What do Evo Morales, Fidel Castro, Robert Mugabe and Joseph Stalin's Soviet Communist Party have in common with the rump of the Pomeranian [British] so-called leftist crowd who gathered in London this past week to adore Hugo Chavez: their new hero-?
One could argue that they are popular with the poor and the dispossessed and they all acted heroically against forces that seem faceless and brutal and symbolised the inchoate nature of subjugation. Certainly some came to power through the gun and some through the ballot through that flash stress point that de Toqueville called the 'tyranny of the majority'-These though are not the core elements that bind them-
Apart from many other things they are all responsible for the compulsory hi-jacking of strategic blocs of their respective country's key private sector owned productive assets: Motor vehicles, coal mines, oil, sugar, productive farmland and the entire Russian state
The British [Pomeranian] Left presided over the annihilation of the British Motor industry, which was ill prepared to handle Japan's competitive onslaught. The coal industry suffered a similar fate, as did the railroad transportation industry, which has still not recovered.
As we all know the great Lenin/Stalin inspired Soviet Kollektive collapsed in such ignominy that nearly two decades later the remnants are still scratching to pick up the pieces and Mr Putin the new Post Soviet Kommissar is reintroducing the old system by stealth and sending State controlled alleged market business entities, more commonly known as State sponsored monopolies like Gazprom, into the liberal democracies of Europe to wreak havoc or market dominance whichever comes first..
One has only to see the crippling effect that the ongoing Telkom monopoly has had on S.A's development to know where that neo-soviet Putin restored model will take Russia.
Chavez and Morales will find themselves increasingly frustrated by the sheer incompetence that is as much the Achilles heel of the tyrannical state as the tyranny of the majority is to the democratic state.
The metaphor that comes to mind here is that media favoured shot of fifties style American vehicles plying the streets of Havana. Should history again repeat itself and both Chavez and Morales rearrange the balloting procedures to avoid losses then both of these worthy gentlemen will, decades from now, be found presiding over a collapsing infrastructure with no way of extending the life of the products they have stolen.
While all the above are [or were] 'redistributing' the wealth that previously rewarded the owners of Capital: like for instance, pensioners, widows, unit trust holders and those with share options, and was otherwise retained for purposes of maintaining competitive profitability, those businesses that fall outside their loop continue to evolve.
There is no solution to this problem. Even Bill Gates famously remarked that his apparent Microsoft monopoly is an illusion that could be shattered by some chance discovery of some new technological marvel by a thirteen-year-old tinkerer.
Monopoly structures breed incompetence. There is almost no escaping it. They become the repository of freebies. In democratic states philanthropic n.g.o,s and sponsored apparent private sector grouping are eased into existence as lobbying groups`, to be repositories for the favours-to-mates thing. In tyrannical states opportunities are naturally by definition less, so the Pals have to be shunted into all the key jobs where they classically under perform, and the 'profits' are assiduously stripped over ages for purposes of 'redistribution'.
The rest of the story is well worn and as well observed and as seemingly obvious as the idea that the runner who sits down on the pavement to experiment with footwear anatomy during the Comrades Marathon will probably miss the cut. So why do so many people keep reinforcing the idea that the private sector is evil and the public sector automatically good: and that it is sound econommics to snatch whjat you need.
If the human race has been around in its present form for some 200,000 years, as many genetic 'fingerprinting' specialists are increasingly claiming, then we must know that for about 190,000 years the entire race lived in poverty and squalor. Over the past ten thousand years a tiny fraction contrived a method to raise themselves above the squalor, and over the past five hundred years the benefits of that method have gradually come to be extended, so that today there are probably a fifth of the global population that no longer live in abject squalor.
The method is privately driven initiative. Those places where private initiative thrives, thrive; those where it doesn't do not. This is a simple observable fact of modern existence.
