What the opposition can learn from the fall of Saddam

“That men do not learn very much from the lessons of history is the most important of all the lessons that history has to teach.”

- Aldous Huxley, ‘Collected Essays’

Only Umno propagandists could liken the plight of their chosen potentate to the toppling of a genocidal dictator by foreign intervention. MyKMU.net's attempt to contextualise Umno’s current political turmoil because of foreign intervention, and that ultimately regret would be what is waiting for those who partake in displacing Umno, should appeal to a certain section of their demographic and I am not talking about the stereotypical “rural Malay” that oppositional types like to bandy about.

I am talking about middle-class, educated Umno/BN supporters who would ignore greater Islamic malfeasances - although to be fair to Saddam Hussein, he was a contradiction of secularism and virulent sectarianism unlike your average Islamic dictator - in favour of advancing the populist neo-colonialism American narrative which most of these regimes use to sustain political hegemony.

This is not new. In fact, the New Straits Times attempted the same a couple of years back. Here is a recap for those who may have forgotten this sordid episode from an article of mine in response to this manufactured outrage:

“Under the vomit-inducing headline of 'Plot to destabilise the government', the New Straits Times (who I believe are propagators of a plot to destabilise rational thinking) outlined a chilling scenario of a motley group of new media types (which includes Malaysiakini) and social activist organisations who are apparently being funded by a nebulous American entity to destabilise the government and the implication being, to create chaos... CHAOS, I tell you, in Malaysia.

“You know they are scraping the bottom of the credibility barrel when they quote Just World president Chandra Muzaffar who gravely intones that NED (National Endowment for Democracy, the nebulous American entity in question) is responsible for funding NGOs in Egypt, Tunisia, Libya and Syria "in the name of democratic freedom with the objective of making people rise up against leaders who were allegedly deemed to be cruel."

However, here is the thing. I am not interested in debunking this latest round of horse manure from the cauldrons of Putrajaya...