The tears have only just begun to dry. I must admit that I did not manage to stay awake to watch the announcement in real time but I still broke down in an inexplicable happy explosion when I watched the rerun on Sky News this morning. It’s happened and it is still sinking in. I know that everybody from Obama to the man in the street will call this the election of Change but the first building block that has been laid today is of Hope. Change will hopefully come about through actions – trial and error as Obama said. What millions of Americans and world citizens have for now is a renewed Hope in a time of depression and recession.
Obama is the man the people have chosen to translate the message of hope into real change. It is a difficult task ahead as the hardest obstacle looms closer – that of disproving traditional politicians’ reputation of being gas bags full of rhetoric, of breaking past the falsities of marketing mantras, of giving shape to the politics of change by roping in every willing participant.
Yes we can. It is a message of hope based on belief in our potential. It can never be stressed how much the US and the world needed this message. This is the epic story of our time beginning to unfold. It is a saga, a narrative that can potentially define the time we live in. Now will be the time to move to actions from the words and the rhetoric. Armed with the message of hope the wave of change might begin.
***
And Inhobbkom Joseph wrote to Obama. I’d rather not comment at this point – and angry pen seldom writes reasonably – but never was the contrast between rhetoric and hope for real action more blatant. When will we quit playing games?
***
A brilliant article: Let’s Celebrate by John McWhorter on The New Republic
j'accuse 
But not to Malta……
A great day for America and the world – whichever way you look at it. Even if it were(which it certainly wasn’t) simply that we have got rid of Georg W Bush.
I thought your remarks about Joseph Muscat were a trifle harsh. Sure, he may have jumped the gun, but I have no doubt that the sentiments expresed were genuine and heatfelt.
The yes we can Obama-inspired hope is principally the product of exhaustion in the wake of eight years of bushism with a world economic crises to boot in a final tail-lash.
Obama’s rhetoric has been perfectly pitched yet still had to rely on the economic crises. America’s divide is in fact even more pronounced following this election. Obama’s performance along America’s conservative reactionary south is the worst democrat performance in decades.
Yet Obama promises a dream that I for one desperately want to translate into reality…
Not in a year, possibly not in the first term says the man…omg follows a pattern…Yet I still refuse not to hope, even if I will also refuse to desire…
Re Joseph’s letter I can understand it eliciting reactions such as wry smiles, or silent cringes, etc but anger?
Woke up at 7 – switched on the TV, CNN and there it was: Obama wins.
I think there were clear indications for his wins: like small town Dixville voting Obama, the huge turnout, the excitement … I still need to look at the figures but I’m sure it was quite a historic election.
@ danny, why don’t you get a blog?
@Jacques – It is good to be a sceptic but not so to be a cynic.
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Hello Fabrizio, I think that the j’accuse blog is a point of reference. I feel that too few have the time or desire to think. It may therefore be more effective to support the very few existing quality blogs rather than inflate their number.
p.s. as Hamilton won his first F1 title I wondered. Who would have ever thought that women’s lot would lag so much behind the colour-of-skin issue? How can we help women get their act together?
The PN also wrote to congatulate Obama today. This is how The Times reported it:
“The Nationalist Party today congratulated Barack Obama on his US presidential election victory.
“It said that it hoped the US would continue the fight against international terrorism under the Obama administration but said that military intervention should be ‘ethical’.”
Joseph at least offered the usual empty meaingless platitudes. The PN offered words of wisdom and meaningless advice. The unspoken message? “Well done for winning the election, but we still don’t trust you to control international terrorism, or to change your country’s policy of unilateral military action. So listen to our advice, gleaned from our vast experience dealing with war and international affairs, and maybe you’ll turn out to be a half-decent president in spite of your ethnicity and liberal tendencies.”
Idiots.
I sincerely hope Obama writes back and tells the PN to fuck off, but I somehow doubt a the usual spin brigade will write to point out the sheer audacity of a Maltese political nonentity instructing the US president on how to run his country.
Be angry, Jacques. Be cynical.
Damn these liberals. They still need to understand that only conservatives, blessed by Granpa-up-in-the-blue-blue-skies- can run a country.
Quite a shame that Palin is ignorant of life-outside-the-states … she would have lurved Malta and its anti-divorce MPs and PM.
