A Very Good Article that I somehow failed to read in Singapore. Jeff- She is a big boss in the legal circle

Straits Times 2005-08-19Is Singapore heading for a selected presidency?

By Thio Li-Ann
In 1991, a novel constitutional experiment took place when the office of the President was transformed from a ceremonial head of state, like the Queen of England, into one charged with additional executive functions. This stemmed from a perceived need to have a fiscal guardian stand sentinel over the nation’s coffers, should freakish elections yield a profligate, irresponsible government which dominates Parliament and enjoys untrammelled power.
To prevent nepotism, the Elected President (EP) was given powers allowing him or her to refuse to concur with key civil service appointments. The EP also has constitutional roles in preventing corruption and protecting human rights. Thus, even without the Prime Minister’s consent, the director of the Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau can investigate a minister, with the EP’s concurrence.
The EP safeguards personal liberty and religious freedom through cancelling ministerial orders under the Internal Security ACt or Maintenance of Religious Harmony Act, under certain conditions.
This is important as judicial review in these matters has been limited or entirely excluded.Thus, the EP scheme buttresses the separation of powers, affirming the need for institutionalised checks on public power.
The EP must be armed with legitimacy and the moral authority to block the Government which could be derived only from the people’s will, expressed at elections. Thus, the institution was made elective.
The EP is commonly understood as an institution which checks the Government in certain stipulated areas. It is thought to add another dimension to democratic, limited government as it derives its legitimacy through the mechanism of the popular vote.
However, the picture is more complex than this as there are other actors, both elected and non-elected, which play an important role in the process of electing an EP and counter-checking the EP’s powers.
As the EP’s powers are relatively limited in the broader scheme of things, it begs the question as to whether the the stringent pre-qualification criteria are necessary for an office which plays a reactive role in governance.
Furthermore, the process of having an unelected body determine the suitability of potential EP candidates not only takes the power of choice one step further away from the people, but it also raises issues about whether these decision-makers should be accountable to the people or whether their decisions should continue to be completely insulated from scrutiny and challenge. Absolute discretion is anathema to the rule of law.
Three key points
To better understand how this complex institution works and what it represents in terms of constitutional government, three important points bear noting.
Firstly, the EP does not work alone in his custodial role but in tandem with the moderating influence of the constitutionally established Council of Presidential Advisers (CPA), which makes recommendations. The EP slects two members and the CPA chair, while four others are appointed on the advice of the Prime Minister, Chief Justice and Public Service Commission (PSC) chair. Where the CPA advises the EP to withhold assent to a Bill, members must indicate the grounds for this. When the EP is temporarily unable to discharge his functions, it is the CPA chair or Speaker that steps in.
Secondly, the EP is subject to counter-checks: where the EP, contrary to CPA recommendations, refuses to assent to a supply Bill or a public appointment such as the attorney-general, Parliament can override the EP’s decision with a two-thirds majority-backed resolution. Thus, the EP cannot hinder a government that controls minimally 66 per cent of parliamentary seats.
Thirdly, the democratic quality of the EP scheme is diluted in two main ways. The first relates to the pre-qualification criteria, which some consider onerous. These impair the equal right of candidature, yielding a small pool of possible candidates.
It is easier to meet the qualifications to be PM (or even the United States President), than to qualify to run for EP, although the PM and the Cabinet shoulder the primary responsibility of formulating and implementing government policy.
Candidates must meet one of the following criteria:
Hold high public such as minister, chief justice, Speaker, attorney-general, auditor-general or permanent secretary. This ensures the candidate has high executive or administrative experience with public affiars, but not necessarily financial expertise across the board.
Alternatively, the chairman or CEO of a company with a minimal paid-up capital of $100 million may qualify. This guarantees financial literacy but not public affairs management experience.
Lastly, the Presidential Elections Committee (PEC) may decided a candidate qualifies, if he holds, as the Constitution states, any similar or comparable position of seniority and responsibility in the public or private sector, which confers the necessary experience and ability in managing financial affairs, equipping the candidate to effectively discharge EP functions.
Under these criteria, people who might be well-qualified to be EP, such as diplomats or respected community leaders, are excluded.
The second way in which the democratic quality of the EP scheme is diluted relates to the process which filters out unsuitable candidates by denying them a certificate of eligibility. Candidates are vetted by “three wise men” of the PEC (the chairs of the PSC and Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority, and a Presidential Council of Minority Rights member). The PEC must be satisfied that a candidate meets the subjective requirement of being a person of integrity, good character and reputation.
Singaporeans can vote only for PEC-vetted candidates, which seems to indicate a paternalistic concern that the electorate cannot be trusted to evaluate candidates and select the right person for the job.
Furthermore, PEC decisions are unaccountable as they are not subject to judicial challenge. Where the PEC states a candidate lacks good character, it cannot, in the absence of malice, be sued for libel.
Who then guards these unelected guardians? The PEC has given brief reasons for denying certificates of eligibility to past candidates, but is not legally obliged to do so; this is anomalous in an age where ensuring the transparency and accountability of all public actors is recognised as essential good governance values.
Dr Thio Li-ann is an associate professor at the Faculty of Law, National University of Singapore. The views expressed here are her own.

