I.M. Beck - quote, unquote

I will open this week with a salutation and then another salutation. The first is to the outgoing editor of this 'ere rag, Victor Aquilina, who has relinquished the reins after a good number of years at the helm. I wish this gentleman, and I use the word deliberately, all that he wishes for himself and thank him for being so patient with me over the years. He wielded the blue pencil with circumspection and only when my efforts fell below his standards of good taste and respect for the laws of libel.

The second salutation goes to the incoming chap who, if my memory serves (which it doesn't always), first took the risk and published me. I might be wrong, of course, it was so long ago (time really does fly when you're having fun). Whatever, young Bugeja has a tough act to follow and, knowing him as I do, I know he'll carry it off.

OK, enough schmoozing, let's get back to business.

Crack(l)ing Rosie

I seem to remember a little ditty by Neil Diamond which used the words in my title (and I'm sure someone will write in to tell me if I'm wrong) and the words have absolutely nothing to do with anything at all except that it lets me use the word cracking with a bit of tongue in cheek and an ell in it.

The cracks to which I refer of course are the ones that are becoming ever more apparent in the façade of the cathedral that is New Labour, whose archbishop, Doctor Alfred Sant, must be sitting less than pretty on his throne, with staff and mitre clutched to his quivering chest.

From what I hear, there are seven or so vultures flapping around in the belfry (where bats are usually kept) waiting for the Praetorian Guard to lower its, er, guard.

The way the story is playing out, this band of brothers, and some sisters, are poised to swoop (do vultures swoop?) when the referendum is lost, boycott or no boycott, and a new man (or woman...) will be installed at the wheel, hopefully one who will not turn loopy at the thought of Malta joining Europe.

Who this new broom will be is being talked about in the cafes and boozers of the land, of course, but I won't blow the gaff myself, because if it is who I think it is, it won't be such a bad thing and I don't want to be blamed for being the reason why not.

Suffice it to say that if the new replaces the New and declares Europe not to be out of the question, on the contrary, that it is a good thing and the will of the people is to be respected, the current bunch will have quite a job getting back in, though realistically, if the other lot change horses now, they shouldn't really expect to have a snow-ball's chance in hell.

Still, many over at the Glass House know they don't have an ice-cube's chance in Beelzebub's domain with the current policies, so it's a bit of a Hobson's from their point of view.

It's going to be an interesting couple of months from now on in, watching Doctor Alfred Sant twist and turn to avoid having to twist and turn in the future. The twisting and turning to which I refer latterly, of course, is meant to summon up the image of the corpse of his political body twisting and turning in the bleak wind of the post-leadership era, when it would have been strung out to dry by the swooped vultures I referred just a bit up from here.

Of course, there's always a chance that the dear boy will win the referendum, which will mean that either the electorate will have to come to its senses and dump him in the elections that will have to follow (which will leave us in quite a pretty position, though not as bad as my favourite nightmare scenario, where Fenech Adami decides to hold both polls on the same day and wins the election but loses the referendum) or else this country will be doomed to a future a bit like Groundhog Day, when all we will do is lurch from one side of the twilight zone to the other.

Talk about dining out at the Restaurant at the Edge of the Universe.

But this is a bit silly, talking about Doctor Alfred Sant winning the referendum, because it's pretty clear to all and sundry that he's about to come up with an astounding surprise and call for a boycott. It would be a surprise to no one, of course, because his media lackeys have been dropping the broadest of broad hints about this for months now.

Which would leave all Doctor Alfred Sant's acolytes, the E. Priviteras, the KMBs and the J. G. Vassallos of this world, flapping about in something of a tizzy, because they've been preaching "No" not "O" and not having the chance to exhort people to put their mark in the box saying "No" would disappoint them more than somewhat, methinks.

Prattling pronouncements

And so it came to pass that Doctor Alfred Sant wrote that "Much as Dr Fenech Adami and his troopers puff hard to pooh-pooh Labour's partnership policy, regarding relations with the European Union, they cannot pooh-pooh it away".

