Yesterday was the official Merdeka (Independence) Day celebrations for Malaysia. It marks 50-over years of independence from our colonials – the Brits. Unfortunately, I did not feel very merdeka at all – not just in terms of the celebrations but also in personal terms. I just did not feel very happy at all.

It could just be that I have been rather unhappy with a whole lot of things and my unhappiness is stacking up gradually. I seem to be running short on my happiness quotient recently. There are just too many things to be depressed about in my life, and my nation by extension.

I find myself surrounded by idiots and as you all know, I do not suffer fools gladly. That’s the crux of the problem.

Maybe I should learn to see things differently, or to surround myself with less foolishness. I think that the latter would be an easier solution to the problem. However, I will have to find some way to alleviate the stress that I am currently under. Hopefully, things will turn out better after my holiday to Japan. Goodness knows I need a break from all this idiocy.

Life sucks. People are dumb. Learn to eat grass.

Not too shabby! Some good news from The Economist, seems that our Malaysian passport is pretty powerful in that we can enter quite a lot of countries without requiring a visa. Interesting!

Believe it or not, the Swedish Pirate Party has garnered enough votes to send at least one MP to the European Parliament. According to Ars, they’re still tallying the numbers but the party has already breached the 4% minimum needed to qualify for a single seat. They’re currently polling at 7.1%. While a single MP in a parliament of 700 may not do very much, it is quite an achieve for a political party that is less than 2 years old and formed with a very narrow set of agendas that deal with intellectual property rights.

Personally, I think that it is great that a political party is able to ride on an intellectual property platform. Obviously, the recent spec-trial of The Pirate Bay helped boost their cause. As a result, they are currently the second largest political party in Sweden and their youth wing is the largest in Sweden. While most people may argue that they are a fringe party, they are a fringe party which has accomplished a lot – more than most other older mainstream political parties.

Personally, I think that this is a great achievement. While they may not wield much power today, they’re the largest under-30 political party in the EU. This gives me hope for the future. Now, if they only opened up a branch in Malaysia.

I am re-evaluating the possibility of using an Apple-TV for my HTPC. The advantage is that this is a device that was designed to be a HTPC from day one. It has all the right connections and is also low-powered. Furthermore, it turns out that XBMC is supported on the Apple-TV. The Apple-TV can be had for about RM1250 (GBP 216) from certain re-sellers in Malaysia (it is listed at RM1450 at the Apple store).

The only potential disadvantage is the lack of support for full-HD content. All references point to the fact that the Apple-TV is only able to decode HD-ready (720p) content but will upscale it to full-HD (1080p). This is not a serious problem at the moment for all of my available media are mainly SD content. Furthermore, I don’t see this situation changing anytime soon simply because there isn’t that much full-HD content available anyway.

Another difficulty may be with the ability to integrate the Apple-TV onto my home network. If I were to get the Apple-TV, I would be getting the 40GB one, which severely limits the amount of media it can store. So, the Apple-TV would need to stream the data off the network. It has got both wired and wireless network connections. However, it would need the correct software to be running on the network in order to work properly. Firefly doesn’t seem to support streaming videos at the moment.

This may be solved by installing XBMC on the Apple-TV. It is certainly capable of running as a standalone application.

Certainly something to consider. It would be easier to get this than some of the other options.

I’m starting to think that our selection of computer goods in Malaysia is severely restricted to the gaming variety. I had the chance to visit Digital Mall, PJ last weekend and spent a while perusing the 4 storeys of shops selling mainly gadgets, phones and computer products. Unfortunately, I failed to find any place that sold anything suitable for my HTPC.

You can see that the local computer retail industry seems to be driven by games. You can see the retail stores pushing high end processors, motherboards and graphics cards. Supposedly, these are needed by the gamers to experience the best and greatest in state-of-the-art games. Unfortunately, gamers are a dumb bunch and end up shelling out a fortune to build a gaming rig that doesn’t perform as well for games as they thought it would have.

Unfortunately for my purposes, I’m going after low power, low profile and low cost systems for my HTPC rig. Seems that my tastes run counter to the main stream. So, trying to get stuff off-the-shelf is not as easy as I had hoped. I was planning to just pick up a suitable e-machines computer or similar for my HTPC rig. Unfortunately, there were none to be found in the whole building. There was only one e-machine model being sold in one-store but it was not suitable for my rig.

Seems that I might actually have to travel down to Low-Yat to have a look, this weekend. I hate having to go down there. Parking is a pain and the crowd is just crazy. Maybe I should take an LRT down instead. I’ve got a new book to read with me and this might be a good time to start. I really need to get my HTPC rig built. Otherwise, my new HDTV is being wasted.

My requirements are really simple – a quiet system that is capable of full-HD output and 5.1 sound. If I had to assemble one myself, at least give me the option of buying the component parts. Otherwise, I would be willing to pay for a ready-made machine at the right price.

I finally took the plunge today. I bought myself a 1080p capable HDTV. It was the model that I had been eyeing for a while – the 32LG53FR. This model has a RRP of about RM2,300 but most outlets have sold it for just under RM2,000 – making it the cheapest 1080p HDTV in the market. I had been waiting for the price to drop a little more before making the purchase.