READ THIS. *jedi mind-trick*

Um... O Ye Chyvalrous and Stoute-Hearted Gentlemen of 4K? YOU SHOULD READ THIS ARTICLE. TRUST ME.

(personally, i think it's highly helpful in an amusing kind of way, but then again, maybe that's just me? eheheh. any comments from the ladies? or maybe even the guys?)

Confident Persistence (website has links to other helpful stuff as well)
by Allen Thompson (really very sorry, mr thompson!)


Maybe you've heard the stories. Perhaps it was a relative, or a friend, or maybe you were watching a late-night talkshow and some smashingly beautiful vixen was on telling how she and her husband met.

They're so in love. They have the perfect marriage. They can't imagine being apart from one another.

But it didn't begin that way.

She wasn't, actually, very interested in him when they first met.

But he pursued her, and he was relentless. It was months, maybe even years, before she finally cracked.

But she DID crack. Fell head over heels in love with him... and they've been living in a dream world -- Happily Ever After since.

How is this possible?

I mean have you not read, more than once probably, that a woman knows within minutes of meeting a man if she's romantically interested in him or not. Does he not get put in the doable or dontable category immediately? Friend or lover? Hot or not?

How can she EVENTUALLY fall for a man who she wasn't IMMEDIATELY attracted to?

Well let me fill you in.

And this "filling in" is going to relate the very essence of being a Don Juan. The very core of becoming the kind of ladies man you've always wanted to be.

The key to women, the key to being surrounded by women, the key to being the envy of all your friends, and the key to being a Don Juan... is Confident Persistence.

Confident Persistence (CP) consists of deciding what you want, and going for it... and doing it with a smile, despite the numerous obstacles which you will most likely encounter along the way.

Obstacles could, for example, include things like: she doesn't return your call, she breaks or reschedules the date, she doesn't flirt with you or laugh at your jokes, she's hard to talk to, she seems interested in someone else, and, in general, she doesn't put herself out or go out of the way to convey that she's interested in you.

In other words, the obstacles are simply how a girl would act who is not HIGHLY INTERESTED in you.

Now... when we speak of CP, we're mainly talking about women that don't know you. Women you've just met. Or women that you've never spent any significant amount of time with. We're not talking about women you've known (and had a crush on) for years.

We employ the techniques of CP to get the initial interest up, to get her to relax and open up, to get the phone number, and to get the first date. CP is not an excuse for you to continue pursuing a woman that you're crazy about, but who knows you pretty well, and has no interest in you.

Now there are basically 2 ways to deal with the situation where you're interested in a girl, but she's not all that crazy about you.


