About Politics

Faultering Universe asked:


My buddy Brock is the onlyu one I know who’s doing okay for himself that knows politics. Thats because he robbed the bar we were working at. Whats a regular guy like myself to do?
Id rather rob a bar.

Allen

Trudy VanBuskirk asked:


I don’t say this just because I’m a Canadian (although I am and people think we’re “nice”). I’m also a Canadian entrepreneur who lived in San Francisco and did business all over the U.S. as well. Marketing means that you probably have opinions and are doing thing differently.

What does polite mean?

The Oxford dictionary (on-line) says that polite is an adjective that means either courteous and well-mannered or cultured and refined as in polite society.

It has also been used to suggest that we keep our opinions to ourselves or be quiet about something as the British have been known to be.

What can we as entrepreneurs do?

We could say nothing at all but we are small business owners who usually offer and do what we think. That means that we probably speak our opinions out loud to everyone whether they’re listening or not.

We could do a number of things.

1. When you own a business, you never know when you meet someone whom they know or what they believe. You could be in line getting groceries or training 20 people on how to write a newsletter or even networking and speaking with someone one on one. Whether you are a small business owner who is marketing on purpose or someone out and about meeting people, keep your controversial opinions to yourself.

2. You might find out what else a person does by asking different questions. Don’t ask the same ones all the time like what is your business, what do you do, or a simple one like who are you. Ask these questions to learn more about the person themself and who they know.

3. Listen more and talk less. That means that you learn about them and their business. It’s said that we each have two ears and one mouth for a reason. We should really listen to what the other person is saying then reply to what they said because we care.

4. Have an opinion but say it quietly and “nicely” like we Canadians. It’s quite alright to speak of an idea that we have that is different from the “norm”. Saying it politely offends no one. If they take it personally then you haven’t been the cause of that.

5. Say nothing. You could just be quiet. I know that’s not the usual thing for entrepreneurs but sometimes it’s best for everybody concerned.

Listen then speak and by all means have ideas in your head and tell them to others. Don’t let this article stop what you say just how you say it.

2007 © Trudy Van Buskirk – Smallbizbuilder

Beverly

Huyan S asked:


I hate politics and philosophy and I have absolutely no desire to think about these things. I jsut wanna do waht everyone else does but instead I’m constantly distracted by all this crap in my head.
How do I distance myself from all this useless thinking and go on with my life?

Renee

Screamo asked:


I’m only 18 so my life is just starting and all but i have recently been really interested in getting into politics. What’s a good way to go about doing this or starting out?

Joanne

M. Nadarajah asked:


Indian Malaysian Community and the New Politics

M. Nadarajah*

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The 12th general election is finally over. The people of Malaysia have delivered their wishes to the contending parties and their nominees. The people have given Barisan National yet another opportunity to continue to form the national government. However, they have decided to deny 2/3 majority to BN in the parliament. They have finally given the opposition the opportunity to play a more significant role in national politics. They have also, in trust, delivered 5 state governments to the opposition. Now the people of Malaysia will have to see if their country in fact becomes what they aspire it to be. It is an aspiration that includes fairness, freedom and social security for all.

These are plain facts. But the meanings of events of the socio-political drama that unfolded and burst into the public arena the last 6 months and in particular the last couple of weeks and on the 8th of March are far too rich. They would capture the imagination of many commentators, analysts, researchers and concerned citizens.

On the ground, the election results are (i) the product of history of what the BN government has actually done (or not done) for the people and this nation since independence, (ii) the political and campaign strategy of individuals, individual parties and/or their coalitions, (iii) the orientation of the voting system and constituencies and lastly, (iv) the easy access to new information and communication technologies by all political contenders (individuals and parties).

Recognising The Role of the Indian Malaysian Community

Among the factors, it is in the history of this nation that we need to look closely and to identify definite trends that have given us what we are experiencing today. A few centuries ago, an European social commentator and revolutionary once said that History moves forward qualitatively only on the side of and through the agency of the oppressed and marginalised. It is they who provide the social ground that offers History a new Future.

