///There are so many terrorists in this country.///- pulau_sibu #6

Exactly, best way now is to blame some terrorists network like (say)regional Islamic militant group Jemaah Islam, the major suspects in the Bali bombing case!

The PM was reported by The MalaysiaInsider’s reporter Neville Spykerman to have “strongly denied Umno should be blamed for raising the mercury in the “Allah” issue which climaxed with today’s attacks on three churches.”

However it should be remembered that for 50 years since independence it was not an issue that the Herald used the common word – not until 2007 when the then Home Affairs Minister Tan Sri Syed Hamid Albar ordered the Catholic Church to stop using the word in its weekly paper. By cause and effect, the seeds of controversy were sown since then in 2007, when Hamid’s position must be atributable to that of collective decision of the government/cabinet, which even today takes the position of appealing against Justice Lau Bee Lan’s decision! And then when it comes to some group wanting to protest against that decision by demonstrations, the stand was taken that “the government cannot stop Muslim groups from expressing their concern about the use of the word” at confined area of the mosque, which rightly or wrongly, conveyed, in popular perception, a more tolerant approach (looked indefensible in the light of overnight torching of the Churches)than (say) other protests from our NGOs and Opposition. We’re talking about perception of double standards here and people remember that certain mobs always prevail and have their way as in the case the Bar Council’s forum on discussing Article 11 when the mob/illegal assembly of a mere 300 were allowed protest, with their spokesmen allowed to trespass into the forum to castigate the members of the forum and the forum, legitimised by permit and hence a legal assembly, required to shop in appeasement of the mob, an illegal assembly, all in the name of national security! The article 11 forum was legal with permit and was to be conducted inside the premises. (It may be asked if the govt could not also do anything if Christians were to protest/demontrate inside the churches’ compound against the then Home Minister’s decision?)

Rightly or wrongly it gives the impression that the ruling party is acquiescing with mob’s demands (on selective basis) if it serves its political purposes.

Against such backdrop, can we criticise Tengku Razaleigh as being lopsided if he blamed HIS OWN party members for pursuing “racial issues more stridently” to “shore up their base” after the electoral debacle of 8th March 2008 in his speech delivered at the ISEAS Regional Outlook Forum 2010 at the Shangri-la Hotel, Singapore on Jan 7? Or newly-appointed senator S Ramakrishnan’s blaming Umno for “politicising the use of ‘the word’ not in sync with the concept of 1Malaysia driving foreign investors away (Report by M Krishnamoorthy of Malaysiakini Jan 8)?

//…may as well don’t say it. In some ways you are like the ministers, want it both ways// – LimKamPut

What is “it” in relation to “both ways”?

Perhaps I can’t, unlike you, write faster than you can think – and hence you do it “one way”!

///Perception of double standards? Jeffrey, comeon, you know better please don’t confuse and mislead./// – LimKamput

It shows you are small minded in challenging the word “perception” and narrow in interpreting what has been said.

We are talking, in context, about our politicians’ management of popular public perception – which has all along been their objective and forte – from their standpoint of political capital or loss in, on one hand in espousing 1 Malaysia, and on the other, managing the fall out from the Herald controversy (groups wanting to protest after the torching of some churches). We are discussing whether based on what they said publicly their positions are credible/consistent from viewpoint of public perception in the backdrop of what happened in the past in Article 11 forum case.

I am not talking here about public perception in context of their intended management of public perception. [I am not talking in absolute terms about philosophical reality whether they are double standards or not. Who needs that to be debated/discussed (as if readers here don't know?]

I am not confusing or misleading anyone here : you are, by your own confusion and inability to understand context of what has been posted, zeroing on word like “perception” and (as usual) imputing motives that are wholly wrong and out of context.

To LimKamPut: As I said you write faster than you can think, and even then nit-picking on what other said that you might find fault before even understanding in full measure and context what has been said in the first place.