong, they're all the same, all cut from the same PAP dictatorship cloth, all pursuing the old Lee Kuan Yew agenda of authoritarian control and authoritarian capitalism, as long as that capitalism works for the political and ruling class for whom they rule the city-state. Looks like Lawrence Wong is equally spineless to act against the culprits Shanmugam and Tan for trying to fly under the public radar. So much for "Singapore transparency and good governance." Must be a PAP in-house joke. How many more Shanmugams and Tans are there that the PAP state is protecting from being exposed for their shenanigans?