PN’s message comes as no surprise…i call it coherence. Muscat’s letter is also typical of the man….shallow and smacking of opportunism.
actually i’m surprised the PN didn;t give him a ticking off for being pro-choice…
…and don’t you just love how the PN is lecturing Obama about being ‘ethical’..?
maybe there are are some closet abortionists within the ranks of our own GOP 🙂
Oh look! Because we’re talking about Obama and not about Daphne, we’ve all suddenly found our names again. Pathetic and gutless. Ahem, ***** – aren’t you on company time at ****am on a Thursday morning? Or do you have a day off? Small wonder that the only thing you produce in a whole week of work is your Sunday newspaper column, which I whip up in two hours of my spare time between doing all the other work which helps pay your salary.
J’ACCUSE NOTE: ***** – Name withheld. People’s jobs will not be jeopardised on my blog. Funny. There I was thinking this was a post about Change, Obama and MLPN reactions to the election. Must be difficult to reconcile the idea of “liberal umbrella PN” and the paternalistic letter sent by PN to Obama. Don’t forget that wars must be ethical eh!!!!
P.S. The “elves” in the Witch post are definitely not the same people as those posting here. This is J’accuse not Salem.
It’s all aboard the Obama bandwagon as predicted. Joseph (Amazing Metamorphosis) Muscat, arch-rival Daphne (The Maltese Middle Classes will Never Vote for a Working Class Arriviste) Caruana Galizia e la bella compania. They all want a bit of the magic. Dream on! As King Juan Carlos Borbon y Borbon famously retorted: “Por que no te callas!”
No. The ones commenting here just stick to circulating emails – in the case of one of them, on company time, using the company computer, and her company email address, all while she is paid to be doing something else.
I should have added that while she is using company time and company money to bitch about me, I am hard at work bringing in the revenue that helps ensure she gets her cheque at the end of the month. But people with that kind of mentality think that money grows on trees or comes out of a tap.
tut tut indeed. Obama anyone? Or an essay on Why the PN is dishing out lessons to liberal democrats? Or another one about Joseph Muscat and his forthcoming Message to the Free World?
(Please post messages during lunch break. Big Brother is watching you – and his sister too!)
I don’t give a flying f**k about what you do on your employer’s time, Jacques. But I have a real and direct interest in what *********** does on company time.
@DCG – You just said that you wouldn’t be posting here anymore – or even lurking around but just popping in to laugh? What happened to you? Found a couple of free seconds to continue Lorry Sant’s work? Giving us more online gossip and pretending that it’s relevant social commentary? Jumping to conclusions? Are you really hard at work? It’s damn hard work when you have to dig up everybody’s sexual history and comment about it. Go on Daphne – Dig 4 Dirt – You Can
@ Daphne For Dummies – Daphne tries to scare people from criticising her or her heroes. She tried to scare of Wenzu Mintoff by dredging up that story about his mother. She tried to scare off Saviour Balzan by bitching about his relationship. She tried to scare off Josanne Cassar by casting nasty rumours about her wasting time. Raphael Vassallo once called Daphne a thug. Kemm kellu ragun
Ajma Daphne is my friend and she is doing the right thing because you are all so jealous of her. She is gorgeous – yesterday when she walked into a coffee shop everybody was blinded by her beauty and not blinded because she hit them with her big patata, which isnt even as big as the much bigger patata of all the hamalli Labour women and the envious bitches with small willies. Daphne works very hard, all the time with her nice shiny laptop on her sexy knees, and you know she has to think very hard to remember who was touching the titties of who when she was a young girl near Fortizza and to make sure that the nasty-titty-touchers were all labour ppl. So please take her seriously because she is very nice and intelligent and when i read all these nasty things I say to my husband (who works with Lawrence and has a big willy) “Maaaa, look what they’re saying about poor Daphne”. My big willy husband always agrees with me and so he goes on Daphne’s blog and passes nice comments
X’ironija. Illum fl-artiklu taghha Daphne tghid kemm il-Maltin mohhom pizella ghax mohhom fil-budget u mhux fl-elezzjoni ta Obama. Imbaghad hi minghaliha li kull kumment li hawn jiriferi ghaliha. Sa fejn nista nara jien – cassar ghamlet kumment fuq l-ittra tal-PN lil Obama. Allura che centra Daphne.?Jahasra x’taghmillek il-paranoia
Biex nzommu mas-suggett (ghax inkella jaqbez Fausto u jghidilna out of point) – Ma tahsbuhiex bhali li hawn Malta m’ghandiex tama li xi darba nitbiddlu ghal ahjar? Lanqas tista taghmel osservazjoni innokwa fuq messag standard li jibaght partiti politici ghax taqbez fuqek Daphne qisha bulldog (u tikxef li il-buznanna kienet tiffansja lil bidillu meta kellha 13?). X’pajjiz!!!