1) You can give up, move on, NEXT HER! And look for someone who is more interested in you.

This is a popular strategy among men who are beginning to learn the "game." It's the easy and safe way of dealing with women. And it's what many guys learn to do as they get older, and begin realizing how much time they have wasted pursuing women who weren't interested in them.

Of course, the bad thing about NEXTing a girl is that you DON'T GET THE GIRL.

And the most common mistake that guys make when employing this strategy is NEXTing a woman too soon. They flirt with a woman, and she doesn't flirt back - NEXT. They leave a message on her machine, and she doesn't call back - NEXT. They plan a date but she calls at the last minute to cancel - NEXT.

In short, they NEXT any woman who doesn't display IMMEDIATE HIGH INTEREST.

What's wrong with this you say?

Well the MISTAKE here is that you're filtering women based simply upon their INITIAL level of interest in you. You're filtering women based upon whether they are IMMEDIATELY attracted to you or not.

This is a WEAK strategy and not one employed by a true Don Juan. It reeks of low confidence, a fragile ego, and fear.

And it's also a BAD strategy.

It's bad because you're expecting a woman that you just met, that you may have only talked to for 3 or 4 minutes, or less, to display signs of high interest. You're expecting some woman that you hardly know, and who hardly knows you, to get excited at the prospect of spending time with you.

Expecting immediate high interest is UNREALISTIC!

Now, of course, it's possible that this will happen, that she will immediately be overwhelmingly attracted to you... maybe because you are just her type physically, you remind her of someone she used to be crazy about (maybe Uncle Steve), she's incredibly desperate at the moment, or you were really on top of your game when you approached her and managed to blow her completely out of the water.

All these things are possible, but you shouldn't rely on them.

You see, when your strategy involves sorting women based upon initial interest levels, you're placing your entire future into the hands of fate. If she is immediately attracted to you -- great! If not -- NEXT!

Being a Don Juan is not about sorting women and NEXTing women. Anyone can sort women based upon their initial attraction levels. That doesn't take any skill. All that takes is not having a fear of rejection and approaching lots of women... until you happen to luck out and find one who, for some strange unknown reason, is immediately attracted to you.

Being a Don Juan is about getting the women you want. And it's about taking a woman who has low to moderate interest and, by following a few simple principles, converting that into high interest and, hopefully, an overwhelming desire to see you naked.


Or 2) You can PURSUE her.

Now the "pursuing" is where it gets tricky and complicated.

You can pursue her in such a way that you come across as being DESPERATE, like most of your fellow Non Juans do, like most guys in this world do. Or you can pursue in such a way that you appear CONFIDENT, STRONG, CHARISMATIC... like a Don Juan does.

So let's talk about how a Don Juan pursues women. Let's talk about the 6 major characteristics of confident persistence.

And remember, CP is not just persistence. CP is the process of displaying certain personality characteristics which actually make you more attractive to women... as you pursue them.


1) A Don Juan never gets upset.

A Don Juan is always in complete control of his emotions. He doesn't get mad when a girl fails to return his call. He doesn't become depressed when she breaks the date. He doesn't get jealous when she flirts with some other guy. He doesn't become irate when she doesn't show up at the restaurant or she shows up late.

He doesn't react in any of these ways because he EXPECTS these little annoyances to occur. He understands that women are flaky. Women are moody. Women are illogical and very inconsistent. (Especially women with low to moderate initial interest.)

He also understands that it's TOO EARLY to expect consistent positive behavior.

Remember, these are women who hardly know you. Maybe women you met at the mall, on the street, at a grocery store. They don't have any reason YET to display signs of high interest. It's your Don Juan job to give them the reasons. But that takes a little bit of time together.

Now the higher her interest level is, the less flaky, moody, illogical, and inconsistent she behaves. But we don't really have to "pursue" highly interested women, do we?


2) A Don Juan does not worry about his ego.

