BondiBlog

The last post

2011-11-30T10:50:00.000+01:00

I started this blog last June as a fun sideline. Over the months it has increasingly required more of me than I originally planned. Because of its popularity it has also complicated life in my day job, producing and presenting Bondi+.

Blogging is an all or nothing activity. You either say what you think or you say nothing at all. Mark Twain once said that there is no such thing as being a little pregnant. You either are or your're not. The same applies to blogging.

In view of both these two considerations, I decided to stop this blog.

From the bottom of my heart I would like to thank all those who have been following and commenting on it. It was a fun ride and it was great to have you on board.

€54,000,000,000

2011-11-29T14:15:00.000+01:00

It has just been announced that €54 billion worth of investments have slipped out of Greece because it failed to keep its financial house in order. To map out some sort of a future they had to go around Europe with a begging bowl. The proud land of Plato and Pericles now even owes Cyprus money.

The late George Bonello du Puis, a former finance minister, used to say that the light morning dew can make Malta flourish but it can also drown it. The slightest movements around us can seal our economic and financial fate, one way or the other. What is insignificant and under the radar for other, much larger, countries fills our cup or empties it.

If a country the size of Greece has been driven to the precipice by its financial incontinence, it will take much, much less folly to join her.

Our island mentality prevents many from joining the dots between what is happening around us and their job, their future and well-being of their families. They prefer to believe in a pie in the sky than to figure how the real pie on their kitchen table got there.

Until, of course, the one in the sky vanishes. And with it, the one on the table.

The paper without balls

2011-11-28T10:19:00.001+01:00

Followers of this blog are familiar with my views of MaltaToday and its "journalists". It is nothing but the newsletter of a cult interested only in its private agendas. But yesterday's newsletter dived deeper down the cesspit than I ever thought possible.

Last week's groundbreaking story was Magistrate Consuelo Scerri Herrera's decision to withdraw her court case against Daphne Caruana Galizia.

How did MaltaToday react? " ... perhaps the most intriguing question concerns Caruana Galizia's real motives in pursuing (successfully) a personal crusade against a magistrate who also happens to be sister to Labour's Spokesman on Home Affairs."

Unbelievable, truly unbelievable. Exclusively through Caruana Galizia's efforts - and certainly with no help from MaltaToday - we get to know all about Magistrate Scerri Herrera's lifestyle and behaviour. The nation's jaw drops as it beholds a woman who learnt her virtues and principles from the gutter. And finally the magistrate drops the court case she herself set in motion so that Caruana Galizia's words are allowed to stand. All of them.

So how did Roger de Giorgio, Saviour Balzan and Raphael Vassallo (who wrote the story) read this extraordinary situation. Did they ask for the magistrate to step down from the bench? Nope. Did they call on the Chief Justice to exercise all the powers at his disposal to discipline the her? Forget it. Impeachment, maybe? You must be kidding.

On the contrary, MaltaToday turned on the journalist who had the courage to bring the story to the public's attention.

Disgusting, absolutely disgusting. But I'm not surprised. For all their annoying self-praise and bluster, Daphne Caruana Galizia journalistic balls wiegh more than the half dozen Roger, Saviour and Raphael share between them.

This is not a weather report

2011-11-26T18:14:00.001+01:00

As soon as Magistrate Consuelo Scerri Herrera withdrew her criminal libel and defamation case against Daphne Caruana Galizia, I blogged that there is no other course of action but impeachment. It is only through an act of parliament that a member of the judiciary can be taken off the bench.

My reasoning was simple. By the magistrate's own choice, the blogger's cataclysmically damning words against her now stand, loud and clear. I do not see how, in these circumstances, Magistrate Consuelo Scerri Herrera can wake up every morning, slip into her toga and judge innocence and guilt in open court.

By way of withdrawing her case, the magistrate claimed that the blogger had withdrawn the substance of her allegations under oath. This is the subject of this post.

Daphne Caruana Galizia's response to this claim was immediate and typically devastating. Not only did she write that she had not withdrawn a comma of her deluge of words but went on to call Magistrate Consuelo Scerri Herrera a liar for making such a claim.

So now the magistrate has yet another ball in her court, as it were. Apart from all the other, now uncontested, words that the blogger threw at her, there is this one.

Magistrate Consuelo Scerri Herrera is a liar.

Unless the magistrate takes the blogger to court again, I do not see how she can continue to preside over her court, ask people to swear to tell the truth and proceed to judge them.

This country cannot have a magistrate being called a liar and life goes on in the land as if we just heard tomorrow's weather report.

My two JPOs

2011-11-26T09:52:00.002+01:00

I cannot fight this feeling. Since Jeffrey Pullicino Orlando announced that he will not be contesting the next elections, a confused sense of pity crept up on me. I'm almost sad he's had to come to this.

Sure, whatever else may have made him gravitate towards this decision, humiliation at the polls must have played a key part. In this narrow sense, he did the right thing.

But my confused sense of pity stems from some place else.

I have known JPO since the early 1990s and there were times when we were fairly close. I knew a Jeffrey who had his ego issues but had other attributes which amply compensated for them. He was charming, smart, driven and open-minded. I remember, for instance, having a long chat with him right after he turned down Eddie Fenech Adami's offer to make him parliamentary secretary in 1998. I strongly disagreed with his decision - an MP can't say no to a prime minister on such a matter - but I was struck by his determination to do what he thought was the right thing. In his mind, he had put his children's interests before politics.