On a more positive note I see that Al Jazeera has done wonders for my old buddy’s Karl’s perspective on things.
this is his comment on the PN “congrats”:
*****
I find the PN’s message of congratulations to US President-elect Barack Obama rather ambiguous. In its message the PN has clearly taken a side towards the Republicans and oddly ponders with a “hope that the US would continue to fight against international terrorism.” Why such a doubt? Whilst my political opinion in Malta is no secret, I regret to note that the message is unbelievably out-of place. I challenge to ask the PN international secretariat to be clear and say if believes in the existence of a so-called “ethical war” ?
It is true that under the Bush administration Malta has benefited in some way, however I consider it rather hypocritical to praise the Bush administration indirectly through a message to President-elect Barack Obama and oddly “expressing reservations over practices at Guantanamo Bay”. Reservations? I don’t even want to reply!
The whole world is rejoicing at this historical moment, what is happening at Tal-Pieta?
yes I noticed that too raph, it’s amazing what a stint away from stamperija can do for one’s blinkers and the removal thereof…:))
Would flying f**k have anything to do with Mile High Clubs? Boqq.
Obama Obama Obama.
Back from lunch – a crappy entrecote (even the bernaise refused to share the same plate)
Oh, and just to answer Karl’s question:
What’s happening at Ta’ Pieta is that the Nationalist Party is simply unable to conceal its profound disappointment at Barack Obama’s victory.
Obama is a left-wing liberal secular socialist (socialist in the European sense, anyway) who represents the very opposite of the PN’s religio et patria philosophy. He plans to raise the time-limit for legal abortions in the States, cut funding for useless overseas aid programmes (like the ones that landed us with intrusive security scanning devices such as Pisces), impeach Bush for dragging the US to war on false pretences – a war which some people out there once vociferously supported, though they might have difficulties remembering that now – and chart a new economic course which will challenge the global status quo.
In other words he scares the living crap out of conservative “family values” sexist patriarchs who believe that the world really is as simple as their childish black/white mentality suggests. And as these people lack the intelligence or political vision to comprehend the unique symbolic power of the moment, they have just gone and made massive jackasses out of themselves in public like the idiots they truly are.
But like I said it’s the P (lick lick) N (slurp slurp swallow), so don’t go expecting any criticism, or anything like that.
Even Condolezza Rice, who is in Bush’s administration, acknowledged the significance of Obama’s win…
but I suppose our conservatives here would have preferred that whiney voiced McCain who can’t even string two sentences together without getting confused… during the campaign he once called himself a ‘liberal’ and then had to correct himself…u le…
appropriately enough, the only good speech he made was in accepting defeat, where he was very much a gentleman…but apart from that, he was hopeless…
Only in Malta…diskussjoni fuq ir-rebha kbira ta’ Obama tispicca f’deskrizzjoni tal-patata (allegatament imdaqqsa) ta’ artikolista prominenti.
Oh my God almighty, listen to this:
“(The PN) also pointed out that Malta-US relations improved substantially under the Bush administration. The highlights included the signing of a double taxation agreement, Malta’s inclusion in the visa waiver programme, assistance to Malta Customs and assistance over immigration. It hoped that relations would be further strengthened over the coming years.”
Can you believe it? The guy hasn’t even taken his oath of office yet, and the PN are already first in line with their begging bowls in hand. Please sir, keep the goodies coming! Please be as generous as Mr Bush, because we’re a small pathetic bunch of losers, incapable of engineering economic growth without a stream of hand-outs from the mighty US of A.
Honestly. Enough to make you want to puke.
In fact, somebody on another site I frequent said that the GOP lost the election the day they nominated McCain. And I tend to agree.
But this does not detract anything from Obama’s inspirational victory.
Jacques: I wish you the best but this blog is really going downhill fast. It’s a good thing Daphne jumps in every so often to liven things up a bit and get your crowd a little excited.
