Divorce a distraction?

I get the nagging feeling that the whole divorce debate is a welcome distraction for the party in government. Whichever way you look at it, even with the possibility of a watered down divorce law on the horizon in the near future, the PN government is set to gain from what is after all a delayed distraction. By some twenty years. If we could adduce some form of strategy from the single-seat government way of thinking it would be that the divorce debate that was clumsily shifted onto its plate has the main bonus of providing the occasional distraction from the pressing issue of COL (cost of living) in its various guises.

The spice that are priests like Daniel Cordina in Zebbug or politicians like the various JPOs, Bartolos and Musumeci only serves to give the affair the varied colouring of an indian spice stand. At the end of the day there is a sense of inevitability that is wired into the divorce issue itself. It is not a question of “If”, more a question of “when” and a bit of “how”. You can read that sense of urgency into Mike Briguglio’s press conference statement today. It almost sounds like an exercise in tautology: “Decision on divorce needs to be taken“.

You can almost hear the Simpsons‘ Homer yelling :”Duh”. But this is the country where Musumeci can claim to be an “opinionist” and not a “journalist” on his little platform on Smash. Where the same Musumeci can proselytise while trying to be the new “good boy” of the PN clan. Where Muscat can shoot at the government for “playing with the people” without actually offering an alternative solution to the problems at hand. Where politicians like Zammit Lewis can quote their leader on facebook and echo the worry about the poor without budging one inch about the new ideas from the new generation.

Thank God for divorce then (or maybe don’t thank Him, since He does not like it). We’d rather the distraction that exposes the pogguti, the sinful and the pagan. It’s more familiar territory for the Kinnie & Twistees generation brought up in the shadow of Mintoffianism and Eddie’s salvationism. Discuss a program for the economic relaunching of the nation? What the hell? I’d rather discuss the sinful qualities of divorce.

And the PLPN are heading towards the 10th legislature since Independence. In this country thinking different is the norm, and the norm is being divorced from reality.

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Abuse of Dominance

MaltaToday reports Chris Said’s concern over Benna’s price hikes on certain types of milk. In its article MT states that the parliamentary secretary will be asking the competition authority to investigate the rise in prices as“the operator could be enjoying a dominant position in the market.” Now the problem here is that a “dominant position” per se is not at all illegal under competition law. The question of whether Benna has a dominant position in the market for milk or in the sub-market for particular types of milk only comes into play if Benna has in any way “abused” of the dominant position. One would hope that the distinction between the existence of dominance and the abuse thereof is clear in the PS’s mind and that the problem is only in the reporting made by MaltaToday.

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Via Salaria

In ancient Rome the Via Salaria linked the Eternal City to the port of Castrum Truentinum, now known as the Port of Ascoli. It was called Salaria because it was the road used by the Sabines to retrieve the precious salt from the mouth of the Tiber. Salt was one of the primary units of payment in ancient Rome – hence the term “salary” from “salarium”.

In modern Malta our parliamentarians do not arrogate themselves a new salary but rather opt to increase their “honorarium”. I doubt whether we have a Via Honoraria running from the new parliament square to the respective centres of the PLPN MPs. In the meantime MPs from both sides perpetuate the pathetic fallacy of “not accepting” the honorarium while insisting on distributing its proceeds according to their wills (if something is not accepted then it is not yours to distribute).

The PN government is now under siege and has resorted to the equivalent of hunting for the mice in the sewers in order to survive. The sudden hike price of commodities from fuel to gas to milk can only serve to exacerbate the unpopularity of a government that seems to have lost the feel of the people’s pulse. Joseph’s Labour might be poised to take advantage of the situation by promising the usual progressive package that protects the weak. The problem lies in the fact that the current economic conditions will not discriminate between conservative intervention or socialist laxity.

Just look at what happened in the UK yesterday. The LibDems and the Tories were both vociferously against any VAT hike while they laboured in opposition. They completed their U-turn yesterday with the announced increase of VAT to 20%. The only saving grace was the fact that essential products (the most cited were bread and nappies) are zero-rated and hence not affected.

So are we to grin and bear the hikes while our salaries plateau over the next few years or are we all to run for parliament in the hope to get a piece of the very special pie that seems to be reserved at the top?

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Credit

2011 has begun in the sign of credit and crunches. As I zap through the news channels with a bile infested head the common thread seems to be the fact that there will be no let up to the effects of the credit crunch in this golden year. While the Con-Dem coalition is under fire for its decision to increase VAT to 20% in the UK, Malta’s opposition and its “social partners” are furious at the rise in prices of anything from petrol to milk. We will speak later about the honoraria debate but for now I’d like to share a conundrum about credit card fraud closer to home.

I was trying to review the damage on the various outlets of credit I possess when I noticed that on the 23rd and 24th December of last year some christian soul had availed himself of nigh €1400 in order to travel around the Philippines (hotel and air travel thank you very much). So I called CETELEM who are surrogates for the devil on this earth and informed them that the only archipelago I had visited at Christmas time was Malta. After a visit to every division in the CETELEM belgian offices I finally got some answers from the man in the fraud division. I would only have to sign some papers and the situation would be repristinated.

But. And there is always a but. I have to get a procés verbal from the police. That means I would have to go to a Luxembourg police station and declare that the data relating to my creditcard (and not the credit card) had been misappropriated. I would also have to tell them that I am doing this declaration in order to inconvenience some desk clerk at the office who would have to print out my declaration and authenticate it. Do you see? The police cannot do much about retrieving what has been stolen. The card is still sitting comfortaby in my wallet but the data has been virtually spirited and used elsewhere.

I would have thought the police would have better things to do and I will actually sympathise with any luxembourg policeman who will complain about the absolute waste of time in filling this form. CETELEM is actually inconveniencing myself (I’ve got to go to the station) and the police (they have to fill the form – or at least I hope they will). This is where I prefer the Maltese banks who send an SMS when you perform transactions with your VISA.

Bahh. C’est la vie. Time to have another antiflu pill or whatever.

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Coming Soon

We’ve heralded the new year with an influenza virus. Thinking positively ahead though and will be back with you as soon as the head feels less like a barrel of bile and snot. Patience.

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Merry Christmas to All J'accuse Readers

It’s obvious that we’re going slow due to the rushing around for the festive season. Meanwhile we would like to wish all our readers a very good Christmas. Easy on the turkey.

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