Castro has kept his populace in the stone-age and his principal modern export is third world standard doctors: under trained human resources. Chavez rides high for a time and may use his sudden windfall to rapidly upgrade the infrastructure for the poor in his nation-but few will invest in a place where investments are subject to gratuitous theft so his infrastructure will gradually unwind. As for Morales, he will find that the cupboard is really quite bare. Ironically the biggest loser in the grabbing game is his neighbour, last year's darling of the Left, Mr Lula of Brazil. One imagines he is not all that happy-a prime leftist out 'lefted'. [Perhaps last weekends 'gangland revolution' in Brazil was a convenient ploy to distract Brazilians from the larger scale theft of their goodies by the new 'gangster on the block' Evo Morales.]
In SA the increasing global drift to formal State control over the economy has taken a more subtle form, nationalisation by stealth it was recently called in a leading article I heard being discussed on the radio. Our new system may even work for a time: we have to experience a major economic downturn to know if it will have an attack of hiccups.
What we also know that we have our own populist demagogue who is on the comeback trail, subject to what happens at his corruption trial. Is it possible that Offshore investors watched that stunning post dénouement gathering outside the courthouse last week and wondered whether they were watching another Evo Morales when he-who-would-be-el-Presidenté held his own post-trial court last week?
This blog saw that possibility.
In fact with all the activities of Populists recently it's no wonder the world has had what we all should hope is a short bout of emerging market blues this past week.
Have fun...el Bloggo...Nik
Friday, May 19, 2006
Monday, May 8, 2006
The competency edge
The Defence won the trial for Mr Zuma by making it impossible for the State to make its case. They superbly exploited, with considerable competence the glitches in the State's case, and it seems there were three.
· Their client, the claimant, presumably failed to reveal that she had a herstory as a serial rape accuser. Their client it seems prevaricated around key issues.
· The senior level policemen who interviewed Mr Zuma apparently violated his rights through not cautioning him, and apparently attempting some form of entrapment. Their possibly crucial evidence was ruled inadmissible. Oh gosh we see it in the movies every, day what to shock to discover that it's real.
· The psychologist who defended the claimant apparently neglected to apply a battery of possibly spurious tests [or perhaps did and chose not to use the results] and therefore left the claimant out to dry as it were. The defence's psychologist was more efficient and allegedly thorough about revealing how lacking in thoroughness the prosecution's psychologist really was-One got the distinct sense that the Judge was angry with the prosecution psychologist. Had she done her job properly the case may have been tried differently.
· The prosecution thus lacked the competency edge so necessary for success in a competitive environment
For the defence the power lay in the successful use of the damaging history of the claimant to demonstrate a material issue in the case rather than the 'rejectable' notion that attacked the clients credibility; although it obviously did that most effectively-a litany of trained liars is difficult to conceive. There was sufficient solid evidence there to cause a grown prosecutor to go pale with shock when the revelations began.
And in fairness to the prosecutor it would be hard for the State to infer that they had entirely failed in their task, when they had to deal with a claimant who may well be 'BAD and MAD' to quote an unknown gender advocate from the post verdict commentary on the radio. She sounded sad [the gender advocate]. And it was bad.
This rape claimant's accusation has been declared to be of no value and she has set back the tide for a time in the struggle of the 'other' gender for equal access to justice. If she's a false accuser then maybe others are too-so the thinking goes-maybe the whole country is loaded with claimants who engage in consensual sex and then when some anticipated payoff is unsatisfactory they cry rape or perhaps they are all crazy, as most men believe. So women in short skirts beware.
Something like this- a revulsion at what has been revealed through this trial may spark the trigger for a Gender Party's assumption to power, assuming there is someone out there who is able to grab that mantle and has the courage. The cool thing about fiction is that you can invent that person and have them work their will. In the real world on which our everyday lives are based though, the cause of justice for those genuinely raped and left butchered and eviscerated has been poorly served.
So she was right to sound sad. And Mr Zuma is right to be glad. There was an interesting observation made in passing by the Judge, in his endless though fascinating reading of the case. In reference to the evidence that the 'accused', operating in his own bedroom, found himself, apparently, in the company of a comely wench, feeling that rejuvenating exultation that accompanies coming on to a young claimant, with the glorious hint of pussy dashing its pheromonal aphrodisiacs about the atmosphere. When asked whether she had been willing, he apparently made a remark to the effect that had she objected 'he would have stopped and left.' I was curious. Why would a man leave his own bedroom, or was that a so-called Freudian slip? Was that what the discredited police evidence would have confirmed? The record shall now forever be silent.
