I don’t have anything to criticise the public policy as much as many local political bloggers. This is because from the angle of an independent political observer (in this case — an emerging Radical Centrist) these public policies are just like any policies. Confused? Policies will bring benefits. But thanks to how the universe works (or some prefer to call it — God’s wisdom), ‘good’ policies have there bads. Still Confused? Because whatever that brings good, brings bad too, and vice-versa. Now, are the policies really that bad? Or are you bad at looking at policies. You better realise this by now.

No. I don’t mean you are not bad at looking at policies per se, you are just politically bias. Politically illiterate? Okay, there is such a spectrum in politics, and in such a spectrum lies 2 popular category — conservative and liberal. A conservative will criticise a liberal politics, and vice-versa. Conservatives trade individual security for individual freewill, liberals do the opposite. Liberal sacrifice free market for workers’ right, conservatives do the opposite. Many conservatives are fundamental, some liberals are radical.

In Singapore, Singapore Democratic Party is a liberal party (the name ‘Democratic’ is a bit misleading). Which due relativity, automatically makes their opponent party, the People’s Action Party, a conservative party. The Democrats are trying (very hard) to create a bipartisan political platform here in Singapore, ill-inspired by the already problematic political system in the United States. This is shown by the critical attitude the party have on conservative policies in Singapore (e.g. homosexual bans, public gathering laws, social welfare, internal security laws, etc.)

Indeed, this polices do make the actionists seems conservative. However, from time to time I see them coming out with policies that surprise me. Policies like compulsory saving through CPF, tactical vehicle reduction through ERP, nationalized education through MOE, social bail out through ERS, free opposition seats through NCMP and the list goes on. I must admit these people are just as pragmatic as our executives in the business industries. I agree that some of these policies make our nation seems like a business project. I am confused and that won’t motivate me to praise their policies.

People in the United States are slowly being enlighten — bipartisan politic is a becoming waste of time. In bipartisan politics, politicians merely engage in idealistic debate yet fail to solve any real problem. For example: (1) Liberal replace every traces of oil dependency for renewable sources, while convervatives want things to stay the way it is. A person with common sense knows that oil is there to stay for least the next decade, but there is no harm developing renewable sources to steadily cut down on this dependency. (2) Conservative believes in a free market for everything, including education, something which liberal argues against. Liberal feels that a market driven educational system produces bad teachers, who are interested in making money instead of teaching. Conversative blames the bad teachers on public schools, who are by-product of noncompetition. Now, common sense tells us that the real problem is not private school nor government school, but simply bad teachers.

Once we break out of the bipartisan trap, we can take an objective view on any problem. This ‘Common sense’ politics they call it: the third-way political philosophy, which aims to replace their old bipartisanship.

Now, we have this Singapore Democrat who seems to be bringing us into the old mistake of United States and other Western liberal nations. Almost everything our democrats avocates are classical examples of liberal (not democratic) political ideology. For example: (1) Nationalisation of Health Care, in contrast to the current Health Care Privatisation the government is moving towards. (2) Lightening the CPF regulation, Singapore’s form of social security, which our government use to control proverty. Therefore, I won’t write things to praise these people either.

You see, who can I write for?

—
ADOLF LAM, flying off to Taipei

Part 2:

[ TheCorporation.com ] Corporations started off as capitalists’ answer to public funded initiative. Corporations then, like today, carry out tasks to fullfill there corporate goals, like building of public roads, water infrastructures, etc. Later, law reforms in the United States granted corporations legal human right, which since allows them to grow into today’s giant economic powerbase. Corporations today control many of our daily necessity — we become dependent on them. This award winning documentary will make you realise what your favourite corporation really is, what it really wants and what it really turning the world into.

Motivation is always associated with a goal, a goal which we think will bring us happiness. With that goal, our mind can have a clear plan and direction, which in turn push us into action.

Motivation controls all our action and therefore we cannot not be motivated. In another words, when we ‘lack motivation’, we merely ‘lack motivation in‘ a specific task. For example: We are always motivated to eat, because we know the taste of food bring us joy. We are motivated to sleep, because we know we are more energetic after that. On the other hand, we are not motivated to work because our negative predictions (e.g. punishments, confusion, boredom, fear of failure, etc) make us resistance, in order to protect our happiness. Incentives does motivates us by out weighting those negative predictions. Country, family and friends, like incentives, can be also be external factors that motivates us. However, incentives does not address the ‘lack of motivation in doing things‘ (or the spirit to move on), what that demotivates at the first place.

In ideal situation, when we are not happy with what we are doing, we always find something else that do. However, reality is never close to ideal. If we cannot change what we are doing, we must change our thinking about doing it. The challenge is to make ourselves happy about doing something we use not to, and that is the challenge of life.

– ADOLF LAM, forced to write about motivation.

—
But like as-if. Talking is famous for being much easier than doing. Sigh.

[911weknow.com] Are you sure you are told the truth about september 11?

Friday, we officially completed the 28km march around Singapore followed by the passing out parade. No more a Chao Private. Just overnight, we are 2 ranks higher. The feeling of having the same if not higher rank than some of the perm staff is indeed, weird.

This course was indeed a memorable one. The most valuable thing is that: I have a section I can trust. Right from the first day, everyone of us did our part to keep the section running. During tough times, while the rest of the platoon were looking for someone to blame for the sorrow, we never fail to motivate one another. I will never forget these people whom I sweated and laughed with during my trainee days. I believe when asked, all of us will say that they are proud to be part of The Section. To those who were posted out — Corporals, all the best.

-With Pride We Lead.

Private Lam YongXian
Golf Platoon 1 Section 1
48TH BSLC

(Play “WOSpec Journey” by SWI)

Happy 43rd Birthday Singapore =)

“Whats wrong with our people now adays…” -Common Question

[revolution-os.com] Introducing the concept of free software and its philosophy, all in a single documentary. It features interviews with prominent hackers such as Richard Stallman, Michael Tiemann, Linus Torvalds, Larry Augustin, Eric S. Raymond, Bruce Perens, Frank Hecker and Brian Behlendorf. It talks about the history of free software, open source, GNU project, Linux and their effort against the spread of proprietary software model.

[theresonanceproject.org] Using modern technology and clues from ancient philosophies, Nassim Haramein and his team of scientist explain fundamental pattern of division — fundamental pattern of creation. This project can ultimately solve millions of problems facing our world today by unifying the ancient wisdom and cutting edge scientific research.

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