I went shopping today and I checked out the recent prices. Carrefour was doing it for RM1,900. I then went to Harvey Norman who told me that they were all sold out and that the line had be discontinued. There weren’t any new units coming in. So, I went to Best, who were selling it at RM1,850. I got them to lower the price a little and settled at just under RM1,800. That was the price-point I was happy with.

So, I am now happily watching a DVD on my new HDTV.

Now, the next thing to do would be to buy myself a suitable HTPC platform. I had already tried out XBMC the other day and it seems to work okay. Obviously, it was slick as well. However, getting a suitable HTPC platform has not been as easy. I would preferably like to purchase it from a store that accepts credit card purchases without a surcharge. Not many of those around in Malaysia!

I think that it is dumb. According to TheStar, our government is considering to limit the number of subjects taken by SPM students to ensure fairer scholarship selection. Although I do not think that the current free-for-all was a good thing to have, I do not agree with this methodology to address the issue of PSD scholarships.

It also raises the issue of fairness. While our DPM said that it was unfair on those who are forced to take less subjects because of economic or administrative reasons. However, the suggested policy would take away the option of taking more subjects from those who may wish to do more. Personally, I like the idea of having the freedom to pick and choose subjects.

However, what the PSD should do is to only consider results from a set number of subjects. This is fair, transparent and simple to do. As a criteria, the PSD should just list down the subjects needed. Having A1s in other subjects can be ignored totally for the purpose of scholarship selection. There is no point adding in an A1 in Science I/II when you’ve already got an A1 in Physics, Chemistry and Biology separately.

If the student wishes to take more subjects in order to pad up their results, they are free to do so as long as they understand that only the results that are requirements will be considered. In fact, the students should only be evaluated based on the pre-requirement subjects. So, the student should not be penalised for getting a bunch of A2s in other non-requirement subjects.

However, it doesn’t surprise me that the government can come up with such dumb solutions to the simplest of problems.

PS: In other news, our PM has said that he intends to dismantle the decades old system of preferment for ethnic Malays. I wonder why it has not been picked up by the local press.

Personally, I am against the idea of the courts being embroiled in the current Silver Sandiwara. I like the idea of having an independent judiciary, one which is equal in power but distinctly separate from the other branches of government. However, we may end up seeing a situation where a 3-men bench got to decide who was the lawful Menteri Besar of Perak.

Whichever way the judges rule, our democracy would have suffered a setback. Whomever they choose to pick as the lawful MB, would circumvent all sorts of procedures. As far as I can tell, the lawful MB is whomever commands the majority of the Assembly and is thus appointed by the Sultan. Unless of course, we get a surprise decision where the judges rule not to rule.

You see, from what I read in a M’kini letter, Article 72 of our Constitution specifically states:

72. (1) The validity of any proceedings in the Legislative Assembly of any State shall not be questioned in any court.

This actually gives the judges a sneaky way out of the situation, by pointing out the fact that the proceedings in the Assembly are not in their purview. So, whether or not an MB commands the majority of the house, is not up to the judiciary to decide. It is entirely up to the Assembly to decide, which was the crux of the whole problem to begin with.

If what is said in this letter is to be believed, the Silver Sandiwara is far from over. According to the letter, the way in which the BN kicked out the previous assembly speaker was not ‘by the book’ and that the present speaker was not even sworn in as a member of the assembly. If any of it is true, it means another major cock-up by the members of the coup.

I think that it is important to follow the Constitution and rules of the house when it comes to these matters. You see, the state government draws its powers and authority from these documents. If these documents are not to be respected, then neither is the state government. Therefore, it is important that everyone plays by the rules, lest the laws of the jungle prevail.

I think that the situation is now so frakked up that there is no easy way out. So, the state can look forward to being so thoroughly screwed up by the politicians up until the next General Election. I pity the people who have to make a living there.

As for the candle light vigils, I understand the need to keep the issue alive so that it simmers and blows up during the next GE. However, I think that the opposition should start looking at doing something else. The only effect that it seems to be having is to get more people arrested. That cannot be a good long-term strategy. Unless of course, it is their objective to get arrested!

I think not. Feel free to disagree.

If we assume that it is the PR’s tactic to run a 4-year campaign up until the next General Election, then the move by the BN to not-contest the Penanti by-election makes sense. There is a reason why the campaign period is limited by the election rules. Continually running by-elections is a way to circumvent those rules.

If we assume that this tactic is true, then there are only two ways to tackle the problem – either beat the competition to a pulp or avoid confrontation entirely. In this particular case, there is no way to do the former. So, it would be better to do the latter.

What the BN needs to do now is focus on the war, not individual battles. Of course, all wars are won one battle at a time, but it is also important to pick and choose battles and battlegrounds. I’m not politically knowledgeable enough to know if Penanti is a strategic seat, but it probably isn’t.

BN needs to break the PR momentum of winning by-election victories and cut-off the campaign flow. Instead, they should focus on fixing the problems of the previous administration and doing a good job of things. If they can show that they are able to do things right, they will have a fighting chance in the next GE.

One good thing that the last GE brought about – the political landscape in Malaysia has changed forever. That is a good thing.