And then of course the police helped. By neglecting to perform a procedural step they guaranteed that the case could be thrown out. This failure to perform an elementary task as part of their duties is an indicator of how difficult it is to break centuries old habits of rights abuse. [One assumes they didn't do it on purpose although that is a thought that I have set-aside for now].
This is the second high profile police engineered failure recently; for undoubtedly the police evidence was crucial to a guilty verdict. The high profile nature of this failure as a result of cutting corners, when added to that other procedural failure last month that saw the accused in a murder trial in Southern Zone One -the notorious Laundry murders- does not look good for the police. We are aware of this 'chain of evidence' issue from movies like CIS and others it was intriguing to have it all spelt out in such excruciating detail from such a first class mind as that revealed by Justice Van der M..
Maybe that is why the police are disbanding their specialist units and seeding experienced officers back to local stations in the hope that some gold will rub off..
So we have had an excellent day's insight into the workings of the system.
The Judge had his moment though: remonstrating almost paternally with an old goat for shagging a young bokkie. I particularly loved his naughty little closing bite about how Kipling would have added some extra lines to 'IF' had he attended the trial. ' If he [Mr Z] had learned about keeping his pecker where it belonged when all his lusts would overcome him then 'you would be a man my son'. [sic]' That was fun and sneaky and pointedly no one from the media referred to it: so my referring to it is probably in bad taste.
-----..
I had a conversation-in-a-crowd once back then during the transition time, with a man who had a collection of ritual scars on his face and whom I discovered later was Mr Zuma.
I'd gatecrashed a hotshot event with a friend and had somehow managed to get to a pole position place amongst a crowd waiting to hear Mr [later President] Mandela speak. Sensing that my neighbour was a man of the future I engaged him in conversation. Eventually I asked him what his chaps intended to do about the crime thing that was serious then and hasn't changed much since-His answer has always intrigued me and I have since followed the man's career with curiosity to find out what he meant.
'We'll let it run for bit.' He said 'and then we'll -.' He left the sentence then in a place Sontag would call the unspoken- and he brought his hands together and wrung them in a motion reminiscent of wringing a turkey's neck. A quick slick gesture.
'Okaay-' I thought and then before I could ask him what that meant the great man himself came onto the podium and we all stopped to hear Him speak.
I wondered if today's verdict would see Mr Z fulfil his gesture in a bizarre piece of irony-and now that he is free-again-I will settle back to await the eventual revelation. And welcome back to the free world Mr Z-it always feels so good to be released doesn't it.
In the meantime since I've suddenly found myself sneaking into a reminiscence, here's the piece I wrote that day-which was a day of moment like today, which regrettably has inspired less than I felt then: Cheers
February 1990:
A report on breaking through the ceiling:
A praise prose poem for Nelson Mandela.
The world came
to watch a
spectacle;
a man who had
been locked away
for twenty-seven years
was to be released.
And the spokespeople
for the media
and the great,
came from afar to hear
the wisdom
which it was
believed
this old man
had gained
during his incarceration.
After waiting
uncertainly
for hours
in the hot February
glare;
He finally emerged
blinking
into the sunlight.
Was led to a podium
around which
a Hundred Thousand people
had gathered and
onwhichtheeyesofFiveHundredMillion
faces
werefocussedviatelevisionsetsina
hundred and eighty
countriesbeamedbyinstantsatellite.
With a great sense of Majesty
All awaited
his unique insights, which,
his publicists claimed,
andwhichallwhocamewould
have
themselves
believe he had gained
through years of
incarcerated
introspection
The great buzz
was that this man
had
through his
suffering
acquired unsullied
wisdom and would
unitethecountryandleadhisto
rmentorsandhispeople
toapromisedland:
freed
of all the pain borne
by the suffering
for millennia.
Slowly
he ascended the steps
and trod
with unaccustomed grace
toward
the podium.
