"He's so lucky he has Pak Lah as his father-in-law," said the education minister to The Star (Hishamuddin: The keris is here to stay, Nov 26) on what he thought of Khairy Jamaluddin's political performance with Umno so far.

But, aren't you also lucky your father was a prime minister? Sounds like a good question. But, going by mainstream media rules, curly questions are seldom asked of our ministers.

Critical readers with a good sense of right and wrong would have been chafed at The Star's muted Q&A with Hishammuddin Hussein. Yawn. 'The people's paper' has again shown its penchant for protocol journalism. Where was the journalistic insight at a time when public appetite was perhaps at its peak for a context to the Umno assembly theatrics.