I’m sitting in a room, mercifully with no cigarette smoke puffing my way. Tonio Borg has been nominated to replace John Dalli as European Commissioner. May Dr Borg get the appointment endorsed by the EP—and may he be our blandest, dullest emissary. That is what our land needs—a man who is truly and universally known to be honest. And let’s forget about the rest for the sake of our past and future reputation worldwide.

Please excuse my seemingly dulled reasoning and even duller way of expressing myself. We, as a nation, should try being dull. And if we are wrong and in the spotlight for being so let us not try turning the tide and accusing everyone else of wronging us. Tainted people should do what all losers should—hide their head in shame and not scream out silly excuses and sillier theories of international conspiracy.

I am lost—truly and utterly lost. I can’t make head or tails of this sorry sordid affair, with so much happening and so much being said and dangerously unsaid that for once I wish to curl up and cry myself to sleep.

I’m not thinking straight and if some politico or media commentator accuses me of being high my answer will simply be: I’d like to be high on the worst of hallucinogens right now to maybe make some sense of this senseless stuff or to forget I am Maltese. Yes we’ve hit the bottom of the barrel and some do not even realise it. After several years I once more feel the need to hide my nationality because I feel we have shamed this land of ours.

Snus sounds sinister just as everything connected to this story sounds wrong. Stories of greed, tales of trust and misguided efforts come to mind when confronted with such weird unfathomable details. Smokescreens are being thrown to hide or transform the truth, which we will never know in full.

Malta, long unknown and now to be long-known as the land where anything looking straight is actually quite crooked.