A hush
fell
uponhalfaBillionhouseholds.
Fathers
shushed their children
andbeatthosewhospokewhilethegreat
Man
began to speak.
And the sound of wonder
amongst
the gathered dignitaries
and the watching multitudes
turned
to
consternation.
For he spoke yet
anancientanditwasbelievedarecently
discreditedlanguage
and none had thought
to expect
it.
And so they sat
in bewildered
and bemused
consideration
ofwhattheywerehearing
while
a
howlingmobofjubilantsupporters
soon turned their joy
to rapturous
violence
smashingallthewindowsonthesquare.
.NiK(1990)
Publ. 1995. Bedford Yearbook
· Their client, the claimant, presumably failed to reveal that she had a herstory as a serial rape accuser. Their client it seems prevaricated around key issues.
· The senior level policemen who interviewed Mr Zuma apparently violated his rights through not cautioning him, and apparently attempting some form of entrapment. Their possibly crucial evidence was ruled inadmissible. Oh gosh we see it in the movies every, day what to shock to discover that it's real.
· The psychologist who defended the claimant apparently neglected to apply a battery of possibly spurious tests [or perhaps did and chose not to use the results] and therefore left the claimant out to dry as it were. The defence's psychologist was more efficient and allegedly thorough about revealing how lacking in thoroughness the prosecution's psychologist really was-One got the distinct sense that the Judge was angry with the prosecution psychologist. Had she done her job properly the case may have been tried differently.
· The prosecution thus lacked the competency edge so necessary for success in a competitive environment
For the defence the power lay in the successful use of the damaging history of the claimant to demonstrate a material issue in the case rather than the 'rejectable' notion that attacked the clients credibility; although it obviously did that most effectively-a litany of trained liars is difficult to conceive. There was sufficient solid evidence there to cause a grown prosecutor to go pale with shock when the revelations began.
And in fairness to the prosecutor it would be hard for the State to infer that they had entirely failed in their task, when they had to deal with a claimant who may well be 'BAD and MAD' to quote an unknown gender advocate from the post verdict commentary on the radio. She sounded sad [the gender advocate]. And it was bad.
This rape claimant's accusation has been declared to be of no value and she has set back the tide for a time in the struggle of the 'other' gender for equal access to justice. If she's a false accuser then maybe others are too-so the thinking goes-maybe the whole country is loaded with claimants who engage in consensual sex and then when some anticipated payoff is unsatisfactory they cry rape or perhaps they are all crazy, as most men believe. So women in short skirts beware.
Something like this- a revulsion at what has been revealed through this trial may spark the trigger for a Gender Party's assumption to power, assuming there is someone out there who is able to grab that mantle and has the courage. The cool thing about fiction is that you can invent that person and have them work their will. In the real world on which our everyday lives are based though, the cause of justice for those genuinely raped and left butchered and eviscerated has been poorly served.
So she was right to sound sad. And Mr Zuma is right to be glad. There was an interesting observation made in passing by the Judge, in his endless though fascinating reading of the case. In reference to the evidence that the 'accused', operating in his own bedroom, found himself, apparently, in the company of a comely wench, feeling that rejuvenating exultation that accompanies coming on to a young claimant, with the glorious hint of pussy dashing its pheromonal aphrodisiacs about the atmosphere. When asked whether she had been willing, he apparently made a remark to the effect that had she objected 'he would have stopped and left.' I was curious. Why would a man leave his own bedroom, or was that a so-called Freudian slip? Was that what the discredited police evidence would have confirmed? The record shall now forever be silent.
And then of course the police helped. By neglecting to perform a procedural step they guaranteed that the case could be thrown out. This failure to perform an elementary task as part of their duties is an indicator of how difficult it is to break centuries old habits of rights abuse. [One assumes they didn't do it on purpose although that is a thought that I have set-aside for now].
This is the second high profile police engineered failure recently; for undoubtedly the police evidence was crucial to a guilty verdict. The high profile nature of this failure as a result of cutting corners, when added to that other procedural failure last month that saw the accused in a murder trial in Southern Zone One -the notorious Laundry murders- does not look good for the police. We are aware of this 'chain of evidence' issue from movies like CIS and others it was intriguing to have it all spelt out in such excruciating detail from such a first class mind as that revealed by Justice Van der M..