Some guys are too worried about getting hurt, too worried about being taken advantage of, too worried about being made a fool of, and too worried that things are going to turn out badly... to be very effective at pursuing women.

A Don Juan does not worry about these things. A Don Juan is not afraid of rejection, he's not afraid of being used, he's not afraid of looking foolish, and he's not afraid of failing.

His self-esteem is high and firmly grounded. He's happy and loving life. And the actions of a few flaky, moody, and illogical ladies are not going to change that. And it's this base of high self-esteem that gives him the confidence to pursue women that seem to be not all that interested in him.

You might even say that a Don Juan loves the CHALLENGE of peaking a girl's interest, closing for the phone number, getting the first date, and then converting her low interest into high.


3) A Don Juan is not lazy.

CP is not really necessary when the girl is highly interested in us right from the start (in other words, when we LUCK OUT). CP is necessary when the girl has a low to moderate level of initial interest in us.

So we expect problems. We expect obstacles. We expect that she probably won't return our call, or that she'll cancel the date, or that she won't show up, etc.

And we're prepared to deal with it. We're prepared to call again and again (until we get a definite NO). We're prepared to have dates canceled or plans altered (we always have backup plans). We're prepared for her inconsistent and confusing behavior (and ignore it). And we're prepared to WORK our way through all the obstacles, confusion, problems, and other drama in order to get what we want.

Getting women is not always easy. Sometimes we have to work a little bit. But like they say, anything worth having is worth working for.

(Special Note: there are a number of very cool strategies that one can utilize to increase the probability of her giving the number, her calling back, her accepting the date, and her actually showing up. Look for those in a future article.)


4) A Don Juan has options.

One of the main reasons a Don Juan is able to control his emotions, that he doesn't get upset or worry about things, is that he's always pursuing numerous women at the same time.

He realizes when he begins his pursuit of any one particular lady, that things may not work out. He may never get her and he's fully prepared to deal with the situation. So he has other options.

Do you really think you'd sit around worrying, or get upset, or concern yourself with "protecting your ego" if you had a date with Susan on Wednesday, a date with Kelly on Friday, two other women calling you all the time, and a stack of 9 or 10 different phone numbers sitting on your dresser?

Of course not, you'd be relaxed and confident. When a girl doesn't return your call, it wouldn't faze you a bit. When she cancels at the last minute, you'd feel like laughing. When you see her flirting with some other guy, you'd kick back and enjoy the show.

This is not to say that you're a player, or that you don't prefer one woman over all the others. It's just that you're smart enough not to put all your eggs in one basket until you're POSITIVE that she's puttin all her eggs in there as well.


5) A Don Juan accepts the inevitable games and tests.

The fact that women play games and test men does not make them bad people. It just means that they have lots of options (many guys who are interested in them) and they have had to come up with tests (often administered in a non-conscious fashion) as a way of filtering their pursuers into the Average Guys and the Real Men.

If you follow the basics of being a Don Juan, you will always pass the tests and blow away the competition. So a Don Juan doesn't worry much about these little tests.

But even if you do, even if you pass the initial tests and she becomes highly interested in you, don't expect the tests and games to stop. Never expect that things will get logical and easy with women. They won't.

For example, she may be very very attracted to you and still not return your phone calls, or she might break a date, or flirt with other guys, or some other such thing. Why?

Because she knows, from years of reading Cosmo and discussing "strategy" with her friends, how to play the game. She knows about playing hard to get, hot and cold, social proof, being busy, etc. And when she finds a man that she really really wants (that would be you, Don Juan), by golly, she's going to use all these little tricks and techniques to try and keep him.

So don't let it upset or confuse you. Take it as a compliment that she's putting in all this effort to keep you interested.


6) A Don Juan knows that he's special.

The entire basis for employing CP is knowing that you are, not just a great guy, but the best guy she's ever going to meet. You KNOW down deep in you soul, that if you could just get a block of her time (a date or two) that you could blow her away and make her forget every other guy she's ever known.