But then over the years something happened to him. It is as if he became someone else, someone I could hardly recognise, let alone identify with. His thinking and behaviour assumed a sense of darkness, of disquiet and duplicitousness. Worst of all, he started being insincere with himself and that is the darkest blind alley in the human labyrinth. I wish I knew what caused this unfortunate transformation but I genuinely do not.

Now the die is cast and Jeffrey is riding to his political sunset. May he find his former self there.

The court of Consuelo Scerri Herrera

2011-11-23T15:45:00.001+01:00

The magistrate & the blogger

The blogposts that Daphne Caruana Galizia had published about Magistrate Consuelo Scerri Herrera were jaw dropping. They ranged from saying that the magistrate had slept with half the police officers to having a series of inappropriate sexual liaisons, from throwing parties in which heavy drugs were consumed to handing out judgements in cases in which she had a clear conflict of interest, developing property while pretending she wasn’t, and giving court-related work to her current partner at the time their affair was secret. And much more in between.

Magistrate Scerri Herrera had asked the police to prosecute Caruana Galizia for criminal defamation. The first sign that there was something unreal about Scerri Herrera's case was that in her testimony she did not deny the lion's share of Caruana Galizia's allegations but picked instead on what seems to have caused her to feel most defamed: the suggestion that she looks like the back of a bus and wears inappropriate clothing, and the fact that her daughter is now the only one of her friends without a picture of her mother on Facebook.

When she testified in court three months ago, Caruana Galizia made what was perhaps the most serious allegation of them all: that Scerri Herrera had a five-year secret affair with a senior-ranking police officer and kept the many incriminating letters he wrote her in the keeping of somebody else, so that her husband would not find them.

Caruana Galizia said under oath that the police officer in question first retrieved that bag of incriminating letters at Scerri Herrera’s request and a few hours later Scerri Herrera filed her report with the police who immediately moved to have Caruana Galizia questioned under arrest. Scerri Herrera’s lawyer did not cross-examine Caruana Galizia about this or deny it.

The second sign of the unreality of this case reached us today when Scerri Herrera withdrew her complaint and left the police with no option but to drop the charges. She did so after Caruana Galizia submitted her list of witnesses for Friday’s now-aborted sitting.

Today, Magistrate Consuelo Scerri Herrera stands in public, in court and in society with the most serious of Daphne Caruana Galizia allegations left undenied and uncontested. Some of them might involve breaking the law. Others, while being perfectly legal, bring her position into serious disrepute. Most of them constitute behaviour which is unbecoming to a resident of Kordin, let alone a magistrate.

Where do we go from here? Doing the Maltese thing and hope that matters would die quietly is just not on. Time does not erase undenied allegations of a magistrate’s grossly unethical behaviour.

The only course left is a motion of impeachment, a power which any member of parliament has and which requires a two thirds majority to pass. If the PN in government saw fit to impeach a member of the judiciary for failing to turn up for work, I do not see how they do can turn a blind eye to this case.

Flash news: our navy has gone Labour

2011-11-23T14:51:00.001+01:00

Yesterday afternoon a rumour was doing the media rounds that the Partit Laburista has penetrated the higher echelons of our land, sea and air forces in anticipation of the next election.

Fearing that the PN would not let go of power if they lose the election, the PL has been trying to strike a hidden deal with powerful elements in all three forces to occupy strategic positions the moment they are elected.

It appears that the navy has already signed off on the deal. Expert observers of its movements noted that a particular patrol boat has been visibly circling the islands throughout the day.

It is the P51. Experts are interpreting this as a coded message that the navy is already supporting Joseph Muscat's 51 proposals.

More breaking news will be reported the moment it reaches Bondiblog's newsroom.

Setting the record straight

2011-11-22T16:21:00.001+01:00

Franco Debono MP

In two public instances over the last weeks, Franco Debono MP criticised PBS and Bondi+.

With reference to these criticisms I have no difficulty in stating that the programme never had the intention of offending anyone.

In case someone, including Franco Debono MP, might have been offended by any programme, I equally have no difficulty to apologise.

Toni's Boot Camp Boys & Girls

2011-11-22T15:37:00.001+01:00

I don't know what it is about Toni Abela, the PL deputy leader but I keep coming across one howler of his after another. On Sunday he was busy talking about sodomy and denigrating gay men.

Here is another pearl of political wisdom that Toni Abela cast our way.

Worried about the lack of discipline of your 18 or 20-year old son or daugher? Don't worry, Toni has the answer: draft all those ending their teens into regiments performing community tasks and run like military units. Here is what he has in mind.

"Jiena nipproponi li jkun hemm perjodu ta’ servizz socjali bi hlas ghal zghazagh bejn it-tmintax u l-ghoxrin sena, f’korpi civili izda b’dixxiplina stretta. Ma jkunux suldati, izda ikunu f’korp b’kodici ta’ dixxiplina militari.

"... dan ix-xorta ta’ servizz civili li kull zaghzugh ikollu jaghmel, ihalli l-marka tieghu fuq il-karattru ta’ kull zaghzugh ... Il-holqien ta’ korpi civili dixxiplinari jista’ jkun l-ewwel pass lejn il-possibilita’ li f’pajjizna nergghu nibdew naraw xi ftit ta’ dixxiplina u ordni." (Toni Abela Blog, 9 January, 2007)

First the Pijunieri, then the Dejma, and now Toni's Boot Camp Boys & Girls

The good but not so old days

2011-11-22T12:28:00.001+01:00

Reno Calleja

Ah, the pleasures of the internet. Here's an article by Reno Calleja, one of the men brought back into the PL fold by Joseph Muscat. Now that Gaddafi's regime is history it is almost unbelieveable that Calleja wrote these words just a few short months ago. It is a truly surreal read.