Maybe that is why the police are disbanding their specialist units and seeding experienced officers back to local stations in the hope that some gold will rub off..
So we have had an excellent day's insight into the workings of the system.
The Judge had his moment though: remonstrating almost paternally with an old goat for shagging a young bokkie. I particularly loved his naughty little closing bite about how Kipling would have added some extra lines to 'IF' had he attended the trial. ' If he [Mr Z] had learned about keeping his pecker where it belonged when all his lusts would overcome him then 'you would be a man my son'. [sic]' That was fun and sneaky and pointedly no one from the media referred to it: so my referring to it is probably in bad taste.
-----..
I had a conversation-in-a-crowd once back then during the transition time, with a man who had a collection of ritual scars on his face and whom I discovered later was Mr Zuma.
I'd gatecrashed a hotshot event with a friend and had somehow managed to get to a pole position place amongst a crowd waiting to hear Mr [later President] Mandela speak. Sensing that my neighbour was a man of the future I engaged him in conversation. Eventually I asked him what his chaps intended to do about the crime thing that was serious then and hasn't changed much since-His answer has always intrigued me and I have since followed the man's career with curiosity to find out what he meant.
'We'll let it run for bit.' He said 'and then we'll -.' He left the sentence then in a place Sontag would call the unspoken- and he brought his hands together and wrung them in a motion reminiscent of wringing a turkey's neck. A quick slick gesture.
'Okaay-' I thought and then before I could ask him what that meant the great man himself came onto the podium and we all stopped to hear Him speak.
I wondered if today's verdict would see Mr Z fulfil his gesture in a bizarre piece of irony-and now that he is free-again-I will settle back to await the eventual revelation. And welcome back to the free world Mr Z-it always feels so good to be released doesn't it.
In the meantime since I've suddenly found myself sneaking into a reminiscence, here's the piece I wrote that day-which was a day of moment like today, which regrettably has inspired less than I felt then: Cheers
February 1990:
A report on breaking through the ceiling:
A praise prose poem for Nelson Mandela.
The world came
to watch a
spectacle;
a man who had
been locked away
for twenty-seven years
was to be released.
And the spokespeople
for the media
and the great,
came from afar to hear
the wisdom
which it was
believed
this old man
had gained
during his incarceration.
After waiting
uncertainly
for hours
in the hot February
glare;
He finally emerged
blinking
into the sunlight.
Was led to a podium
around which
a Hundred Thousand people
had gathered and
onwhichtheeyesofFiveHundredMillion
faces
werefocussedviatelevisionsetsina
hundred and eighty
countriesbeamedbyinstantsatellite.
With a great sense of Majesty
All awaited
his unique insights, which,
his publicists claimed,
andwhichallwhocamewould
have
themselves
believe he had gained
through years of
incarcerated
introspection
The great buzz
was that this man
had
through his
suffering
acquired unsullied
wisdom and would
unitethecountryandleadhisto
rmentorsandhispeople
toapromisedland:
freed
of all the pain borne
by the suffering
for millennia.
Slowly
he ascended the steps
and trod
with unaccustomed grace
toward
the podium.
A hush
fell
uponhalfaBillionhouseholds.
Fathers
shushed their children
andbeatthosewhospokewhilethegreat
Man
began to speak.
And the sound of wonder
amongst
the gathered dignitaries
and the watching multitudes
turned
to
consternation.
For he spoke yet
anancientanditwasbelievedarecently
discreditedlanguage
and none had thought
to expect
it.
And so they sat
in bewildered
and bemused
consideration
ofwhattheywerehearing
while
a
howlingmobofjubilantsupporters
soon turned their joy
to rapturous
violence
smashingallthewindowsonthesquare.
.NiK(1990)
Publ. 1995. Bedford Yearbook
A dammnable expense Mr Zuma
So this is the morning that tells all. The sideshow that has entertained us for months now since the news broke that our former deputy president had been accused of rape is about to be decided and then what.