Beautiful women are everywhere. Go to any mall, or nightclub, or office building, or just walk down a crowded sidewalk. Beautiful women are not that rare. You see them all the time.

But YOU ARE RARE. You're a Don Juan. How many guys do you think are Don Juans? How many do you think are really good with women? Well, my friend, it's very very few. That I know for a fact. But if I had to make an educated guess, I'd say maybe 3 out of 100 guys are good with women, and maybe 1 out of 1000 is Don Juan good with women.

If you keep these numbers in mind, if you keep in mind that the number of drop dead gorgeous women far exceeds the number of Don Juans, you begin to realize that "Hey, I'm the one who's special here. I'm the guy that all these women are looking for."

This must be your mindset. This is the mindset of a Don Juan.


To help crystallize the principles of CP for you, how bout a real-life example of a Don Juan who regularly employs CP to charm the ladies? I'm talking about the man himself, James Bond. (Okay, okay he's not really real.)

Any Bond fan knows that James does not always have immediate success with the ladies. Sometimes the women are not interested in him, sometimes they despise him, sometimes they're bitter evil enemies, and sometimes they actually want him dead.

Do these "minor" obstacles ever bother James? No way. Whenever a woman acts like she's uninterested, despises him, or wishes he were dead, what does he do? He just smiles.

He knows that NO WOMAN can resist him... FOR LONG. He knows that he's special. And he employs all of the above principles of CP to charm and disarm the ladies.


So when playing the field of beautiful ladies, keep the principles of CP in mind: never get upset, forget your ego, don't be lazy, accept the tests and games, have plenty of options, and, most importantly, always remember that you're a Don Juan and any lady would be lucky to even have a shot at you.

Allen Thompson
DJNewslet@aol.com
Copyright © 1998 - 2003

after dinner... we all trooped into TK's house for red wine and mint chocolates from CS all the way from Chicago! and zihui's game... 

before kian sin left and when shi mei had joined us! purposely composed the can ju on the table into the pic.. hahahahah... 

before xumin left!  

lighting wasn't too good for this pic. so i sepia-ed it. and look it's so nice! LOL... do re mi fa so! hahaha..  

the feast in front of me! 

and that's veron and xumiN! 

guess who this is.. hahaha. 

and that's TK! bringing out the wine glasses. 6 wine glasses. and we had white wine and red wine(later on) 

us girls! this time's gath more girls turned up than guys! this time there was shihui, lin jie, me, pei xuan, siting, veron, deborah, xumin, shi mei, tanny and zihui!!! and Lilian! heh.. guys, there was kian sin, TK(duh), wei hong, kang xun, jun ming and chin siong! all eighteen of us!

before we started... 

setting up the grill..  

standing/sitting around talking waiting for dinner to start. heh 

weihong! before the dinner.. he's trying v hard to master the the guitar! 

and lovely shitake mushrooms and veggies! we love grilled mushrooms! 

juicy sweeet capscium! hee!  

's maid helped to prepare the food.. so we didn't really do much.. except to cut the capsicium and the guys marinated the chicken cutlet with A LOT of herbs. heh. 

and next comes the delicious food! the story goes that our dear Mr TK went to the market early in the morning to shop for these fresh food for us! then none of us girls managed to turn up for the shopping at 2pm and so the guys shopped for can food wine and stuff at Giant... and Tk 

and photo no 2 goes to CS! msging.. haha.. 

the first photo i took! shihui! haha.. we had our steamboat dinner under the stars! on TK's lawn... heh. 

Confirmed: Going back to DHS on 5th of August, Friday

Needless to say, it is impossible to get everyone to go back to dhs on the same day. Hence, by fiat, we have decided to set Friday 5th, August as the glorious day as we return to our motherland. Meet at Kampong Arang at 12.30pm for lunch, or in front of the security guard at 1.00pm. See you guys!