In a sense, History has thrust upon the Indian Malaysian community that special responsibility. This is not to suggest that others did not play an equally critical role but only to record the spirit, the contribution and the role played by Indian Malaysians as a community in the election, as many during the many election ceramahs acknowledged.

Certainly, the 12th general election was the temporal space where History conspired to give us all the opportunity for that ‘an-other’ Malaysia that we many of us increasingly aspire for.

Along with so many others, the Indian Malaysian community has pushed the agenda of a new politics for Malaysia. On hindsight, the spirit behind Hindraf, and later Makkal Sakthi, is undeniably a critical turning point in recent Malaysian politics. Beyond organisational politics, they really represent the spirit of an economically marginalised, politically powerless, and culturally-battered community aspiring for fairness.

This development in the Indian Malaysian community and the new found orientation among the other Malaysian communities have now given us all an opportunity to break the hold of ethnocracy in Malaysia and dismantle the ethnic model of politics. We have an opportunity to look beyond that model, the limit of which was reached by the end of the last century.

One of the many icons of ethnic politics in Malaysia, the MIC and its head, Datuk Seri Samy Vellu, supposedly represented the Indians in BN, which is populated and controlled by strong ethnic parties. But the increasing problems of the Indian Malaysian community and the inability of the MIC leadership to deal with them adequately only led to the accumulation of disenchantment in the community.

People’s Power

The frustration, humiliation and disappointment Indians (in particular the Tamils) felt intensely was bound to become self-conscious and take a social form and it did. Makkal Sakthi (People’s Power) is that collective oppositional self-consciousness. A long view of this is that while it is Indian in form, it certainly is Malaysian in content. In fact, it did catch the imagination of many candidates and the term was used during their election ceramahs.

The mainstream media, BN national leaders and Samy Vellu dismissed all these critical developments. One of the main mainstream papers even trivialised the anger of the Indian/Tamil people expressed through Hindraf in their editorial. And Samy Vellu did not see what was coming his way. He even thought the 2008 Thaipusam in Batu Caves was a success when the community knew it was not. Probably he did not go to places like Kuala Selangor to see what was happening there. He thought the Indians/Tamils would vote the MIC leaders to power anyway, without carefully listening to the murmurings on the ground, even among once-staunch MIC supporters. But it is all too clear and loud now.

The angry Indian/Tamil Malaysians have removed Samy Vellu from power but have also, directly with the concerted help of other Malaysians, left the MIC in a disarray. (We can say that for MCA too.) The community does not want MIC to represent it. MIC cannot claim to represent Indian Malaysians in the BN and the government. There is simply no legitimacy to that claim. Whatever BN may do to include Indian Malaysians, the BN now cannot claim to run the often promoted and publicised but questionable ‘successful’ racial/ethnic consociational model of politics. The Indian Malaysian community has said it loud and clear that it does not want to be included as Indians but as Malaysians.

The Need for a New Political Language

A new political language needs to be framed. And the new young parliamentarians (and the ADUNS) who will now speak for all of us, including the Indian Malaysians, must frame it, by practice.

Along with many concerned citizens from all communities, the Indian Malaysian community has delivered to all Malaysians the opportunity for nurturing a new politics. And in this challenging interim period, they have done that at great risk and further marginalisation as a community, if those who have been elected to power i.e. the opposition, do not subscribe to a politics beyond the ethnic model and beyond ethnocracy or theocracy. The Indian Malaysian Community needs the active intervention of parties like the DAP, Keadilan and PAS (if it believes that the spirit of Islam and its protection is for all) to take up their cause as Malaysians.

There is an urgent need to subscribe to a politics that sees the problems and needs of Malaysians as common problems and needs of a people governed by a common destiny.

While needs and problems can be specific to definite Malaysian communities like the Malays, Kadazans, Penans, Mandailings, Chinese or Indians, they need to be framed as national problems or needs and addressed with national concern and sensitivity. Such an orientation will build us as a people and allow for equitable distribution of national resources. There is no room for ethnicisation of the problems of citizens, particularly when they involve access to basic goods and services, like water and housing. Addressing the needs of citizens must become colour-blind.

