The Irony of Lee Kuan Yew’s “Insightful” Worldview
My wife passed me a physical copy of an article entitled “Foreseeing Red: Lee Kuan Yew on China” published in the current issue of Time Magazine. Turns out that three researchers from Harvard University (Graham Allison, Robert Blackwill & Ali Wyne) have interviewed him on his views on China, United States and the rest of...
Why I am glad to predict the Punggol East by-election wrongly
To start, I predicted the result of the Punggol East by-election wrongly as my guess is 51% for the ruling party and 48% for Workers Party with the 1% split for the minnows. Of course, with no polling data available, the way I came to the prediction was to look at the historical datapoints we...
Why Nations Fail by Daron Acemoglu and James A Robinson
Written by Daron Acemoglu and James A Robinson, the central theme of the book “Why Nations Fail” is to explain the huge differences in incomes and standards of living that split the rich countries of the world from the poor, and put forward a perspective based on how institutions created from politics can evolve the...
Where & Why did Social Media succeed & fail in GE 2011?
After the past 10 days of intensive campaigning, cooling off and subsequently polling day for the Singapore General Elections 2011 (GE 2011), an interesting question comes to mind, “Why has social media worked for the opposition parties and failed badly for the ruling party particularly the case of George Yeo?” I examine certain aspects of...
Are Property Prices affected by who you vote for?
Recently, Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew mentioned that the property prices of Aljunied GRC will go down if the voters of that constituency vote for the opposition. In his words, “If you have the wrong government, your property prices go right down. Ask why in Hougang the property is not as high as their neighbours.”...
The Problem of Relative Choice for Singaporean Voters
Some time back, the Prime Minister of Singapore announced a few sweeping changes to the election system to encourage more dissenting voices within the Parliament in Singapore. He proposed the following changes namely: (1) Permanency and Number of Nominated Members of Parliament in the Singapore Political System: Nominated Members of Parliament will feature as a...
Singapore General Election 2009 Likely?
In times of crisis with people gravitating towards the government for assistance in domestic concerns, it is usually a good time for ruling parties (from UK to Singapore) to call for a general election. With recent happenings in Singapore, is it worth the effort of the ruling party of Singapore to call for a general...
Why SAF Officers have fast track promotions
The headline “US soldier takes potshots at SAF” by Loh Chee Kong (Today, 12 March 2007) examines several themes in an research journal article “The Roar of the Lion City: Ethnicity, Gender and Culture in the Singapore Armed Forces” (Armed Forces & Society, 2007, 33:265-285) and the rebuttals from MINDEF in response to several issues...
