Foot in mouth disease

There are very few sure things in politics. However, there are a couple. You can be sure, for example, that Joe Mizzi will continue believing there are hidden oil reserves in Maltese territorial waters, concealed by a conspiracy of silence.

Then there's the certainty that practically every parliamentary question tabled by Labour MP Adrian Vassallo will include a reference to prostitutes, pimps, porn, soliciting and loitering, single mothers or some matter related to sex.

A quick trawl through the internet will throw up the answers of repeated queries by the Labour MP who seems to think that we are going to hell in a handcart, morality-wise.

Thanks to this Maltese male version of Mary Whitehouse, we learnt that in July 2005, five women were caught loitering. The bug must have caught on, because in 2009 there were 11 times as many people arraigned for hanging around with criminal intent. That was the year when 36 prostitutes were prosecuted some 255 times.

Not content with keeping tabs on women of ill-repute, the Labour MP turned his sights on single mothers and the benefits they were receiving. And the most recent query is the now infamous one about porn films being shown in hotels.

A common thread runs through Vassallo's parliamentary interventions and it's quite clear what it is. It's sex - sex on the brain, sex which is paid for, sex on street corners, sex between members of the same gender, sex which takes place with someone other than one's lawful wedded spouse. There's no dislodging Vassallo from his sexual hobby-horse.

Despite his single-mindedness and fixation with the idea that all society's ills can be linked to extramarital affairs, it's not the parliamentary questions which I find most idiotic. After all, there may be residents who are concerned about their neighbourhood turning into a red-light district, and the number of single mothers may be an indication of how society is changing. So, Vassallo's probing in that direction may be justified.

What I find absolutely ridiculous is Vassallo's claim that he would prefer to live in Iran and riot in the streets to defend his religion than live in a country where pornography is available in hotel rooms. He may be too wrapped up in who's getting all hot and sweaty under the covers while watching a blue film in some hotel room, but I presume that Vassallo is aware of what goes on in Iran. If he was quoted correctly - then his dream destination is one where child offenders are executed, as are converts to religions other than that of Islam, where gay men are killed or forced to undergo gender re-assignment surgery, where adulterers are stoned to death, where democratic protests are quashed by military force and where women are swaddled in burkas.

And Iran is an Islamic country which doesn't care much for religious freedoms, let alone Vassallo's right to take to the streets to start a Christian crusade against pay-per-view in hotel rooms.

I take it that this does not square with Vassallo's vision of an ideal society which I imagine is something like Malta in the 1800s, complete with women wearing the għonella instead of wispy mini-dresses.

So, if he didn't mean it, why did he go shooting off his mouth like that? Why did he expose himself to ridicule and make himself the butt of a thousand jokes? What kind of masochist (of the non-sexual kind, I hasten to add) does Vassallo have to be to make such an ill-advised remark?

Yes, it's been hyped up and amplified by the media, but it's entirely his fault for giving them such a juicy morsel to chew on. The Labour MP could have chosen his words more judiciously. Didn't he learn anything from his Nationalist counterpart Edwin Vassallo, who was taken to task when he was reported as saying the government had an interest in what went on in the bedroom? Evidently not.

Vassallo is further proof, if any was needed, of the utter shambles within the Labour camp when it comes to projecting a coherent message about what the party is about.

Joseph Muscat goes on about how the revamped Labour Party is the natural home for liberals but then his own team sabotages him. Half the Labour MPs are off-message, without the political acumen to realise they are portraying the party as being made up of a set of people holding disparate and conflicting views.

More to the point, they set themselves up as figures of ridicule for the press to take pot-shots at. The impression one gets is of a rudderless boat careening from one gaffe to another. Since the PL seems to be operating in a policy vacuum, the public's perception of the party can only be based on the impression given by its exponents, and at the moment it's not a good one. In a world where it is all about perception, the PL is slipping up big time.

cl.bon@nextgen.net.mt