Aħna u l-Libja – Malta għad trid tibki

Jien qatt ma kelli dubju dwar dak li qalet it-TORĊA dwar il-missila li kienet sparata lejn Malta. Li kieku din il-missilla ma kinetx interċettata u splodied fuq Ħad-Dingli jew ir-Rabat, kienet isseħħ traġedja f’Malta.

U l-kbir għadu ġej. Jekk il-Gvern Nazzjonalista se jibqa’ jkun pupu f’idejn in-NATO, partikolarment tal-Amerikani, il-Franċiżi u l-Ingliżi, Malta tista tiffaċċja nkwiet kbir. Ma nistax nifhem għaliex min għandu d-dmir jiddefendi lill-poplu Malti mhux qed jintebaħ x’jista’ jiġri lil pajjiżna.

Wara u meta Tripli taqa’ f’idejn ir-’ribelli’, wara li jkun hemm xmara ta’ demm, bi tpattija dawk ta’ Bengażi jagħmlu vendikazzjoni min-nies ta’ Tripli. Araw x’qed jiġri fil-Kosta tal-Ivojru. Kif dawk tal-President il-ġdid Quattara daħlu fl-ibliet maħkuma min-nies tal-eks president Gbagbo għamlu ħerba minnhom. Nisa u tfal inqatlu u ndifnu ħajjin. Hemm 400,000, daqs kemm hawn nies Malta, maħruba fil-pajjiżi li jmissu mal-Kosta tal-Ivorju. Għax kif jersqu lejn id-djar fejn kienu joqogħdu, ta’ Quattara jbiċċruhom. L-aqwa li hemm it-truppi tal-Ġnus Magħquda jħarsu. L-aqwa li l-Franċiżi għaddiet tagħhom.

Wara li taqa’ Tripli, dawk li jaħarbu li ġejjin mit-Tribù ta’ Gaddafi jiffurmaw ċelloli ta’ tpattija u terrur. Jirrikorru għal attakki terroristiċi biex ipattuha lil dawk ta’ Bengażi. L-istorja turi li dawn iċ-ċelloli mhux biss jattakkaw lill-gvern li jkun ħadilhom posthom, iżda jpattuha lil dawk li għenuhom.

Mhux qed noħlom, ħbieb. Dan ġara fl-Iraq fejn sal-lum għad hemm ċelloli ta’ Saddam Hussein, fejn għad hemm musulmani Sunni jġibu ħerba kuljum bi tpattija.

Jista’ jkun li lil Gaddafi u lil uliedu joqtluhom. Iżda la tiżbaljawx ħbieb. Gaddafi għandu miljuni li jadurawh. Fosthom mal-miljun mara li diġà ffurmaw armata u ħalfu fuq il-Koran li lesti li jibqgħu jiġġieldu lil dawk ta’ Bengażi.

Għal dawn l-aħħar 40 sena pajjiżna għex fil-paċi u l-kwiet għax qatt ma ndħalna bejn il-basla u qoxritha.

Jien ilni niftaħ għajnejn il-poplu Malti dwar is-sitwaz-zjoni fil-Libja minn mindu ħadt sehem fil-programm Xarabank sitt xhur ilu.

Dakinhar, kontra kull kur-rent, u rrid ngħid anke b’ħars ikrah minn nies li jħaddnu prinċipji laburisti bħal tiegħi, widdibt li hemm riskju kbir li s-sitwazzjoni fil-Libja tinbidel f’waħda simili għas-Somalja.

Ħaqqaqt li l-Prim Ministru Malti qed jimxi fil-għama meta jagħmel ċerti dikjarazzjonijiet mgħaġġla. Sħaqt li s-sitwazzjoni kienet se ttawwal. Li kien se jinxtered baħar ta’ demm. Li l-qawmien ta’ Bengazi kontra Tripli ma kinetx rewwixta popolari kif kien hemm fl-Eġittu u fit-Tuneżija iżda ġlieda bejn żewġ jew aktar tribujiet għas-supremazija u l-ġid kbir li għandha l-Libja.

Dan l-aħħar kont qed naqra artiklu fil-Wall Street Journal. Żgur li mhux xi ġurnal xellugi. Dan proprjetà ta’ Rupert Murdoch li dan l-aħħar kien f’in-kwiet kbir fl-Ingilterra. Huwa ġurnal li l-ħin kollu jimbotta l-aġenda tal-Punent, speċjalment dik tal-Amerika u l-Iżrael. Job-għod lill-Għarab għall-mewt.

L-artiklu li deher ftit ġim-għat ilu żvela li fejn qegħdin jirbħu dawk li qegħdin jattakkaw lil Gaddafi, qegħdin iħallu xmara ta’ demm. Qegħ-

din joqtlu lis-suwed kollha għax jaħsbu li dawn jappoġ-ġaw lil Gaddafi. L-artiklu sejjaħ dan ‘ethnic cleansing’.

Tafu x’ifisser dan? Li razza sħiħa qiegħda tinqatel minn dawk li jsejħu lilhom infushom ribelli jew ġellieda għal-libertà u d-demokrazija. Rajtu xi ħaġa dwar dan fuq il-BBC, is-CNN u l-El Jazeera? Rajtu xi ħaġa fil-ġurnali tagħna?

