December 05, 2007

Singapore-Israel A political comparison

Double Take said:

He [Shimon Peres] wrote: “In my opinion, there was an accumulation of events and processes that together brought about Labour’s downfall. In general, movements of social reform reach peaks – and then slowly sink into sloth and fatigue.

Power provides comfort and security, but it also steadily erodes and corrupts. People in power begin to enjoy the trappings and benefits of power, often falling into self-pity and self-justification.

They harp on how hard they work and on how heavy a responsibility they must shoulder.

They become insensitive to one of the infallible principles of politics in a democracy: the more one enjoys wielding power, the likelier one is to lose it….

Party machines and party hierarchies, created originally to serve the noblest goals, become bloated and parasitical in the eyes of the people….

The fire that burned in the bones of the founding fathers abated with time.

Even these great social experiments (the collective kibbutz and co-operative moshav) began to pall, radiating elitism, selfishness and apathy, rather than concern for and involvement in the problems of society.”

Recommended by at82: "Historically, Singapore has been in much less danger of annihilation than Israel. Yet Israel has a functioning democracy, which allows opposing political parties to replace each other in government. What has stopped Singapore from enjoying this “luxury”?"

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Submitted by at82 on December 04//12:36pm and published by shianux, Angelique :: 3479 reads | trackback
Comments 9

Ridz,

"Never an Israeli PM ever achieve peace with its Arab neighbours except Rabin"
Not true. See Menahem Begin in 1977. Peace with Egypt. An alleged right-wing extremist PM who was the first to give up territory for peace.
Rabin achieved a failed peace accord with the palestinians which only increased violence in the area for the past decade.
He was not murdered by mad extremist. He was murdered by an asshole megalomaniac extremist who thought he could stop a dangerous peace process.
The peace accord with Jordan signed shortly after Oslo was a consequence of the Jordanian minority monarchy afraid of Israel concluding a deal with the palestinians behind their back, as palestinians constitute aprrox. 80 percents of the kingdoms population.
Israeli politics is crap, yes. Leaders have been declared to be the next Messiah only to be scorned in public a mere few months afterwards. It is a part of a very harsh and brutal form of jewish self criticism.
Israel has a whole lot more to learn, yes.
But I sense a hostility in your words for a country which I doubt you know much about.

Posted by Anonymous Coward* on 16 December, 2007 - 8:53pm

Technically LKY is Singapore's only PM.

Posted by Anonymous Cow* on 8 December, 2007 - 12:40pm

Israel's political arena is still developing not as much developed as Singapore's. Over the course of 6 decades since Israel's creation, Israelis have had 12 Prime Ministers quadrapled that of Singapore, which as we know only had 3. (LKY, GCT, LHL)
For Israel's cast they're constantly on the brink of a war breakout with it's neighbours who oppose its existence but not Singapore because we're cast out by the Federation of Malaya. Through that we gain independence.
Israelis government keeps replacing itself because the citizens are not satisfied with the condition they're living in. So it's like a trial and error. It keeps changing until there is peace in Middle East. Never an Israeli PM ever achieve peace with its Arab neighbours except Rabin which was assassinated by a lunatic jew.
Wish Olmert good luck on the Annapolis Peace Conference now as he's popularity is decreasing over time. Expected another change in political arena as the Labour takes in control over Likud.

Posted by Ridz* on 7 December, 2007 - 6:47pm

Can somebody feature something that I can understand... ...?
Sorry... But politics is really not my cuppa teh korsong.

Tomorrow.sg like nowadays slower in putting up new articles hor...

Scope.

I understand the problem.

You are one of the masses of politically indifferent people who are preventing Singapore from being a functioning multi- party democracy. I think that Singaporeans get the government, the political system they deserve.

If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the problem.

Posted by aaronkwok* on 6 December, 2007 - 11:51pm

Singapore has been in much less danger of annihilation than Israel. Yet Israel has a functioning democracy

Well, most Singaporeans don't know that. They have been fed a diet of doomsday propaganda by the PAP-controlled media. I've lost count of the number of bogeymen the PAP made up to scare Singaporeans into subservience.

Posted by chutzpah* on 6 December, 2007 - 2:21pm

My personal take on this missing "luxury":

War and other discontentments are the main tools that allow opposition parties to rise in popularity. That Singapore experiences little such upheavals, relatively speaking compared to the rest of the world, is more often than not attributed to a strong PAP-government.

Why then will Singaporeans risk unchartered waters?

Actually there is another reason. They have to have a "functioning democracy", which as we understand the term means that instead of having 1 government you don't like winning the election every year, you rotate between 2 governments you don't really like. Or maybe you have more parties. The reason is that it will make Israel look more like the United States which is of vital importance because if it were not for the fact that Israel were a great ally of the USA it would be in very very deep shit.

Posted by aaronkwok* on 6 December, 2007 - 11:47pm

What has stopped Singapore from enjoying this “luxury”?"
=====

Very simple, just need to google for the poem, "Then they came for me"