Click to hear the Small Faces’ ‘Happy Boys Happy’!
No missiles flying yet. In North Korea, an apparently somewhat dull-witted brat, born into a life of luxury and privilege, totally cut off from his fellow citizens, surrounded by sycophants and boosted by a crude propaganda machine, befriends interest groups and weighs potential opponents as he prepares to assume power.
Thank God such a thing is unthinkable here in Hong Kong, where Chief Executive candidate Henry Tang launches his ‘campaign’ with hackneyed razzmatazz and the endorsement of the city’s depressing excuse for an establishment elite.
The superficially slick PR, including lame slogan and wedding-style video of the great man’s upbringing, bore all the hallmarks of what corporate communications voodoo practitioners produce to flatter and satisfy an easily impressed client rather than to persuade and convince a bigger and more reluctant audience. The alleged policy platform was predictable and pitiful: more education spending, when the problem is outdated education methods; a bit more housing supply, when the problem is the land system; fill in your favourite.
In fairness, one proposed measure will bring a guaranteed result: a pledge to bolster the middle class – dwindling in the Big Lychee at least as rapidly as elsewhere, as witnessed in our old friend, the disconnection between median household income and per capita GDP. Henry’s solution is to upgrade the definition of ‘middle class’ households from those with monthly incomes of HK$10,000-40,000 to those earning HK$20,000-80,000. Voila! A richer middle class!
The cast of nearly 1,000 supporters was similarly unsurprising and uninspiring – the self-appointed, smug, bureaucrat-tycoon coterie typified by HK General Chamber boss Anthony Wu (the big guy next to Antony Leung), plus various hangers-on yearning for a Bronze Bauhinia Star one day, along with a few people we had forgotten even existed, like former Executive Council member Sir SY Chung and pop star Leon Lai. All that was missing, apart from ordinary people and the pro-Beijing groups awaiting orders on whom to back, were the property tycoons. The public hates the developers as much as the developers loath Henry’s rival CY Leung, so on balance it was best they stayed away.
North Korea’s new leader is ‘sadistic and unpredictable’. We don’t have to worry about that, at least.
A quite brilliant juxtaposition today, Hemmers. Well done. For the humorous possibilities alone, dictators should die more often.
Agree with you Mary, great post Hemlock.
Looking at the two page extravaganza in the Sub Standard, complete with usual cast of Dr. The Hon Li, Tubby Wu, Lexus Leung, Chinese Semen, Wiggy Yam et al , I was reminded of the scene in the Godfather showing Batista’s 1959 Havana New Year party. Inside is the “star-studded cast” whilst outside are the excluded masses.
It’s a shame El Presidente (non elect) Henry Horseman is not going to do a midnight flit as well. A truly ugly spectacle, in Asia’s World City, little better than the hereditary events in Pyongyang.
Oh, good: A senior U.S. official said intelligence analysts believe, for instance, that Kim Jung Eun “tortured small animals” when he was a youth.
Plus he’s got a face that’s just begging to be punched in.
Ah, but he has his father’s smile.
Official Portrait just released
http://p.twimg.com/AhC3CHMCIAAZxhs.jpg:large
I think I read somewhere today about Tang in that ‘he spoke quite eloquently, quite unlike his usual stereotype’. For god’s sake, if he couldnt even administer a speech that had been written and ‘polished’ by PR hacks to an adoring crowd, he’d be even more vapid than we know him to be. I don’t get Stephen Chau’s connection in all of this. Pretty conservative for a ‘creative’. But hey, maybe he’s looking for new comedy material and has hit the mother load in the Tangster’s roadshow?
To follow up on Maugrim’s post of yesterday. More top facts on the worlds most dangerous dead tyrant.
http://www.sabotagetimes.com/people/kim-jong-il-in-numbers/
Stephen CHAU … Is he the chap who could not get a visa for Canada because of alleged Triad connections. The comments about the Godfather connection have some resonance.
http://www.contactmusic.com/news-article/chow-once-refused-entry-to-canada-for-triad-links
Steven Chau/Chow/Zhou, isn’t that the guy who made his name by copying Woody Allen humour into Chinese movies? On the same scale of plagurism I fully expect the horseman to pretend he is a gifted political leader who can play golf at 38 under par, climb everest without oxygen, be born into a political elite, enjoy fine wines and receive the adoration of millions….. Oh…..
It’s one of those sh1t bugger f**k days for Helmlock’s veiw
I couldn’t agree more with what Hemmer wrote, nor all the comments so far
Absolutely
Sorry .. somehow my previous comment got posted incomplete
I was intending to write ” absolutely on the ball”
( and not a rugby ball)
Only 1,000 people turned up for the horse show. Wow…. I should have gone myself and thrust a custard pie in my face in front of all the cameras to show how how much I disdain the duck and and the horse
CY may be a “wolf” but better a wolf that’s a wolf than a wolf in sheep’s clothing ( sorry : horse’s clothing)
What we need is to convince the sycophants and CE candidates to expand their platform with a commitment to rename ‘zimmer frame’ into something must more endearing to the post 80s … I mean anything is better than zimmer frame, you got to agree…