Il-fatti huma li fil-Libja mhux veru qamet rewwixta popolari kontra Gaddafi. Nifthemu. Jien m’għandi ebda simpatija ma’ Gaddafi u ma’ kull min hu bħalu. Dan nisħqu kull darba għax ma rrid lil ħadd jaħseb li jien nissimpatizza miegħu.

Iżda min huma dawk ta’

Bengazi? Qatta’ korrotti u ħal-lellin li diġà dawru għexieren ta’ miljuni bil-kummissjonijiet li qegħdin jieħdu mix-xiri tal-armi u bil-bejgħ taż-żejt.

Eżatt bħal dawk l-imbrol-juni li sabu ruħhom Ministri fl-Iraq wara li waqgħa ta’ Saddam Hussein.

Serqu u għadhom jisiru mijiet ta’ miljuni u l-poplu Iraqqin tefgħuh fil-medju evu. Dawn kienu jippoppaw sidirhom li qegħdin jiġġieldu biex iġibu d-demokrazija fi-Iraq. Iżda ma ddejqux tliet xhur ilu, jikkmandaw lis-suldati u lill-pulizija jiftħu n-nar fuq nisa u tfal għax ħarġu jipprotestaw għax m’għandhomx ilma u ikel. Hekk se jġri fil-Libja.

Meta nara l-BBC jew is-CNN u kultant l-El Jazeera (għax anke dawn għandhom l-aġen-da tagħhom) jintervistaw xi ‘ribelli’ u nisma’ wħud minnhom jitkellmu bl-Ingliż Amerikanizzat ngħid ‘Hawn aħna. Għandhom seba’ mitt sena biex ibillu subgħajhom wara li jaqa’ Gaddafi.

Ta’ Bengazi qatt ma ħamluh lil Gaddafi għax ġej minn tribù li dejjem, skont l-istorja, kien imqaffed mat-tribù ta’ Bengażi. It-tribù li ġej minnu Gaddafi huwa iżgħar minn dak ta’ Bengazi. Dawn qatt ma niżżluha li Gaddafi ġej minn tribù żgħir, qed jaħkem fuqhom.

Dan li rridu ngħallmu lill-poplu Malti ħalli jifhem kemm aħna prużuntużi u lagħqa tal-Punent meta nidħlu bejn il-basla u qoxritha.

Kien hemm numru ta’ kumplotti fejn nies minn Bengazi ppruvaw joqtlu lil Gaddafi.

Naturalment Gaddafi u dawk ta’ miegħu m’għamlulux żiżi lil ta’ Bengazi.

Il-poplu Malti jrid jiftaħ għajnejh dwar dawn il-fatti. U bla tlaqlieq ngħid li aħna għandna d-dmir li ngħaddu dak li nafu lill-poplu. Ma nistgħux inċiċċu bil-qegħda. Ma nistgħux noqogħdu nħarsu.

Irridu nkunu aħna li nattak-kaw lill-gvern ta’ Gonzi fiex ġab lil Malta u fiex se jġib lil Malta.

Il-ġlieda fil-Libja se ttwwal aktar milli qegħdin jaħsbu xi wħud. Xi tliet gimgħat ilu kellna buffu mil-Libja li ngħata intervista mis-Sunday Times u qal li kienet kwistjoni ta’ ġranet sa ma Gaddafi jaqa’. Dħaqt u bkejt li gazzetta tal-kalibru tat-Times tagħti widen lil dan, li jien naf min hu.

J’Alla dak li qed ibeżżagħni ma jseħħx. J’Alla wara l-waqgħa ta’ Gaddafi s-sitwazzjoni tiġi għan-normal. Nibża’ li mhux se jiġri hekk. Ta’ Benhgazi diġà qegħdin jiġġieldu bejniethom. Hemm il-ġlied meta għadhom ma rebħux il-bjar taż-żejt. Aħseb u ara x’se jiġri malli jidħlu Tripli.

Sur Editur, kompli iftaħ għajnejn il-poplu. Jgħajruk kemm jgħajruk. Jippruvaw igiddbuk kemm igiddbuk. Fl-aħħar mill-aħħar iż-żejt jitla’ f’wiċċ l-ilma. Għad jgħaddi ż-żmien u l-verità toħroġ. Ikun żvelat li dik veru kienet missilla immirata lejn Malta.

Solidarity with his abdomen, not his brain

2011-11-22T11:54:00.001+01:00

What was that?

I found it quite shocking actually.

Take a look at the comments underneath the Times online story about Austin Gatt's sudden hospitalisation because of abdominal severe pains. Most of the contributors preface their speedy recovery wishes with the same proviso: 'Even though I don't agree with him ...'

How absolutely awful and uncivilised.

Why is it necessary for these men and women to dissociate themselves from Gatt's words and deeds before wishing him well? It is as if their wishes are conditional on the dissociation.

They can bring themselves to wish a speedy recovery to Austin Gatt's abdomen only by bypassing his brain.

Sod(omise) this

2011-11-22T11:26:00.001+01:00

Gabi Calleja

The Malta Gay Rights Movement has justifiable raised a number of valid queries about the PN's suggestive nod towards gay civil unions.

Gabi Calleja, its chairperson, said that a proper civil union is not equivalent to granting cohabitation rights to gay couples. Gay couples, she said, wanted rights related to hospital visits, inheritance, residency for third-country nationals, parenting, filing tax returns and some but not all marital rights.

Ms Calleja is right in calling for clarity in a debate which I suspect will be more divisive and high octane than that about divorce.

One small point, however. I find it quite odd that the representative of Maltese gays has still not condemned Toni Abela, the PL deputy leader, for his KullHadd story denigrating gay men and sodomy in the most homophobic manner.

