Re: Truth, how Stupid can International Herald Tribune get???

Mr tan Liang Hong show some guts and face
the muzic before they throw you out of your
cuckoo nest.


"truth" <truth@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:yoNBi.28794$4A1.13764@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
I will do it if u can stop licking the arses of the pap.


"." <.@xxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:fb805b$9n0$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
If you feel so strongly that what he
writes is wrong, prove it, after
showing proof sue him so that
he would have to apologoise
to you. Show the world that a
bankrupt like you know that
others don't. Or are you just
letting off hot air. Mr Tan Liang Hong

"truth" <truth@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:XuMBi.28760$4A1.6019@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Have u live thru the era ?
Have the journalist live thru to
era to classify it as malaria infested ?
How about now ? We can called
the present Singapore as DENGUE
INFESTED.
Is Malaria worst that the SARS outbreak
which sent the whole pap government
into a panic.
For every foreign journalist who wrote
glowing tribute to Lee Kuan Yew there is
a more independent one that write the opposite.
Lee Kuan Yew with his US$trillions can very
well be owning the companies which controlled
these newspaper.


"." <.@xxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:fb7bl1$91i$1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Truth can you proof the IHT is not telling the TRUTH, like you do????

SINGAPORE: Lee Kuan Yew, who turned a malarial island into a modern
financial center with a first world skyline, is peering ahead again
into
this city-state's future, this time with plans to seal it off with
dikes
against the rising tides of global warming.

"Let's start thinking about it now," he said during an interview last
week, in what could be the motto for a lifetime of nation building.
Ever
since its difficult birth in 1965, when it was expelled from
Malaysia,
he said, Singapore has struggled to stay alive in a sea of economic
and
political forces beyond its control.

"If the water goes up by three, four, five meters," he said,
laughing,
"what will happen to us? Half of Singapore will disappear."

For all his success, Lee remains on the alert for perils that may
exist
only on the distant horizon: the rising role of China in the region
as
the United States looks the other way, the buffeting of the world
economy, even climate change.

Vigorous and strong-minded and on the verge of his 84th birthday, Lee
talked at length about his country's vulnerabilities, its slow
movement
toward a more open, worldly society and the influence of China, India
and the United States in world affairs.

A British-educated lawyer, Lee is one of Asia's remarkable
personalities, a world figure whose guest book is filled with the
names
of international political and financial leaders.

His creation, modern Singapore, is an economic powerhouse with one of
the world's highest per capita incomes, high-quality schools, health
care and public services that have made it a magnet for global labor.
Foreigners make up roughly a fifth of its 4.5 million residents.

In his office in the former headquarters of the island's British
colonial rulers, Lee sat back in a zippered blue jacket, sipping
small
cups of hot water and laughing often, as different as could be from
the
bare-knuckled political infighter he has described himself as.

"I've done my bit," said Lee, who stepped down as prime minister in
1990
and now watches over the country - and occasionally takes part in
political disputes - with a seat in the cabinet and the title of
minister mentor. His eldest son, Lee Hsien Loong, is prime minister.

"To understand Singapore," he said, "you've got to start off with an
improbable story: It should not exist." It is a nation with almost no
natural resources, without a common culture, a fractured mix of
Chinese,
Malays and Indians, relying on its wits to stay afloat and prosper.

"We have survived so far, 42 years," he said. "Will we survive for
another 42? It depends upon world conditions. It doesn't depend on us
alone."

This sense of vulnerability is Lee's answer to all his critics, to
those
who say his country is too tightly controlled, that it leashes the
press, suppresses free speech, curtails democracy, tramples on
dissidents and stunts entrepreneurship and creativity in its
citizens.

"The answer lies in our genesis," he said. "To survive, we have to do
these things. And although what you see today - the superstructure of
a
modern city - the base is a very narrow one and could easily
disintegrate."

Asked whether, looking back, he felt he might have gone too far in
crushing his opponents, sometimes with ruinous lawsuits, sometimes
with
long jail terms, he answered, "No, I don't think so. I never killed
them. I never destroyed them. Politically, they destroyed
themselves."

One of his concerns now, Lee said, is that the United States has
become
so preoccupied with the Middle East that it is failing to look ahead
and
plan in this part of the world.

"I think it's a real drag slowing down adjusting to the new
situation,"
he said, a lapse that worries Southeast Asian countries that count on
Washington to balance the rising economic and diplomatic power of
China.

"Without this draining of energy, attention and resources for Iraq,
Iran, Lebanon, Israel, Palestine, there would have been deep thinking
about the long-term trends - working out possible options that the
U.S.
could exercise to change the direction of long-term trends more in
its
favor," Lee said.

American diplomats in the region insist that the United States has
not
turned its back on Southeast Asia, noting that high-level visits
continue, from President George W. Bush, from cabinet secretaries and
from the military.

