It is not surprising that Rehman Rashid of the New Straits Times had been cast away to join the best and the brightest in Malaysian journalism plying their trade outside the mainstream press. This has happened to others before him, and it will happen again for as long as the Malaysian mainstream press remains a stifling bureaucracy of beholden brown-nosers.

Rehman will survive this sacking and, like some courageous others, may even thrive in the creative fringes of Malaysian journalism. But the loss is to the Malaysian reading public who, by social conditioning, are sceptical of anything not mainstream. That leaves room for mediocre pretenders to assume the purported legitimacy of mainstream journalism in the country. This is the real tragedy.

A lot of us who recognise Rehman's skills were greatly encouraged by his determination to return to his old haunt "to make a difference". We should have guessed that a talented writer and a forthright person like Rehman cannot be paired with poor old unactualised souls still doing the bidding of the hands that giveth. It was a non-starter.

But never mind the 'official' reason for the parting, even though writing speeches for people who are supposed to make their living by writing, does seem a bit odd to me.

The thing that really bothers me is - what is it about mainstream anything in this country that always seem to sell itself short. What is it about individual flair that scares the crap out of the Malaysian establishment? Is it too bothersome to accommodate excellence at the expense of frivolous practices and falling standards? Or must the brilliant tone down their sharpness in order to assimilate with the dull and the sluggish?

This brings me to the brilliant Mustapa Mohamad, executive director of the National Economic Action Council. A first-class honours graduate of economics from Australia, he recently replied to the Economist o­n behalf of the Malaysian government.

What a let-down. A totally unconvincing letter, almost as if his intellect bothered him in having been asked to undertake a task unbecoming of a self-assured person with broad exposure and a liberated mind. Because intellectually speaking, there was nothing really worthy of the hue and cry!

Maybe that's what it takes to make it in the Malaysian establishment - join the crowd or risk being cut down.