Two weights, two measures?

When Edward was not a politician

2011-11-21T18:14:00.001+01:00

The previous post included the comments of Edward Scicluna vehemently denying that he called for an increase in taxes on industry.

Be that as it may, here he is in May 2008 on free health care and free education. Can we afford it?

"Niddubita, ghandi id-dubju, ghandi dubbji serji, difficli li tghid li jista’ jkollok sahha ghal kullhadd bl-ahjar medicina ghal kullhadd b’xejn u dan kollu, l-ebda pajjiz."

Should health services be given free for those who cannot afford them?

"Hekk iva. Imma ghal kulhadd, il-hin kollu u minghajr limitu fuq tipo x’tiehu u ma tiehux, fl-ebda pajjiz ma tezisti u ma tistax tezisti hawn."

Sorry, no questions

2011-11-21T14:06:00.001+01:00

Edward Scicluna, one of the more enlightened spokespersons of the Partit Laburista, is now attacking me for putting pretty gentle questions to him.

On Thursday's Bondi+ Scicluna noted that "unlike other European countries Malta sees the full cost of maternity leave being borne by the employers of female workers I also said that in other countries the cost is less burdensome and less discriminatory because it is shared". The glaringly obvious line of questioning - and I needed no prompting to come up with it - was for me to find out where the money was going to come from. For doing so, Scicluna took umbrage. I honestly do not get it.

Here is the Maltastar report.

Scicluna tells Gonzi: stop making silly claims and focus on the serious business of reducing public debt and make the economy grow

Labour MEP said Monday afternoon: “I strongly refute the claim by the Prime Minister that to reduce the debt I am in favour of increasing taxes. This is completely baseless and is meant as just a ploy to deflect attention.”

Scicluna said that during the Budget debate carried by the media he has written articles, given interviews and appeared on a number of TV programmes. “Thanks to today’s technology, these contributions are accessible to all and can be checked as to their contents. I therefore challenge the Prime Minister to quote the exact words I said which in his fertile imagination he construed as my having advised taxation increases on industry at this time of our economic situation.”

Scicluna went on to say “The only occasion that an interviewer tried to put words in my mouth to that effect was, surprise surprise, the Bondi+ programme which discussed the extension of the maternity leave. When I remarked that unlike other European countries Malta sees the full cost of maternity leave being borne by the employers of female workers I also said that in other countries the cost is less burdensome and less discriminatory because it is shared. At this point the interviewer, visibly and audibly prompted by the Minister of Finance Tonio Fenech, asked me whether I am suggesting that the cost be added to the National Insurance (NI).

“I replied that this is not what I am suggesting. With continued badgering on this point I continued repeating several times that this burden already exists on industry, so no new burdens are being suggested. Sharing an existing burden does not add any taxes or NI. It is one way to make the existing burden lighter on the employers. Being solely an employers’ matter it is obvious that this would have to be solved among themselves, and not imposed by the government.”

Scicluna said that his detailed description of how the European Commission will be looking at the government’s Budget following the Warning Letter, and that the debt ratio which is forecasted to continue rising should have been the budget’s concern, surely did not go down well with the Prime Minister.

Scicluna concluded: “It is very obvious that the government is getting hysterical because it is in a tight spot. The situation we are now in is the accumulation of many past economic mistakes. It will be more worthwhile for the Prime Minister to heed E.U. Commissioner Ohlin Rhen’s Warning Letter where the Government, by December, has to show that its fiscal measures are “sufficient”, “permanent”, and “convincing”. By deflecting attention from its chores by inventing silly claims like the one above, will not make its political and economic problems go away.”

Luciano's catch

2011-11-21T12:06:00.001+01:00

Luciano Busuttil

Luciano Busuttil, the Partit Laburista spokesperson on European Affairs, uploaded the following three comments in Maltese on facebook. My response to each is in English.

1. "illum m'hawnx 11000 qiegheda imma aktar minn 12000 u hafna minn dawk li jahdmu ghandhom xoghol prekarju minn xahar ghal xahar." Malta has the fifth lowest unemployment rate in Europe.

2. "qabel kelna l'catch. dak iz-zmien ma kienx hawn ghazla imma l-maltin ghal bicca cikkulata kellhom il.flus biex jaqbdu ajruplan u jmorru jixtruwha minn barra. illum la flus m'ghad fadal u ftit zmien iehor anqas ajruplani." Not true. More Maltese people travel more frequently today than at any point in the history of this country. As for 'Catch', the less said the better.

3. "id-dawl jinqata. ejja marsaxlokk u ma' l-ewwel halba xita tas-sena jkun hawn blackout. infakkrek li l-aghar blackouts nazzjonali ta' l-istorja graw matul dawn l-ahhar snin." Electricity black outs are a national disgrace and should be a thing of the past. That is why we treated the issue on Bondi+ a number of times.

Toni Abela calls for sodomy

2011-11-21T10:13:00.001+01:00

Toni Abela: moderate & progressive

Toni Abela, the deputy leader of the Partit Laburista, is politically and legally responsible for the party's sunday newspaper KullHadd.

Yesterday he ran a story criticising Natalino Fenech, TVM's head of news. The story had the following headline: "Mur sib xi Grieg Natalino Fenech".

Transposing from the vernacular, this amounts to the deputy leader of a government in waiting calling on a journalist to seek a man to sodomise him.

Give yourself 10 seconds to get over the vulgarity and crassness of such a comment uttered by the deputy leader of a political party.

Give yourself another 10 seconds to get over the fact that this is a party which is supposed to be shedding a bright liberal light on this nation.

