“...then he added, as if requiring a response to his own remark, 'Probably the greater the difference, the greater the similarity, and the greater the similarity, the greater the difference,' at that moment he did not yet know how right he was.”

- José Saramago, ‘All the Names’

Before I begin, I would just like to highlight Chris Lau's amazing reportage on the Malaysian 'chemsex' scene. This is the kind of work that Malaysiakini needs more of.

And a big thumbs down to Sports and Youth Minister Khairy Jamaluddin (KJ) for not engaging with Malaysiakini by using such a moronic excuse (that the news portal is a “purveyor of one-sided journalism”). KJ used to be the kind of establishment operative who at the very least had the cojones to deal with the alternative media. I guess eventually the excesses of this regime makes eunuchs of all its political operatives.

Meanwhile, if anyone is interested, I am putting out my own prize-winning compilation (I awarded myself the first and only prize) - ‘Umno a danger to Malaysians and secularism in Malaysia’ - out there soon, so stayed tuned.

Opposition propaganda seems to have this blowback effect. The very public internal squabbles seem to be the only thing that the opposition is reliable at. Until now, I never really understood the whole Umno DNA line of reasoning that people throw at PKR and the “Malay” component of the opposition.

The only reason why there is a viable opposition is that there is a split in the Malay polity. There is a split in the Malay polity because jailed political prisoner Anwar Ibrahim managed to galvanise a Malay base with the help of PAS and then in a move that in hindsight can only be described as miraculous, hobbled together an opposition alliance that delivered a blow to the hegemon that nearly brought it to its knees.

Throughout the years, the opposition has seen the migration of BN politicians into the opposition fold and the erosion of ideological and religious values that resulted in the opposition becoming a viable alternative to the ruling hegemon. The DAP and PAS, who never were able to put aside their differences, managed to find some middle ground but this common ground was not ideological but political.

“Setting aside differences”, while a potent political strategy, unfortunately does not translate to good governance, policies or principles that Malaysians desperately need to recover from the self-inflicted wound that is Umno-BN hegemony. Is there a difference between the opposition and the establishment? Of course, there is because even a superficial difference is a difference, but we should not think that the difference is a paradigm shifting one that some opposition operatives claim will save Malaysia.

Of former law minister Zaid Ibrahim, I wrote, “When DAP supremo Lim Kit Siang says in jest that Zaid should be a team player and not a prima donna, I think of it in terms of nervous laughter instead of a political joke to break the tension. The DAP has a history of losing prominent ‘Malay’ voices and a history of vilifying those who leave the flock. Will history repeat itself, especially considering that Zaid has a history of feuding with his allies and has no problem exposing the flaws of internal party politics?”...