‘I never realized I was clueless’ – Carrie shock

A few months ago, Hongkongers were bemused by the obliviousness of the woman Beijing was choosing as their city’s next Chief Executive. Carrie Lam didn’t know how to use an MTR turnstile, and couldn’t work out how to buy toilet paper. She publicly laughed at her own ineptness, so it seemed slightly endearing (if you could see the funny side of it).

Off-camera, when consulting ‘various sectors’ ahead of the quasi-election and working on her pretend-campaign, there was less scope for flippancy. On at least a couple of occasions I heard of, she was visibly shocked to hear gruesome details of issues like subdivided housing. “They don’t tell us about this in government.”

Now she admits that she had no idea before then that young people in Hong Kong were so disgruntled.

So in all her years in top bureaucratic and ministerial positions, she did not notice that the mass of her fellow citizens, especially the young and educated, were growing angrier and more alienated. For two decades, she did not perceive that the Hong Kong government’s only real policy was to serve parasite cartels by distorting supply and demand to ramp up land values, property prices and rents. And in late 2014, as the whole world watched the Umbrella Movement occupy three separate parts of the city, she was distracted – perhaps away in the South Pole or something.

It is tempting – even comforting – to think she is exaggerating her ignorance, acting dumb in order to save face as her new administration gropes desperately for Communist Party-compliant, tycoon-friendly policies to give the young hope for the future. But (as with her earlier on- and off-the-record reactions to reality) she sounds candid about the fact that she has no knowledge of anything unless it appears in a memo or briefing paper. And unaware that the rest of us might find it unusual, let alone scary.

On the subject of the ‘unusual-to-scary’ part of the political-events spectrum, I declare the weekend open with (for anyone who’s missed it) with the latest swamp-management antics in DC, guaranteed to put helpless and hopeless Carrie into hug-able perspective.

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11 Responses to ‘I never realized I was clueless’ – Carrie shock

  1. Cassowary says:

    Bit rich for her to say she was clueless, since she was the person Donald Tsang/CY Leung physically pushed outside the gates to negotiate with angry young protesters on multiple occasions. Has she forgotten the Queen’s Pier sit-in? The Express Rail Siege of Legco? Young Joshua’s anti national education campaign? You think a person would realize, if the youth are laying siege to government buildings every few years, that they’re more than a little ticked off.

  2. Chinese Netizen says:

    Yes, “The Mooch” is truly a goombah nut job straight out of Central Casting.

    Look for more Mafia-like quotable gems from him while addressing national security/defence/policy/diplomacy/etc…

  3. Magnus Pym says:

    “….that the Hong Kong government’s only real policy was to serve parasite cartels by distorting supply and demand to ramp up land values, property prices and rents.”

    Steady on old boy. You’re beginning to sound like a smelly socks.

    Go home, slap one of the maids, count your share certificates and calm down.

    Pip, pip!

  4. Stanley Lieber says:

    Anthony Scaramucci: grandson of Italian immigrants, son of a construction worker, graduate of Tufts University and Harvard Law School, seven years at Goldman Sachs (not long enough to become a complete GS asshole), then started his own investment firm, now worth US$50 million, now a top advisor to the president.

    Yeah, what a loser.

  5. Cassowary says:

    Remember when some of you lot were saying “Trump will appoint sensible advisers to keep him steady”?

    Pffffffft.

    He is the human embodiment of a ruptured sewer line, anyone near him gets covered in sh*t. If he accomplishes one thing in foreign policy, it’ll be to put the rest of the world off democracy. All any halfway competent despot has to do is point to him and say “look”.

  6. Knownot says:

    For the weekend

    The question this week is co-location
    At West Kowloon Station.
    The Government wants legislation
    To permit the operation
    Of Mainland Immigration
    At our – yes, our – station.
    This appears to be a violation
    Of a Basic Law provision
    And we should not give permission.
    Or is it only a small revision
    Of the Law, a small evasion
    Only on this occasion?
    Co-location is needed
    And progress should not be impeded
    By Law, written by those who did not see how
    Inconvenient it would be now.
    Perhaps we could allow it
    And just swallow it.
    But what would follow it?

  7. Joe Blow says:

    @Knownot (how to write poetry): why don’t you save up your priceless rhyming verse for the Christmas holidays so you can read (recite) them to your nearest and dearest. I promise you that they will never visit again. I wish I had a way to keep ‘distant relatives’ from visiting year after year.

  8. bing tung says:

    the poetry is nice, as good as sitting through a dinner with blowhard bankers while getting a bj from their manager.

  9. Jason says:

    @Cassowary: I agree that Carrie Lam cannot be as clueless as she pretends to be.
    And she is certainly not an example of honesty. Her cluenessness serves probably as a “proof” for being such a humble and caring person.
    When 689 disappeared from the scene in Oct 2014, many people had the hope she would show some empathy for the participants and the cause of the Umbrella Movement. But she just parotted the CCP-line.
    I appreciate Hemlock’s blog and agree with -at least- 90% of its content.
    If someone doesn’t like this blog, he should just stop reading it. So simple! It’s impolite and childish to attack the author (Hemlock) on the comment section.

  10. Knownot says:

    Joe Blow –

    Thank you for your useful comment. With your discriminating eye, you have seen that one line is too long: “By Law, written by those who did not see how” – which I revise to “By Law; its writers did not see how”.

    Clumsily, I struggle with my lyrics; as always, I am grateful to my critics.

  11. Red Dragon says:

    You carry on, Knownot. I like your verse.

    Don’t listen to that grumpy old bugger, Joe Blow.

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