Then concentrate on a third matter. The Partit Laburista first ghettoised gay people into a political cell called LGBT. In itself this was already a denigration of people with alternative sexual orientations. It is as if these people think with their genitals, not their brains.

Now, adding insult to injury, Toni Abela is standing outside that LGBT cell, mocking and insulting gay men in terms reminiscent of the Dark Ages.

Will the Malta Gay Rights Movement remain silent?

Not quite Jack Daniel's

2011-11-18T11:08:00.002+01:00

Looking back on a quarter of a century of having the Partit Laburista on the opposition benches, it is not difficult to pick out a range of spectacularly consistent mistakes explaining its predicament.

No matter how many elections they lose - 5 out of the last 6, plus the EU referendum - and no matter how many leaders they change - 3 - they are the embodiment of one of the best slogans ever invented: 'Some Things Never Change. Jack Daniel's Is One Of Them.' The slight difference is that, unlike Jack, the PL persists in error. Not necessarily ideological or even political. Just tactical. Here's one of them.

Previous Labour leaders have systematically opposed all key PN government policies, independently of their merit. A back of an envelope list would read something like this: import liberalisation, pluralism in broadcasting, local councils, political party participation in local councils, privatization, Partnership for Peace, VAT, EU membership, the building of Mater Dei, every President ever appointed. I could go one but you get the drift.

Eventually, and as sure as night follows day, either stark political reality or voters at the polls force the Partit Laburista to recognise their mistake. Frantically, and with a mob of activists verging on political schizophrenia in tow, they start embracing what they originally rejected. In each and every case. Life moves on until the PL finds yet another key PN policy to oppose. And the cycle begins again.

Is Joseph Muscat falling in this tactical rut as well? When he was elected to lead the party he gave signals suggesting that he was not. Today, the evidence suggests that he has. Rather than draw up a list of key PN policies he opposed, I invite you to draw up a list with the ones he embraced. I guarantee that it will be short and insignificant in the general political scheme of things.

I can already hear dissenting responses coming my way. Isn't the democratic role of the Opposition to oppose? How could Joseph Muscat be the prime minister in waiting if all he does is silently wait till election time?

True, but not fully.

First, the unyeilding routine of opposing everything desensitises swathes of thinking people to the key difference between what Labour thinks is fundamental and what isn't. When the PL carpet bombs the public with ten press releases and several speeches a week, all having the same scorched earth tone against GonziPN, the net effect is that it all sounds predictable, just poltical noise.

Secondly, harsh, categoric and knee jerk opposition narrows down future options. And as a rule of thumb that is never a good idea in politics. In the past and today, the PL treats every policy as if it were a boxing ring in which it instinctively takes up the spot diagonally across from government. At PL clubs on a Sunday morning this tactic draws enthusiastic applause. But when the PL leader peers over its shoulder the next day he realises that he's in a corner. Yet again. And applause is replaced by deathly silence.

Finally, when Labour paints a black and white world, people and the media invariably turn their attention directly to the Mile End glass palace for immediate black and white answers. If Joseph Muscat keeps repeating that Lawrence Gonzi has all the wrong answers to current political challenges, it stands to reason that they expect Joseph Muscat to have all the right ones. On everything. And that is very, very slippery ground for a political leader to occupy.

Ground control to major Tom (Bowie)

2011-11-17T16:33:00.001+01:00

Some, perhaps many, still harbour the illusion that the financial crisis is happening in another universe, rather than in this world and on our continent.

Perhaps the story below, uploaded just hours ago, might jog them out of their stupor. The crisis is now, literally, at our doorstep.

PALERMO - Precari, studenti medi e universitari stanno manifestando a Palermo per dire no alla crisi economica. Nella giornata internazionale di mobilitazione studentesca tre cortei stanno sfilando per le vie del centro cittadino.

Da piazza Verdi è partito, con in testa lo striscione 'Politici di tutti i colori sindacalisti venduti, imprenditori e banchieri cacciamoli tutti', il corteo, organizzato dai ragazzi dello studentato autogestito Anomalia, di OccupyUnipa e della Rete degli studenti medi. Secondo gli organizzatori, alla manifestazione 'Blocchiamo tutto day' stanno partecipando, circa 5 mila persone. Da piazza Politeama, invece, è partito il corteo degli studenti della rete dei collettivi. Un'altra manifestazione riguarda invece Cobas e Cub, contro possibili manovre del nuovo governo che potrebbero portare a tagli a redditi, pensioni e salari.

I manifestanti hanno lanciato uova e fumogeni contro sedi di banche, hanno scritto sui muri e hanno tentato di occupare la sede dell'istituto San Paolo a Palermo ma sono stati caricati dalle forze dell'ordine. Uno dei manifestanti che protesta perché non ha la casa è stato ferito alla testa. Sui muri dell'agenzia dell'entrate alcuni giovani hanno scritto "Ladri ridateci i nostri soldi".

Sui muri di una sede giovanile del Pdl è stato scritto "Tutti a casa governi di merda" e i locali sono stati danneggiati. Contro la sede del Banco di Sicilia in via Roma sono state lanciate uova e fumogeni. Il corteo si è ricompattato in via Roma dove si sono svolte altre cariche delle forze dell'ordine che hanno usato spray urticanti perché i manifestanti hanno cominciato a lanciare sassi e fumogeni.

Un gruppo di ragazzi, alcuni con il casco e a volto coperto, hanno insultato gli agenti e hanno cominciato il lancio di oggetti tra cui un mattone. La polizia è intervenuta caricando a più riprese gli studenti. Nel corso dei tafferugli, è stato ferito anche un passante.