Cheers Mark. In case you find that this blog does not get too exciting too often you might as well go to the real deal which is to be found here http://www.daphnecaruanagalizia.com .
Downhill we go… faster, downer, stronger!
I wish to state that my husband with the big willy who works for Lawrence and who says nice things about Daphne on her blog is not Mark Aloisio. I don’t mean that Mark Aloisio has a small willy. That can’t be because only the people who post on the blogs which are not of Daphne have small willies.
Cruella: do you have a real name to go with your crude sexual innuendo?
Jacques: I was only offering my opinion on a blog that I choose to read – no need to be rude.
sorry mark only livening things up you know!
OK Jacques, you got me there! I’m glad to see you have a sense of humor.
Oooooh Mark Aloisio, I wasn’t making crude sexual innuendos. I was just repeating what my friend Daphne said on another post in this blog….she said that there are only men with small willies here ( I forgot, maybe she said the p**** word or even the ruder z** – but maybe not the z*** word because she got very annoyed when her sister found that rude, rude word in the dictionary of her children). I dont know how you can say I am being rude when I was repeating what Daphne was saying because she is never rude
Cruella: sorry, I didn’t catch your name…
Here’s Mark doing his little bit for the cause.
Cruella: “only the people who post on the blogs which are not of Daphne”
You mean ‘only the people who post on blogs other than Daphne’s’
“in the dictionary of her children” – English-speakers say ‘in her children’s dictionary’ and don’t translate literally ‘fid-dizzjunarju tat-tfal taghha’.
Take my advice: an insult loses all of its edge when it’s ungrammatical and sounds like the speaker is semi-literate.
You see I told you all that Daphne works very hard… even now late at night when everybody is asleep or doing things (not rude ones Mark Aloisio ) with big Nationalist willies… she is helping me with my grammar. She has a heart of gold Daphne. U allura…it doesnt matter if she says all the secrets that Wenzu Mintoff told her many years ago. As I told my husband (of the big Willie), it serves him right, he shouldnt have wasted her time and anyway Daphne knows that ppl get fed up always reading about how nasty Joseph Muscat is. She is very clever and to change the subject now she is writing about how nasty Wenzu is.
No, Cruella – I just find it interesting that even when people go to such great lengths to hide their identity, there are some things which they just can’t hide: their social origins being one of them. ‘Dictionary of her children’ tells me a lot about where you’re coming from and what your particular problem is – or one of them at least.
Your last post: we tell secrets; we don’t ‘say’ them (another one that reveals your social origins). ‘Of the Big Willie’ (tal-pesisa kbira, as I imagine you translated it): ‘the one with the big willy’ if you have more than one husband, so as to distinguish him from your other husbands who have small ones, or – if you have just one husband – ‘who has a big willy’.
It’s spelt with a y because the boy’s name is spelt with an ie, and it’s not a proper noun so no capital letters are used. Big Willie would be a man, not a prick.
ppl: grown-ups don’t use text-message spelling when communicating with other grown-ups via the internet, unless they wish to be thought educationally, socially or mentally deficient.
I won’t bother with your punctuation and sentence construction.
I’m invariably struck by how badly many Maltese speak and write English, despite the advantages of learning it from birth, good schooling, and even tertiary and post-graduate education. I suppose some of these people here adopt the same attitude towards improving their English that their political peers take to learning correct protocol: qabda nejk.
Mark Aloisio: they don’t use their names because they’re ashamed of themselves, yet dress up their shame as ‘fear of consequences’ and that way they can feel better about their spineless behaviour. When faced with people who use their real names no matter what, they feel even more inadequate.
I am always proved right – you see how kind and hard-working Daphne is. First thing in the morning and she helps me to spell and all about the “pessisa kbira”. She knows how to spell these words, especially “oxx”.
You learn a lot about good manners from Daphne. Did you know that it is only well-mannered people who say “Fuck off” to people who are only doing their job?
Daphne knows how to spell too. She told Mario Debono that he was very “najs” when he told her that he used to fancy her a long time ago in sixth form. That was a very long time ago when her patata was smaller. Imma insomma bigger is better hux?