In reviewing this case one has never been more forcibly reminded of one Lord Chesterfield's famous assertion about the sexual act: ' The position is ridiculous, the pleasure momentary, and the expense damnable.' Never was a man more dammed for a quick fuck than the generally indomitable Mr Zuma.
There is only the fact. He is either guilty or he is not guilty. For those of us who did not attend the trial and did not sniff the multiplicity of nuances prevalent in the courtrooms of our television Perry mason moulded consciousness there are only a clutter of disconnected lumps of information, of which these two stand out.
· The complainant is allegedly a practicing lesbian, which would indicate that men were not her thing. This has perhaps been overlooked in the general sidestepping angst surrounding her HIV status [and his].
· There is the countervailing power thing of the power relationship Zuma big [How dare you be a ] Lesbo protester weak, demonstrated so convincingly in Britain this past week where their deputy prime minister was stripped of all administrative responsibilities because of his sexual abuses. Does powa trump lesbo?
That the two engaged in a copulatory act is undeniable. What is at issue is the question of consent
Should Mr Zuma be found guilty then we move on. He is discredited and the country moves toward a new and perhaps more sober reality in which the gradual realisation that we are a country ruled by law prevails. We gradually become a more law-abiding nation and this is a large step towards that destiny.
On the other hand should he be found not guilty:- the generally unsupported allegations of serial rape [perhaps she was raped serially-the late Andrea Dworkin was wont to observe that all penetration is rape-and perhaps it is] and other contradictory evidence, this time on the part of the unknown complainant, conspire to convince the judge [and his pair of generally unidentified assessors] that a case for reasonable doubt exists then Mr Zuma is declared a free man and every woman in a short skirt is immediately fucked against their will.
This is a crucial turning point.
As some of you know I have previously made reference to a fictional work I have written that sets out the model for the society in which a new science fiction story that I am writing is set. The foundations for that world of mine [The Azanian Konfederacy] are laid during this decade and specifically concerns the period 2009-2019. They are presented in the form of a history of a region discovered by travellers at some distant time when our era is as remote as that of the early Roman Empire, with which it is often confused by young and old.
In my history of the 21st century presidency of Corinth Starr [the Elder] first woman president of Southern Azania [South Africa-SA] published some years ago on another website it is the issue of rape that proves a turning point in the fortunes of the ruling party. Criminality generally is a problem but for two groups of people rape is an especial problem. My history was vague on the actual incident that triggers the rise of the Gender Party -a mass rape and burning of a girls high school hostel-an incident which subsequently took place in Kenya was the given trigger.
In time a not guilty verdict could well become the genesis of that evolution.
In my history [I'm going back into my fiction now] Corinth Starr from Zone One [Gauteng] takes over the leadership of a little remembered party that has taken part in every election and gained so few votes it's not funny. That is a 'Women's party'.
Starr renames it 'The Gender Party' and builds it into an irrevocable force. Her pragmatism [she engineers the next great 'fanciful' project after the Gautrain- which is still at that time in a state of Be-coming-. This is the famous 'Towers' project in North West Zone One: five massive 1000 metre tall Towers constructed to collectively put many millions of hectares under thermally controlled cultivation and, as a by product, providing commercial water supplementation.] and power generation. [for the sceptics you'll find them in Google: a small one in Spain and a 1000 metre jobbie going up in Australia]
Her winning formula is forming an alliance with the equally unknown 'Basic Pay' party. This was not its name at that time. It was formerkly known as the 'Grouping for a basic income grant {BIG]'.
Starr argued brilliantly that the country was liberated from servitude in 1994 and that the word 'Grant' in the reference to basic income was humiliating and represented a return to feudal servitude. [as a cynical commentator in the press observed at the time 'they should be humiliated more politely'].
Starr proposed that the electronic wired nature of society allowed for every citizen to receive Basic Pay, which became a mantra at rallies across the country. She engineered a voter registration drive to get every poor person and woman in the country onto the voters roll and gained just sufficient votes to give her an upset victory in the 2009 elections.