This boat is not sinking

2011-11-17T12:18:00.001+01:00

I just came across three rather interesting facts about Maltese people who opt for cruise ship holidays.

Fact 1: Over a 12 month period, about 17,000 Maltese people took a such a trip lasting an average of a week.

Fact 2: They entered an average of 5 ports of call during each trip, spending about €60 a head in each one. In other words, apart from the cost of the trip itself - which is usually all inclusive - these 17,000 Maltese people spent an additional €5.1 million.

Fact 3: 1.8% of Europeans take cruise ship holidays. 4% of Maltese people do.

And this during a recession.

A reality check for Nicola Abela Garrett

2011-11-16T15:22:00.001+01:00

Watch Sky news tomorrow night and you'll see what 50,000 Irish university students would have been up to during the day.

Press Release

Massive student protests in Ireland against dramatic budget cuts

DUBLIN – An estimated 50,000 Irish students will hit the streets of Dublin on 16 November in an attempt to avert a dramatic increase of their tuition fees. The Irish government is expected to announce an increase in their budget plans, on 7 December. Tuition fees in Ireland currently stand at 2,000 euro. Chairperson of the European Students’ Union (ESU) Allan Päll said: “We strongly oppose this development which runs across students all over the European continent. Reduced public financing will lead to extra financial burdens for students. Eventually this will lead to less people being able to study. Is this really what the Irish government wants?"

Aengus Ó Maoláin, Education Officer from the Union of Students (USI) in Ireland –ESU member - said: “Before the general elections, the Labour Party and Fine Gael promised not to increase fees or cut grants. Thousands of students voted for these parties for that reason. And now, when the students are most in need, those same parties are turning their back on us”.

Dublin looks also set reduce the already inadequate funding for disadvantaged students by a measure of several percent. This happens in response to the European Central Bank’s extreme cost cutting measures imposed on Ireland after a hostile bailout by the EU-ECB-IMF troika in 2010. The campaign website from USI can be found here: www.stopfees.ie.

-- END ---

Published: 16 November 2011

For more information, please contact:Allan Päll, ESU Chairperson: +32/479.591.499 or allan@esu-online.org

Aengus Ó Maoláin, Education Officer from the Union of Students (USI), +353833723161

Marianne Slegers, ESU Communications Manager: +32/473.669.894 or marianne@esu-online.org

He loves you, he really does

2011-11-16T12:17:00.001+01:00

What is it about facebook that makes people try to pass themselves off as someone they clearly are not and when the ploy is so obviously transparent?

We don't live in the United States of America or China where no one beyond your small circle of work colleagues and friends knows who you are.

This is Malta with a population of less than half a million. People and their faces are known, especially if you've made a couple of appearances in the media. And if you are not known, a couple of phone calls will do the trick.

So here is Ronnie Pellegrini on facebook: "Good Morning - Take all your chances while you can, because you never know when they'll pass you by.?" And to accompany this thought he put up the stomach-churning design above.

I have spoken to people who used to be terrorised by Ronnie Pellegrini when he was Lorry Sant's thug. Thirty years later he's back in the Partit Laburista trying to pass himself off as a new age guru decked out in rays of light and nauseating heart designs.

Click like.

Ronnie: 'Your village needs you'

2011-11-16T11:34:00.001+01:00

Ronnie Pellegrini: pink works better than red on me

Someone whispered in my ear that the Partit Laburista has entrusted Ronnie Pellegrini with an important mission.

I suppose that walking up and down Valletta's Republic Street all morning hardly justifies extracting a salary from the ftit-minghand-il-hafna coffers.

So what is Ronnie's mission?

My information is that the Partit Laburista has tasked him with the mission of recruiting candidates for the upcoming local council elections.

Ah, how the mighty ones of the 1980s have fallen.

From Lorry Sant's thug to persuading Mario and Rita that their village needs them.

Edward talks about pigs

2011-11-15T16:19:00.001+01:00

Edward Scicluna

Edward Scicluna, a Labour Member of the European Parliament, wrote the following article in today's The Times. It is choc-a-bloc with very valuable insights.

The deepest one, if you care to join the dots, is that Malta's economic and financial policy should be a national effort, not a partisan one.

Eurozone’s economic taboo

Two and a half years ago, we used to call them jokingly and somewhat affectionately PIGS or PIIGS. Not anymore.

The predicament which Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece and Spain are now passing through is no longer a joke. Each one in turn has tried hard to avoid the limelight and stay off the financial markets’ radar screen. Their exorbitant debts tell of each country a different story. Some debts were of long standing (Italy and Greece), others were a result of the financial crisis and its aftermath (Ireland, Portugal and Spain).

Ireland apart, each country, however, suffered from a common ailment: lack of competitiveness and sluggish growth, which kept festering for a decade protected and abetted by a veil of eurozone respectability and stoked by an undeserving low interest rate. By the end of this month we can say that, over this year, each one of these countries would have shared another common trait. They all would have experienced a change of government in some form or other.

Whatever political hues the ruling party or ruling coalition were, they would have suffered the same fate.

Their leaders would have resigned or been deposed, with many pushed into an election before its constitutional due date.

Most of these bloodless coups occurred around the time parliamentary approval of their respective budgets was being sought. All of them resisted successfully the push from the fiercely fought street protests, criticism from the opposition and from within their own party.

And, yet, the ousting of Prime Minister Brian Cowen and his Fianna Fail in Ireland in late February was followed by the resignation of Josè Socrates and his socialist party in Portugal in early June.

