In response to Umno vice-president Muhammad Taib's type-casting of PAS as the "Taliban of Malaysia" in the Indera Kayangan by-election campaign, PAS' best shot at retaliation was to in turn type-cast Umno as the "United States and Northern Alliance of Malaysia" and in so doing, indirectly affirm its own status as the "Taliban of Malaysia".

It is a mistake for PAS to fall into BN's trap of defining the political struggle for Indera Kayangan along these lines, especially when Keadilan that fields the opposition candidate is viewed as a surrogate of PAS having not supported the DAP on its differences with PAS on the Islamic state issue.

Sure, average Malaysians still strive for the principles of democracy good governance and justice but this takes time and we (or at least many of us) are still a patient lot with a higher threshold of tolerance for autocracy, imperfect justice and governance as long as economic lollies are present, and we are not suffering the economic downturn as bad as the Philippines, Indonesia and even Singapore.

For the Chinese voters, the MCA split and their anger at Team A's Nanyang Holdings acquisition ought to be a non issue because whether Team A or Team B wins, Chinese political marginalisation in context of national politics is not mitigated. So it is natural for them to look beyond MCA at Umno as leader of the BN pack.

Compared with PAS, the leader of the other opposition pack, Umno appears a lesser evil. An opposition victory in Indera Kayangan, on the other hand, may portend a paradigm shift to more radical religious order, the dangers of which Sept 11 events underscore.

The opposition is indolent if it does not give the implications of Sept 11 the significance, in popular mind, that these events deserve.

Everyone is affected adversely the shock of the loss of lives; slowdown in tourism; the falling of our exports due to global and principally lower US consumer spending; the retrenchment of our factory workers and a quantum leap in insurance premiums for all kinds of risks covered.

Autocracy, the ISA, injustice, cronyism, corruption and misuse of public funds are evils that should be eliminated but these depredations have been there for the last couple of general elections and the people and our culture are as much to be blamed for these as the ruling elite that remains in power by taking advantage of these cultural habits.

Cultural habits take time to shed, but a radical and immediate change of politics to "an Islamic state" is a greater anathema to the collective psyche. It is not touching up an imperfect painting so to speak. It is tearing down the whole canvass and attempting another Utopian art form that the majority will feel uncomfortable.

So much so that the most strident and consistent voice against mis-governance all these years the DAP has to break away from the BA coalition and refuse to campaign for it in Indera Kayangan because of this reason!

Look at it this way. In the Indera Kayangan by-election, Keadilan's fight for democracy, human rights and justice is entirely lost, and pales to insignificance before the looming issue being crystallised as that of PAS' Islamic state versus the BN's hybrid "secular Islamic state".

In addition to reasons set forth in Steven Gan's 'Uphill task for Keadilan to repeat Lunas feat'(Jan 10) Keadilan's position is immediately compromised when political discourse of the Indera Kayangan by-election is structured along the lines of a fight between religious extremism and moderation.

Umno has already categorised PAS as 'Taliban Malaysia'. PAS has more or less admitted to this comparison by branding Umno as 'United States and Northern Alliance Malaysia'.

Even BN's traditional nemesis, DAP, remains 'neutral' in not campaigning for Keadilan, viewed as PAS' surrogate, on grounds that in doing so it would be indirectly supporting an agenda of the 'Taliban' Islamic state, the very raison d'etre of its departure from the opposition coalition.

When three political heavy weights Umno, PAS and DAP have already defined the contest in Indera kayangan as that between existing political order versus PAS new Islamic order, how could political light weight, Keadilan, re-define it otherwise as that between existing political order against new order of justice democracy and human rights?

Thus so defined, Keadilan should be prepared for the analogous outcome as that played out in Afghanistan in which the Taliban were routed.