Her first Act though is to declare rape to be a genocidal crime, subject to investigation under the provisions of the newly passed terrorism act [which had not been passed when I originally wrote this]
Because of the difficulties of proving rape the presumption of innocence provision in the law is changed [based on the precedent of the traffic fine which presumes guilt unless you choose to go to court and fight over your innocence]. So under Corinth Starr's presidency Mr Zuma would have had to prove his innocence and the string of witnesses from various assembled church groupings would testify that Mr Zuma was a serial rapist fathering children and crying off his responsibilities and it would be his task to show that he had been wrongfully accused.
This naturally gave rise to many structural difficulty and therefore it became de-rigeur that every act of copulation had to be preceded by a contractual agreement certifying that penetration had occurred voluntarily, with the option to cry duress on the part of the penetratee. [Yes the gender Party received strong support from that part of the male gender fraternity who are themselves the subject of unwanted anal attention-hence it is the very act of penetration without a contract signed and agreed not less than twenty four hours before the act takes place, with both parties freely able to move about and the contract digitally verified twice before the act.]
Failure to adhere to this rule meant that guilt was automatic.
Of course in my fictional world everything was a bit more complicated than this brief piece regarding the potential downside to a not guilty verdict. Nonetheless this case with Mr Zuma has revealed many things about whether the cheque woman are getting from the constitution needs to be returned address unknown or not, to paraphrase Martin Luther King.
If by expense Lord Chesterfield referred to the ever ballooning costs of Mr Zuma's fast fuck, then the cost to the party could be catastrophic, as Mr Phony Haire the Brit [Pomeranian] master of the glib riposte has this past few weeks discovered to his irrecoverable loss.
My character of Corinth Starr was modelled and built around three admirable women: Winnie Madikazela-Mandela, Patricia de Lille [in her PAC days], and Maggie Thatcher-her zeal that of the former two her economics that of the new emerging third way with the goal of the privatised market based welfare state.
I think it is pretty inevitable right now that a woman will be our country's [SA's] new President in 2009. The outcome of today's decision could raise the question: which party will she represent?
0905 8th april 2006
In reviewing this case one has never been more forcibly reminded of one Lord Chesterfield's famous assertion about the sexual act: ' The position is ridiculous, the pleasure momentary, and the expense damnable.' Never was a man more dammed for a quick fuck than the generally indomitable Mr Zuma.
There is only the fact. He is either guilty or he is not guilty. For those of us who did not attend the trial and did not sniff the multiplicity of nuances prevalent in the courtrooms of our television Perry mason moulded consciousness there are only a clutter of disconnected lumps of information, of which these two stand out.
· The complainant is allegedly a practicing lesbian, which would indicate that men were not her thing. This has perhaps been overlooked in the general sidestepping angst surrounding her HIV status [and his].
· There is the countervailing power thing of the power relationship Zuma big [How dare you be a ] Lesbo protester weak, demonstrated so convincingly in Britain this past week where their deputy prime minister was stripped of all administrative responsibilities because of his sexual abuses. Does powa trump lesbo?
That the two engaged in a copulatory act is undeniable. What is at issue is the question of consent
Should Mr Zuma be found guilty then we move on. He is discredited and the country moves toward a new and perhaps more sober reality in which the gradual realisation that we are a country ruled by law prevails. We gradually become a more law-abiding nation and this is a large step towards that destiny.
On the other hand should he be found not guilty:- the generally unsupported allegations of serial rape [perhaps she was raped serially-the late Andrea Dworkin was wont to observe that all penetration is rape-and perhaps it is] and other contradictory evidence, this time on the part of the unknown complainant, conspire to convince the judge [and his pair of generally unidentified assessors] that a case for reasonable doubt exists then Mr Zuma is declared a free man and every woman in a short skirt is immediately fucked against their will.
This is a crucial turning point.
As some of you know I have previously made reference to a fictional work I have written that sets out the model for the society in which a new science fiction story that I am writing is set. The foundations for that world of mine [The Azanian Konfederacy] are laid during this decade and specifically concerns the period 2009-2019. They are presented in the form of a history of a region discovered by travellers at some distant time when our era is as remote as that of the early Roman Empire, with which it is often confused by young and old.