Last week, it was the Greek socialist leader Georges Papandreou’s turn to give way to a respected economist Lucas Papademos to take charge of a unity government while Italy’s Silvio Berlusconi is promising the same to the likes of respected academics such as Mario Monti. Later this month, it will be Spain’s turn to hand over the government to the opposition party after the announcement, last April, that Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero would not stand again for elections.

One could explain this phenomenon as an obvious response to the suffering electorate as a result of the austerity packages “negotiated” on their behalf by their elected government with their eurozone paymasters.

However, a close look at each country will show that this is not the case. Yes, of course, cracks did start to appear along the whole edifice of each ruling party. But the coup de grâce was not served by the electorate, nor by the opposition but by the financial markets.

The financial markets have managed to bring down to its knees any country they do not trust. Once the lack of trust gets translated into a reluctance to buy and support the country’s debt, this then results in raising the cost of capital beyond a rate that makes the national debt burden unsustainable. Italy’s 10-year bond yield rose to 6.77 per cent last week, which translates into a spread (or risk premium over the German nearly riskless yield) of nearly five per cent.

The powers of the European Central Bank to buy bonds from the secondary market of these countries manage somewhat to restrict this widening of these spreads but would not be able stop them.

Beyond a certain point, the political leader of any country, however strong and stubborn, would be unable to resist the tsunami of global pressure that pushes relentlessly towards the country’s default. In that situation the country has no alternative but to ask for a bailout whether from the IMF or, in the case of a eurozone member, a joint IMF/EFSF one.

A bailout means that the indebted country will be at the mercy of its creditors. What these creditors ask is a severe an austerity programme able to cut the outstanding debt as quickly as possible to sustainable proportions. In the IMF annals, many were the countries brought to this situation. Most of them grit their teeth and bear it in a stoic way.

Recent examples are Lithuania, Ireland and Iceland. Other countries with Mediterranean blood flowing through their veins do the opposite.

This scares the creditors and sows grave doubts in their minds that the bitter medicine will not be accepted. Creditors do have lots of power over the debtors but they know that it is not in their interest to drive the debtors into a default. So they push and interfere as much as possible in the governance of the country to ensure compliance with their recommendations without triggering a disorderly default. Such scenes of IMF and other leading banks’ delegations visiting a poor “banana republic” are familiar. What is not familiar is that these scenes are starting to take place in the Europe. Chaperons are being appointed for both Greece and Italy. Oli Rhen now even wants the commitment from these countries “in writing”. This attitude will, no doubt, be resented by many a proud country knowing that the alternative is much worse.

Having the opportunity to meet with German Minister Wolfgang Schauble last week I had to ask the question. Austerity programmes for indebted countries are understandable but since Europe is on the brink of a recession surely the creditor countries with surpluses and strong finance can afford to do something about it?

He looked at me with alarming eyes. He said: “Look here, we are under attack! When the markets turn their eyes away from us, to a non-eurozone country such as the… UK or the States then we can breathe easier and talk about public expenditures. For now such words should be unthinkable let alone whispered”.

The message was loud and clear. In the eurozone, at the moment, such words should be considered as economic taboo. Who mentioned growth?

Butt hose in arrears?

2011-11-15T14:30:00.001+01:00

Yo bro, gotta a hose?

Ah, the English language. It can give you so much pleasure. But be warned. Make a mistake and it will instantly turn on you with varying degrees of viciousness.

Even putting a space in the wrong place can cause linguistic self-immolation.

The Times online is running a story on the budget. It contains the following sentence.

"Revenue from TV licences will drop to €2.5 million from €4m this year. The licence will be abolished next year, butt hose in arrears still have to pay up."

Detach a 't' from 'those', stick it at the end of 'but' and we leave the territory of TV licences.

In an instant, the unmerciful English language transports us to a gay leather bar in Harlem.

And the word 'arrears' takes on a completely different meaning.

No direction home

2011-11-15T11:09:00.001+01:00

Rock & roll will forever be a walking, or rather strutting, contradiction.

Is it art or commerce, raw passion or introspection in faded jeans, poetry in pelvic motion or a great swindle, as the Sex Pistols put it when they weren't busy spitting at their audiences?

Are Elvis, the Beatles, Bob Dylan and the Rolling Stones a small, non-descript valley in the panoramic history of western music? Or do they stand on a majestic snow-peaked mountain eyeballing Bach, Mozart and Beethoven standing on the one behind them?

What is this thing called rock & roll anyway, this musical bastard conceived somewhere deep in the Mississippi delta by the most unlikely of parents?

Elvis was its pioneer, The Beatles its geniuses and the Stones its energy. Seeing Dylan live last weekend drove a simple point home. All these attributes are elusively wrapped in the musical soul and being of this one man. Now you see one, now you see the other. But never for long enough to allow you to pin him down.

Dylan's songs sound simultaneously ancient and modern. His words are mesmerising without ever giving a clue why they are.

You close your eyes and his growling voice could be that of a drunken pirate stumbling back to ship after a night at the harbour whore house.

But it could also be the young voice of an 'alternative' singer-songwriter strumming his guitar in a New York loft today. All of a sudden he realises that he's just stumbled on a magical new galaxy in rock & roll's aging universe. Just like a certain Robert Zimmerman did four decades earlier.

Bob Dylan was and will always be alternative. Because he's always been an alternative to himself.

"How does it feel
To be on your own
With no direction home
Like a complete unknown
Like a rolling stone"

Pure rock & roll.