I was told that I am one of such troopers, which is not as bad as being one of KMB's old troopers, I suppose, or being a soldier of steel from the old, old days, striding down Republic Street on the way to sack the Curia. But I digress

Of course we puff to pooh-pooh Labour's partnership "policy" because it is not a policy as you and I would understand the concept. The point is that this "policy" is nothing more or less than a wishlist, much of the sort the son and heir puts before me every time any reason to celebrate rolls around.

Doctor Alfred Sant goes on to write, a propos of this very point, that "such a policy only needs the understanding that it will be placed on the agenda, when the opposition becomes a government. For partnership, that understanding already exists."

Excuse me? Are you seriously expecting us, the great unwashed, to vote no to the question of whether Malta should take its place in Europe on the basis of a known equation, in favour of your assertion that there is an understanding that the partnership idea, such as it is, will be placed on the agenda if the opposition becomes, Lord luv us, a government?

I've heard of turkeys voting for Christmas but this borders on the equally nutty, comparable not to leaping without looking but to leaping knowing full well that all I'm leaping into is a void filled with bureaucrats' promises and the understanding that there may be space on the agenda, presumably under "Other matters - discussion with micro-states who think they are something".

Doctor Alfred Sant, bless his little cotton socks, even has a jargon laden theory to cover his position. Understand this purple passage, if you can: "if Malta functions in the central Mediterranean as a European island society, open to all, it would serve as one niche for the development of different forms of interaction with spaces outside the European one."

It's almost as bad as promoting gender mainstreaming in a multi-cultural society bearing in mind the subconscious sensibilities of the lesser-spotted warbler, while trying to juggle a sack of whippets with one hand tied under the carpet.

And then, not to be outdone by his own lackeys, he goes on, does Doctor Alfred Sant, to make it clear (well, clear in his own way, of course, which is not hardly) that he's not exactly over the moon about having a referendum.

He writes that "the rules governing the way elections are run - who wins, who sins, who loses, and how, and for what period - are written in the constitution. No such rules apply for plebiscites. Yet those who are now making the run for plebiscitary democracy claim that a referendum organised by the government of the day, under rules that are clearly laid down nowhere, certainly not in the constitution, should be binding for ever on all. Of course, they insist that this would be so only if the 'result' goes their way. If not..."

Leaving aside the nasty thought that Labour's record in respecting the Constitution (which those of us with respect for it write with a capital "C") is hardly exemplary and the fact that my spell-checker baulked at "plebiscitary", what is he getting at? That referenda are illegal, or unconstitutional or what?

Surely even he realises that this is tripe of the first water? And why does he fly in the face of actuality (not to say something else - why drop the new editor into on his first day?) and say that there are no rules to the referendum game?

There are and he knows it.

And the question is

Just for fun, try to answer yes or no to this one. Do you not agree that it is fair to say that you are in favour of not voting against the proposition that Malta should not fail to accept that it is a positive step for it to overcome the negative trends proposed by the lobby that state that it would be more appropriate to vote no and therefore not become a member of the European Union?

I have it on no authority at all that the Labour Parliamentary group will be proposing that as the question to be put.

On the other hand, being asked whether I think that Malta should join the EU as part of the next enlargement is less likely to give me a migraine.

Get it right, girls

Some of the best columnists we have are women. That means absolutely nothing at all, of course, because chromosomal arrangements are irrelevant when it comes to bashing at the keyboard and letting the spleen run, but it gives me a snappy title, so what the heck?

Any old how, a couple of the ones I always look at, and they're conveniently packaged in the Sunday version of this estimable publication, are Pamela Hansen and Mona, the one who has a moan about where she's been taken to eat every week.

It is the responsibility of all of us who craft this sort of thing to make sure that we give a good example to our devotees and use the language in such a manner as to promote its correct deployment, rather than aiding and abetting the massacre that is being perpetrated on a daily basis.

Thus La Hansen is guilty as charged of mixing her metaphors, when she wrote about people shouting their mouths off. Dear lady, people either shout their heads off or shoot their mouths off, it's one or t'other, not both together.

And Mona, if you would allow me to address you by your first name since, officially, I don't know that your surname is ***********, you don't cut muster but mustard. I know mustard is what you use to ginger up food and that it is not susceptible of cutting, but that's the phrase - don't blame me.

You pass muster, incidentally.