@DCG – No one cares about Cruella’s spelling. Stop correcting her and tell us why you finished off what Lorry Sant started. Tell us why you can sit in judgement and decide when it’s okay to start a relationship after your partner has died. Tell us why you continue bringing up the case of Alfie Rizzo. Don’t you know his family is suffering. There are worse things than having bad manners.
@Wise old man and Cruella – give it a rest. People were having an interesting discussion about American politics before it got sidetracked. You really need to stop obsessing about DCG: it’s probably not a healthy thing to be doing to your brains, especially if you really are old as well as wise.
To Wise Young Man – people will discuss what they want to. Didn’t you notice that it was DCG who butted in the interesting discussion about US elections by making mad accusations about those commenting? She can’t expect us to ignore Her Royal Barminess then.
“Wise Old Man” has asked a very interesting question – “Why did DCG finish off Lorry Sant’s work?”
The answer is that some things which seem to be totally different because of one very obvious facet are identical in all other aspects.
At first glance, nothing could be more different than the late hulking former Labour Minister and the tal-pepé columnist from Sliema. But once you see past that screen, you will find that they are two peas from the same pod – essentially thugs who are ready to go to any lengths to get their way.
One used the strength of his arms (or those of his followers) and his contacts in the Labour Gov. The other uses the poison in her pen and her contacts in the PN Gov.
Quod non fecerunt barbari, fecerunt Barberini
It is hard to see what value this robust “exchange of views” between Daphne Caruana Galizia and Cruella is bringing to the blog. If Daphne considers Cruella so unworthy of consideration for her shortcomings in class and intellectual prowess, she does herself no favours by carrying on like the hysterical fishwife she is increasingly coming to resemble.
The less said about Cruella’s crude outpourings, the better.
As to the exercised issue of anonymity, which some bloggers (ahem) may prefer to preserve for reasons other than deviousness and deviancy, I cannot help but recall that a certain rumour-monger did not shirk from concealing her identity when submitting some pretty scurrilous material to a regular gossip column in the now-defunct tabloid The People.
Of course, that may itself have been just a nasty rumour.
U ejja Vlad … il-ftit ewforja li kien hawn f’pajjizna ghall-elezzjoni Presidenzjali fl-Istati Uniti ta’ l-Amerika hadnieha meta konna qed inqallbu l-istazzjonijiet waqt ir-riklami ta’ KC u/jew Arani Issa. Mhux qed nitkellem bi snobbizmu, tafx. Ghax jien ma nafx x’irid Obama u x’kien jaghmel kieku tela McCain. Allura fuqhiex tridna nitkellmu? Mhux ma’ l-ewwel cans li jkollna ndawwru t-tahdita ghal xi haga li nhossuna komdi nitkellmu dwarha?
Jien iktar inwahhal f’Jacques Rene’ Zammit kieku. Ghax ma missux jikteb fuq dawn l-affarijiet.
Jien iktar jinteressani min qed jorqod ma’ min u min qed jaqlibha lil min. Mela l-Amerika?! Ghandi xorti naf li qieghda barra mil-Mediterran. Jew mhix?
@ Vlad – excellently out. Finally someone has summarised the whole exchange and put it in coZtext.
Vlad – I remember you used to have a blog. Any chance of reviving it?
@ Zizzu – You’ve also pointed out why we never get over our insular nature
Innutajt x’ghamlet u x’qalet DCG imma b’daqshekk xorta wahda ma nistax nifhem ghalfejn xi nies jibdew jiktbu u jitkellmu fuqha malli jifthu ghajnejhom. Nispera li ta’ l-anqas ghandhek xi delizzju iehor ghax inkella se tahraq l-ahhar ftit snin li baqalhek haj titnejjek quddiem il-kompjuter.
@ wise young man – Mhux biex inkun pedantiku imma DCG qed taqbez u timutettja fis-sighat bikrin ta bil-lejl u kmieni filghodu – u din tghid li ghandha hafna x’taghmel. Naprezza l-fatt li tixtieqli l-gid u hafna affarijiet sbieh pero ahjar taghtih lil DCG il-parir biex isib delizzju – ghax qed issir histerika u ddisprata
@ Wise Old Man: is-sens komun jghidli li l-parir tieghi jghodd ghat-tnejn li inthom. Kieku jien kont Daphne ma noqghodx nahli l-hin ma dik il-persuna (li mid-dehra hija kemm xejn hamalla u ghalhekk qed tirraguna minn ghajnha) imsejjha Cruella. Kieku jien kont Wise Old Man ma kontx nahli hini ma Daphne l’anqas ghax nimmagina li hemm hafna affarijiet izjed utili x’naghmel b’hajti. Imma imbaghad wara kollox ghamlu li l-qahbec tridu. . . imma kif ghidt qabel, kienet ghaddejja diskussjoni xi ftit jew wisq interessanti u fottejtuha.