That may be true on a day-to-day basis, Lee said, "because of the
machine."

"Your ambassadors are here," he said. "Your chambers of commerce are
here. Your State Department, trade and Treasury and so on, they are
on
the ball in keeping the shop going."

The continued U.S. dominance in the region can be seen in the weight
of
its economy. Lee said that if its current market problems lead to a
slowdown in domestic consumption, all Asian economies will shrink.

Even China's vigorous quest for raw materials in the region, he said,
is
driven in large part by the United States, which along with Europe is
the main market for Chinese products.

As the United States focuses on the Middle East, Lee said, the
Chinese
are busy refining their policies and building the foundations of more
cooperative long-term relationships in Asia. "They are making
strategic
decisions on their relations with the region," he said.

And this is where tiny Singapore sees itself as a model for the
world's
most-populous country. "They've got to be like us," Lee said, "with a
very keen sense of what is possible, and what is not."

Every year, he said, Chinese ministers meet twice with Singaporean
ministers to learn from their experience. Fifty mayors of Chinese
cities
visit every three months for courses in city management.

Singapore's secret, Lee said, is that it is "ideology free," an
unsentimental pragmatism that infuses the workings of the country as
if
it were in itself an ideology.

"Does it work?" Lee said. "Let's try it and if it does work, fine,
let's
continue it. If it doesn't work, toss it out, try another one."

The yardstick, he said, is, "is this necessary for survival and
progress? If it is, let's do it."

Hoping to attract more tourists, for example, Singapore is building
two
huge casinos, despite Lee's expressed distaste for them.

"I don't like casinos," he said. "but the world has changed and if we
don't have an integrated resort like the ones in Las Vegas - Las
Vegas
Sands - we'll lose.

"So, let's go," he said. "Let's try and still keep it safe and
mafia-free and prostitution-free and money-laundering-free. Can we do
it? I'm not sure, but we're going to give it a good try."

Even on social issues, themes he habitually argues with an
aggressiveness that can seem inflexible, Lee sounded almost mellow.

"I think we have to go in whatever direction world conditions dictate
if
we are to survive and to be part of this modern world," he said. "If
we
are not connected to this modern world, we are dead. We'll go back to
the fishing village we once were."

For example, on the issue of homosexuality, he said, "we take an
ambiguous position. We say, O.K., leave them alone, but let's leave
the
law as it is for the time being and let's have no gay parades."

Although gay sex remains technically illegal in Singapore, the
government has indicated it will not actively enforce the law.

China, Hong Kong and Taiwan already have more liberal policies
regarding
gays, he noted. "It's a matter of time," he said. "But we have a part
Muslim population, another part conservative older Chinese and
Indians.
So, let's go slowly. It's a pragmatic approach to maintain social
cohesion."

As for the set of "Asian values" of hierarchy, respect and order that
Singapore is founded on, he said, "It's already diluted and we can
see
it in the difference between the generations. It's inevitable."

In his own family, generational values are changing. From father to
children to grandchildren, he said, command of the Chinese language
had
weakened, along with the culture it embodies.

"They had a basic set of traditional Confucian values," he said of
his
children, two sons and a daughter. "Not my grandchildren."

One grandson has just begun his studies at Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, he said; the other is heading to the Wharton School of
the
University of Pennsylvania.

This well-educated younger generation is part of what Lee said was a
social dichotomy in which the top 20 percent is as cosmopolitan as
any -
well educated, surfing the Internet, traveling the world without
constraint. "This is not a closed society," he insisted.

But at the same time, he said, the government must protect the less
well-off, less well-educated people from information that might upset
or
confuse them - people "who are not finding it so comfortable to
suddenly
find the world changed, their world, their sense of place, their
sense
of position in society."

These are the people who he said had to be pulled into the future as
he
seeks to make Singapore "a first world oasis in a third world
region."

"We built up the infrastructure," he said. "The difficult part was
getting the people to change their habits so that they behaved more
like
first world citizens, not like third world citizens spitting and
littering all over the place."

So Singapore embarked on what he called "campaigns to do this,
campaigns
to do that."

Do not chew gum. Do not throw garbage from rooftops. Speak good
English.
Smile. Perform spontaneous acts of kindness.

Paradoxically, he said, if Singapore had not been so poor it might
never
have transformed itself and prospered as it has. His warnings about
vulnerability and collapse are a constant theme to persuade his
people
to accept limits on their freedoms.

"Supposing we had oil and gas, do you think I could get the people to
do
this? No," he said. "If I had oil and gas I'd have a different
people,
with different motivations and expectations."

"It's because we don't have oil and gas and they know that we don't
have, and they know that this progress comes from their efforts," he
said. "So please do it and do it well."

International Herald Tribune Copyright (c) 2007 The International
Herald
Tribune | www.iht










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