It used to be every five years, then it became every so often. That you see my words of wit and wisdom on Thursday, I mean. This is because our electoral law, in its infinitely patronising omniscience, deems it necessary that for a day before the poll there should be silence so that the fog of war can engulf you without distraction.

Why would you buy the counterfeit when the original is still alive and kicking?

So don’t go on to the ’net or access the online papers, will you?

So here we have it, Saturday is but hours away and Joseph Muscat’s dream is poised to be realised. He will be skipping merrily up the steps to Castille on the back of a campaign that was very, very, very long on promises, promises but very, very, very short on how they’re going to be achieved, especially if you leave aside thoughts of fairy godfathers with €600 million to spend on castles in the air and magical power stations.

This is what happens when you promise all things to all men and his sister, you can’t be too specific about the ‘how’ bit because it will become way too clear that you won’t be able to deliver. But this doesn’t worry the sound-bite generation, even if it really should.

I, for one, am worried about being led by a Prime Minister who thinks he’s giving his campaign a shot in the arm by signing an 11th-hour deal with the hunters.

Hopefully, the deal will end up being a shot in Labour’s own foot, when people on the more balanced side of the electorate take it for what it is: a ploy designed to appeal, yet again, to another selfish group, this time one that tends towards favouring anyone who lets them roam the countryside blasting away to the heart’s content.

The funny thing is that Muscat’s mask slipped even more than it usually does on this one because he’s let it be known, if only obliquely, that some (all?) hunters won’t be pleased with the final outcome.

What he means is that this is probably one more of those promises designed to ‘wow’ but not actually to have anything approaching an outcome.

At least, the birds will be pleased if this turns out to be so, though, for the hunters, like the rest of us, it will be too late.

This election is being heralded, though not by many, as the one in which Alternattiva Demokratika will make history and get someone elected. These heralds don’t seem to have too strong a grasp of the reality of numbers, though.

But why should anyone vote Muscat, really?

Notice I didn’t write ‘vote Labour’ because, although all through the 2008 campaign, and for five years after that, we got a constant barrage of pooh-poohing because of the GonziPN branding, we’ve now had the surfeit of all surfeits of josephmuscat.com.

Whether this is because so many of Labour’s faces are deemed to be unfit to be placed before the electorate or because Muscat is only capable of thinking as far as the limits imposed by his own qualities is not for me to surmise, lest I be accused of vicious personal attacks.

That many candidates were kept away from the cameras or were told to choose not to pit themselves against Simon Busuttil or the Prime Minister is a fact. Muscat himself was always less than eager for direct encounters, even with the Broadcasting Authority having done its best to shield him from nasty, pushy interviewers.

Suffice it to say that in this, as in so much else, Labour has done its utmost to ensure that there’s no way for us to twig that all they’ve done is ape the PN. Subliminally, they’re telling us, vote ‘Labour, get PN’ while making sure you’re not going to see them in action against the PN because you’ll soon spot the difference.

So, why would you buy the counterfeit when the original is still alive and kicking? If you do, you’ll get the bits of the original that are nothing less than flawed and tarnished. You know to whom I am referring, those welcomed with open arms by Muscat as soon as they saw that their personal ambitions would not be pandered to by the PN.

Why would you risk Labour, with a record even in Opposition that shows they resort to cover-ups and manipulation to ensure that the party remains squeaky clean, even if only on the surface?

With the painfully thin veneer removed, what can be seen is not attractive at all and it’s not going to produce many jobs: that, if nothing else, if for sure.

On the other hand, the PN in Government has a good record. It’s not spotless – why should it be? – but look around you, look to all points of the compass and see if we’re not in pretty decent shape.

The good stuff doesn’t happen by accident and the less good stuff won’t be fixed by cheap promises and shallow slogans. However, many smug faces are plastered on billboards, spewing platitudes and saying precisely nothing.

Well, there you have it. We’ll be back to normal soon, even if there are a few crypto thugs lining up to take revenge on those who they see as enemies of josephmuscat.com.

Hopefully, despite their slavering appetite for revenge and vindictiveness, it won’t happen because Malta remains a decent place, even if their heroes have been trying to give the impression that it isn’t.

People with a brain that works know this to be a lie and you read this, so you have one. A brain, I mean.

imbocca@gmail.com

www.timesofmalta.com/articles/author/20