Mahathir Mohamad's Blog, page 28

CABARAN MOUNTAIN BIKE ANTARABANGSA LANGKAWI 2010

1. Langkawi sekali lagi akan menjadi tuan rumah kepada satu pertandingan bertaraf antarabangsa dari 6 hingga 8 Ogos. Ia bukanlah pertandingan Le Tour de Langkawi. Kali ini, acaranya ialah Cabaran Mountain Bike Antarabangsa Langkawi 2010, yang akan diadakan sepenuhnya di Langkawi.

2. Peserta-peserta yang bertanding datang dari 16 negara, termasuk peserta Malaysia. Yang lainnya datang dari negara jiran Asia, Eropah termasuk juga dari Afrika Selatan. Acara ini menjanjikan satu pertandingan yang...

HIGH INCOME ECONOMY

1. The Government has announced the intention to make Malaysia a high income country. I assume this means people will receive high wages, salaries and profits.

2. But if wages and salaries are to be increased by the private sector, the cost of doing business would have to increase as well. To cover this increase, prices of products must be increased. This will mean that the consumers will have to pay higher prices for whatever they purchase. There would be, by definition, inflation.

3. The...

THE FREE MARKET 2

1. When I wrote about the free market, I was not thinking of wanting to make money from the United States. It is good if we can but without the US market Malaysian palm oil is doing extremely well.

2. I just wanted to show the hypocrisy of America. We do not go around the world preaching free market, so if we are not so free as alleged, we are not being hypocritical. I had always been sceptical of ideas coming from the rich. They are all self-serving.

3. They preach and fiercely demand that...

THE FREE MARKET

1. A long time ago when I was Prime Minister I met President Bush the father, at Boston University where he was conferring degrees for graduates. I met him in a side room and I told him of the unfair anti-palm oil campaign by America, blaming it for heart diseases.

2. We later submitted palm oil samples for three American chemical laboratories to examine the cholesterol contents. Their findings proved that although palm oil had more cholesterol than rival soya bean oil, the main edible oil...

SUNAT DAN WAJIB

1. Sejak kecil lagi saya diajar tentang perbezaan antara sunat dan wajib dalam Islam.



2. Yang sunat saya diberitahu jika dibuat berpahala tetapi tidak dibuat tidak berdosa. Sebaliknya yang wajib perlu dibuat jika tidak akan berdosa.



3. Sudah tentu awal-awal lagi saya diberitahu sembahyang lima waktu itu wajib. Tetapi kelonggaran diberi jika tidak sihat, jika dalam perjalanan, dalam kecemasan.



4. Jika tidak dapat berdiri boleh duduk semasa sembahyang, dalam perjalanan boleh jamak...

"I DON'T KNOW WHY THEY HATE US"

1. Americans seem incapable or more likely unable to accept the real reason why they are hated by Muslims.



2. After 9/11 Bush was reported to have said, "I don't know why they (the Muslims) hate us".



3. Later on answering his own question, Bush declared that "they hate our democracy. They hate our freedom".


4. Since then more and more reasons have been suggested as to why Muslim individuals are prepared to tie explosives to their bodies and blow themselves up in order to kill Americans.

INTERNET GUARANTEE

1. When we appointed an International Advisory Panel of prominent IT personalities from around the world, we gave a guarantee that Malaysia would not censor the Internet.

2. We thought at that time that even if we wanted to, we couldn't. The technology was not available for us to do this. And so Malaysiakini and other sites flourished.

3. Now that I have retired I feel glad that we made the decision not to censor. I have benefited much from the blogs as have very many bloggers. There may be...

KHAZANAH...

1. Fresh from losing three billion ringgit via its majority owned firm Sime Darby, I hear that Khazanah is buying or going to buy "Aman Resorts".

2. These are six star resorts in Bali, Phuket and other exotic places. I don't know how profitable they are but I do know that hotels and resorts are not easy to manage, even less easy to make profits. It is the management companies which make the profits because profitable or not they get their cut of the takings.

3. I am sure Khazanah is well...

TONY BLAIR 2

1. British papers headlined "Blair's battle with law chief over Iraq". Tony Blair was told the Iraq war was illegal by Attorney-General (Lord Goldsmith) the day before he (Blair) gave George Bush the go-ahead for invasion.

2. Blair's fury at the repeated warnings from Lord Goldsmith was laid bare as secret memos were published by the Chilcot Inquiry on the British involvement in the Iraq war after the memos were declassified by the Government.

3. On the memo by Lord Goldsmith, the...

TATARSTAN

1. Akhirnya sampai juga saya ke Tatarstan, negeri orang Tartar yang pada satu masa dahulu hampir tawan Moscow. Sekarang Tatarstan adalah sebuah negeri autonomi dalam Persekutuan Rusia. Seperti juga dengan negeri-negeri Melayu yang dilindungi oleh British dahulu, Rusia menguasai perkara-perkara hubungan luar dah pertahanan. Bezanya Tatarstan telah ditawan oleh Rusia semasa Czar Ivan the Terrible dalam abad ke-16.

2. Orang Tartar telah terima Islam pada abad ke-9 Masehi, iaitu 200 tahun selepas...