In my history of the 21st century presidency of Corinth Starr [the Elder] first woman president of Southern Azania [South Africa-SA] published some years ago on another website it is the issue of rape that proves a turning point in the fortunes of the ruling party. Criminality generally is a problem but for two groups of people rape is an especial problem. My history was vague on the actual incident that triggers the rise of the Gender Party -a mass rape and burning of a girls high school hostel-an incident which subsequently took place in Kenya was the given trigger.
In time a not guilty verdict could well become the genesis of that evolution.
In my history [I'm going back into my fiction now] Corinth Starr from Zone One [Gauteng] takes over the leadership of a little remembered party that has taken part in every election and gained so few votes it's not funny. That is a 'Women's party'.
Starr renames it 'The Gender Party' and builds it into an irrevocable force. Her pragmatism [she engineers the next great 'fanciful' project after the Gautrain- which is still at that time in a state of Be-coming-. This is the famous 'Towers' project in North West Zone One: five massive 1000 metre tall Towers constructed to collectively put many millions of hectares under thermally controlled cultivation and, as a by product, providing commercial water supplementation.] and power generation. [for the sceptics you'll find them in Google: a small one in Spain and a 1000 metre jobbie going up in Australia]
Her winning formula is forming an alliance with the equally unknown 'Basic Pay' party. This was not its name at that time. It was formerkly known as the 'Grouping for a basic income grant {BIG]'.
Starr argued brilliantly that the country was liberated from servitude in 1994 and that the word 'Grant' in the reference to basic income was humiliating and represented a return to feudal servitude. [as a cynical commentator in the press observed at the time 'they should be humiliated more politely'].
Starr proposed that the electronic wired nature of society allowed for every citizen to receive Basic Pay, which became a mantra at rallies across the country. She engineered a voter registration drive to get every poor person and woman in the country onto the voters roll and gained just sufficient votes to give her an upset victory in the 2009 elections.
Her first Act though is to declare rape to be a genocidal crime, subject to investigation under the provisions of the newly passed terrorism act [which had not been passed when I originally wrote this]
Because of the difficulties of proving rape the presumption of innocence provision in the law is changed [based on the precedent of the traffic fine which presumes guilt unless you choose to go to court and fight over your innocence]. So under Corinth Starr's presidency Mr Zuma would have had to prove his innocence and the string of witnesses from various assembled church groupings would testify that Mr Zuma was a serial rapist fathering children and crying off his responsibilities and it would be his task to show that he had been wrongfully accused.
This naturally gave rise to many structural difficulty and therefore it became de-rigeur that every act of copulation had to be preceded by a contractual agreement certifying that penetration had occurred voluntarily, with the option to cry duress on the part of the penetratee. [Yes the gender Party received strong support from that part of the male gender fraternity who are themselves the subject of unwanted anal attention-hence it is the very act of penetration without a contract signed and agreed not less than twenty four hours before the act takes place, with both parties freely able to move about and the contract digitally verified twice before the act.]
Failure to adhere to this rule meant that guilt was automatic.
Of course in my fictional world everything was a bit more complicated than this brief piece regarding the potential downside to a not guilty verdict. Nonetheless this case with Mr Zuma has revealed many things about whether the cheque woman are getting from the constitution needs to be returned address unknown or not, to paraphrase Martin Luther King.
If by expense Lord Chesterfield referred to the ever ballooning costs of Mr Zuma's fast fuck, then the cost to the party could be catastrophic, as Mr Phony Haire the Brit [Pomeranian] master of the glib riposte has this past few weeks discovered to his irrecoverable loss.
My character of Corinth Starr was modelled and built around three admirable women: Winnie Madikazela-Mandela, Patricia de Lille [in her PAC days], and Maggie Thatcher-her zeal that of the former two her economics that of the new emerging third way with the goal of the privatised market based welfare state.
I think it is pretty inevitable right now that a woman will be our country's [SA's] new President in 2009. The outcome of today's decision could raise the question: which party will she represent?
0905 8th april 2006
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