The ‘opposition to the Opposition’ will hold on to the old order and political language with great tenacity, pulling (or pooling) all its resources to actively discredit and delegitimise the gains of the forces of change, of the New Order. To counteract it, we need a new political language of dialogue, inclusiveness and all-round sustainability, knowing very well that it is going to take some time and challenges to institutionalise it. But a language names the world, shapes our dream, influences our imagination and helps build the society we want.

It is the responsibility of the Opposition and the new set of young parliamentarians (and ADUNS) to give us this as soon as possible. They have to balance their social commitment, the demands of their parties and arrive at a workable minimum programme for inter-party relationship and co-operation. They must be seen as representative of all the communities, of all the people.

We are at a threshold of a new future for the future generations and us. Can we nurture, shape and sustain it together … with single-mindedness and vision?

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*See http://votecharles.wordpress.com/2008/03/21/indian-malaysian-community-and-the-new-politics/

Joe

Calvin T Stevens asked:


Note to Christians: We need to end our affair with Constantine. It’s over—or it ought to be. When the fourth-century emperor made Christianity the state religion, our love affair with political power began. We wanted to change the world, and we thought this would help.

Now after 17 centuries of experience in the courts of secular power, there are few (in the US at least) that think we have anything to do with change. We are defined as a rock-solid and morally righteous political block of social conservatives, either to be wooed or rendered ineffectual, depending on your point-of-view.

The clout of the so-called religious right is waning. Blame it on the lack of a unifying candidate if you want to, but as a Christian I think this is a good thing. Political power is the opiate of the religious. Ironically, the very power we sought has stripped our true effectiveness, and defined us as merely another political force among many.

So it’s over, Connie. This will actually be good for both of us.

For the first 300 years of our existence the Christian community was decidedly counter-culture, without secular status or power. We were known for our love and community; our growth came mostly from among the poor. Then with Constantine we gained a champion who blended cross, sword and earthly wealth. We rose out of the catacombs and into the courts of the civic lords.

The Bible refers to us collectively as the “Bride of Christ.” Our dalliance with this handsome patrician Constantine was the first of our serial adulteries with rulers good and bad: Charlemagne, Henry, Catherine, Francisco, Benito, William, George—all of them. We leveraged them, or they us. Shamefully, at our worst, we became accomplices-by-silence, as we did in 1930’s Germany.

Our role remains shallow today if all we do is find candidates or political causes with the values closest to our own and then endorse them. If our work does not actually target the greatest need for change, in the human heart, we have instead merely adopted the American secular power system (admittedly the best one out there) and then tried to dress it up with our morals. Given the failing and sin that occupies even the best of human systems, this approach is a bit like putting lipstick on a pig.

At our very core we represent an entirely different order, one that is deeply suspicious of all worldly power. The Christian concept of authority is upside-down from the rest of the world; we believe that to be great is to be a servant, and that the last shall be first. We believe in turning the other cheek and in loving our enemies. These are difficult to live out practically, but nobody claimed it would be easy.

This ought to produce Christian citizens who are engaged and involved, making decisions for the practical good of the world order. We have a good example of this in one of our own evangelicals, William Wilberforce, who worked to end English slave trade in 1833.

For most of the issues that divide liberals and conservatives, there is not a “Christian position.” Believers disagree about the role of government in economics, or whether any certain worldly conflict is just. I hate to startle or anger my evangelical friends, but this means that a committed, born-again evangelical Christians can just as likely be a Democrat as Republican.

Jesus told us to render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s. These two citizenships are not to be confused. I am a Christian, and because of that, I am in nobody’s camp. If I am persuaded you may have my vote, but my heart belongs to God.

Bernice

brickity hussein brack asked:


How many are legitimate sincere people looking for an answer, as opposed to oafs masking political statements in the form of a question like:
“Why are liberals lazy?” “Do Republicans know how evil they are?” “Why is Obama ashamed of being a racist Muslim?” or “Who’s a better liar; Bill or Hillary?”
I do it all the time and it’s fun, but just wondering what the percentage of questions on YA Politics and Goverment that abide by community guidelines would be.
I’ll say 5%.

Dana

serenada asked:


Just got a job and feel stressed with the workload and the office politics. Any suggestions on how I can handle these problems and be happy at work?

Thanks.

Debbie