Zbub, spelling, hamalli-pepe, srum kbar, niftahru kemm nafu niktbu Ingliz perfett u kemm l-ohrajn ghandhom Ingliz atroci…PAJJIZ MIMLI HANG-UPS U DWEJJAQ DAK LI AHNA. Gibtuh zibel dal-blogg li xi darba kien xaqq dawl. Ja qatta injuranti.
“Gibnih zibel”??
Kont se nighidlek min gabu zibel dal-blogg, imma ahjar ma nghid xejn ghax lanqas haqq iz-zobb ta’ hassle.
Over and out
Sewwa qed tghid Bonello. Il-bicca l-kbira tan-nies fuq dan il-blog jitkellmu biss meta tigbdilhom l-ispaga Daphne.
I’ m with Sigi on this one.
@David – You have pricked my conscience, so I thought I would rouse my blog from its slumber for a one-off special.
Please feel free to litter the comments section with peurile reference to genitalia and bed-wetting. That is what sets the best blogs apart, after all.
The case for the new orthodoxy of Natural Nationalist (of the absolute conservative ilk) Superiority would be a lot more persuasive if NNS proponents were not pushing their claim in such an agressive and fanatical manner.
@ Vlad: that is the spirit
@ Sigi Bonello: a post ‘Go Barack’ please
@ danny: Ha! Forget it mate; you have four more years like this. The MLP will go on to win the 2013 election (yes, we can?) and you’ll get how beautiful life was under Gonzi and the usual retro but always stylish Mintoff stories.
In the meantime – and mark my word on this one – Gonzi will be dismissed as a Catholic fundamentalist (you know, being pretty much anti-divorce) and Austin gets elected to lead the blue eye boy and girl to the promised land.
2018: PN wins the election
A few months down the line, Jacques – by then married with kids with a beer belly to boot – will blog something on the end of the Obama period. Daphne, more experienced than before, will tell us something new and something not so new about things we do not really care to know. It will then go on a penis tangent. After 60 something of mental masturbating comments danny attard will comment:
‘The case for the new orthodoxy of Natural Nationalist (of the absolute conservative ilk) Superiority …’
Ch-Ch-Change
Insomma … thanks for the show, have a great weekend.
Peace
and…while change has come to America…it is pretty clear that change in mentality will probably never come to Malta…and that is the pity
have a nice weekend…:)
I know I will
Fabrizio, I can picture it to a t.
one poem from 2003:
(Bush)
it is not history that will judge, laud, forgive or curse you,
but the whims of the next god to follow you…
for those of us who have been here before know
that only the factory of fragile gods
may survive.
Peace back.
ps heard the latest? Israel is building a monument to tollerance…over a muslim cemetry…reminds me of a sudden urgent need to hold a mass meeting at zejtun…with no subsequent recurring need ever registered…eppur si muove, i suppose…
an afterthought:
Labour (or rather Joseph) could win the next election…but not with the current set-up.
I must admit that those who said that nothing will change in the labour party have been proved right (at least up to this point). Even the most circuitous of old-time ‘investors’ continue to shape the lifeless hut, and in this state Labour could only pierce the fundamentalist bastions if these self-crumble flat to the ground…and still not much good will that do.
A labour ‘victory’ in the up-and-coming MEP elections will only endorse the labour status quo that may not struggle to manage a tombola party let alone a country.
So my mind is telling me: vote for change in labour to change Malta…vote Cassola…
I will however postpone my opinion till up-coming statutory changes…
corection:
A labour ‘victory’ in the up-and-coming MEP elections will only endorse labour status quo that may struggle to manage a tombola party let alone a country.
I think AD will flop in the EP elections, and without George Abela contesting, Simon Busutill will head the elected list like last time. But really, I can’t be bothered with the EP elections.
As for the MLP, I think we give way too much importance to the parties’ administrations. It is their problem and not ours.