Kevvy, if you’re such an excellent coverer and predictor of, I assume, unseen ‘issues’, why are you never taken seriously?

Must be frustrating.

Purdie, just stick to what you’re good at and babble on.

On my part I know very well what I’m talking about. I would have been covering any such issue for months – sometimes years – before it eventually reaches you lot (through the mainstream media, of course, twisted to the core).

The fact that what I say sounds weird to you is only a reflection of your ignorance, Purdie.

Kevvy, what the hell are you smoking?

‘elements of state intelligence’, ‘global corporatism’, ‘American Nazis’? Of course, however, don’t twist and spin the real, mostly good world into your, whoefully naive, conspiracy bull shit.

Time to seek professional help. Really.

You’re coming across as an ‘out of it weirdo’.

Focus, and get real.

Although there certainly is pent-up anger amongst the people, I don’t think that most university students are as angry as Ms Abela Garret. I see them going quietly about their daily business every day. I think most of them are aware that had they been in any foreign university, they would have to pay a lot of money to read for a degree.

For the misguided anger (apart from the Labour Party, which is obvious), I blame none other than The Times, the most widely read newspaper in Malta. It loves latching onto big international news and trying to recreate them in Malta in miniature scale as if to say ‘We have big issues too.’

When the international headlines were about the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, The Times looked for a local natural disaster and found… sand in Dwejra used during a film shoot.

When the international headlines were about trapped Chilean miners, The Times put the photograph of a man who fell in a hole in the countryside and was lifted up safely in a couple of hours on its front page.

When a Maltese lady on a bus reported an act of racism at a local police station, they compared her to Rosa Parks.

I’m sure others can think of more examples.

This time around the headlines are all about riots and revolutions. Sticking to its strategy, The Times scoured for a Maltese revolution. They did not find an unemployed graduate setting himself on fire or a massive crowd of rioting angry young people (no doubt they were too busy spending their stipend in Paceville) but they found a university student who can’t string a full sentence in good Maltese or English harassing a minister about the public transport. In the circumstances, it had to do.

None of the above stories would have got much column space in normal circumstances but because of the Times’s obsession with presenting local issues even when there aren’t any, these stories were inflated to undue proportions.

This results in the already insular Maltese having an even more warped sense of reality.

The truth is that since the Nationalist Party was first elected, Malta has been (and I say this in the most positive way) a very boring place where nothing much ever happens. The Nationalists have generally run a very smooth operation and had it not been for the masses of ignorant people, it would have progressed much more and faster.

Consider this; while other countries are introducing severe austerity measures, raising fees and taxes, cutting back on social benefits and getting ever more frugal, this week our government has effectively extended our stipend system to secondary school students by giving them a Culture Card (I don’t know why this hasn’t been given more coverage) and substantially increased the number of free medicines that people are entitled to.

North Africa is burning.

Much of southern Africa is starving.

Many European neighbours are on the verge of collapse.

Barack Obama is frantically trying to inspire job creation.

Amazingly, almost obscenely so, Malta seems to be in rude health. Austin Gatt alone always seems to be launching some big project or other. Unemployment is only 6.2% (fourth lowest rate in the EU).

Figures released a few days ago show that Malta has one of the biggest black markets in the EU. Just imagine how better off Malta’s coffers would be if these people were participating in the regular economy. I have no doubt that the people who are so heavily involved in the black market are the same ones who keep asking for the prime minister’s head.

Before I go, I would like to give a word of advice to all those who keep whining about the bus service. Get yourself a hobby. Whether you travel using your own car or by public transport, you’re going to spend a considerable amount of time stuck in traffic every day. Be proactive and do something meaningful with your time. I’ve never understood how so many people spend so much time staring out of a window or talking (mostly complaining) about the same things.

Personally, I love to read. I love travelling by bus (now in air-conditioned comfort) because it’s the quietest moment of the day I get. I often find myself wishing the journey to be a little bit longer so that I can finish the chapter I’m on.

I will try not to judge someone for not enjoying reading but with a plethora of gadgets available- from laptops to tablet computers – surely anyone who wants to, especially university students, can find something interesting and useful to do.

The OWS has long been hijacked by elements of state intelligence and their minions. Only those calling to end the Federal Reserve know what they’re talking about (these were the originators of the protests in the first place). Most of the rest are disgruntled voters (who are valid), socialist idealists and Marxist losers who believe that this is a result of the ‘free market’ without realising that what they’re up against is global corporatism. Oh, and the American Nazi party has prominently joined the fray, so the media can further demonise the protests.

I don’t do partisan bull, Daphne. You should know that by now. Lilliputian talk tends to put me off, especially when I see minions of both sides playing out their respective roles as rulers and leaders in a spectacle that is hardly related to reality – all for people like you to gossip about. The result is both entertaining and surreal, but sadly so.

The usual left wing violence. Socialists, communists and anarchists. Reminds me of the Genoa G8, 2001.

What a sorry state of mess your mind is in, Vella. If I remember correctly you were one of those who ridiculed me when I told you in 2008 that this was no ordinary ‘business cycle’ but the end of a well-designed ‘long cycle’, to use Keynesian terms.

My apologies for treating you like dummies, of course. But there you are. No one’s perfect.

(And by the way, do decipher the difference between ‘free market capitalism’ and ‘managed market corporatism’, Sur Vella… but then such an educated person like you wouldn’t even know where to start. Educated, yes, but erudite…?)

[Daphne – So tell us, Kevin, do you and Sharon believe that the solution is Karmenu Vella and his magic box of unseen policies? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1RpOT5zX6I
Has Sharon been allowed a peek at those policies or is he afraid that she will steal them too? I’m glad to see he’s noticed that she’s a woman. I was a little bit concerned about his powers of observation after that initial ‘kandidat validu’.]

It’s OK, Antoine. The aliens have his number and are in the process of frying his last brain cell.

At that time we weren’t sure that Nato was going to impose the no fly zone and help with the bombing of military objectives.

[Daphne – Excuse me? That happened really early on.]

If it hadn’t, the result would have been different and we would now be witnessing people hanging from poles all the way from Tripoli to Benghasi.

[Daphne – The imposition of the no-fly zone did not change Malta’s position, even though the Constitution specifically allowed it. The facts are what they are and it is pointless using hindsight to argue them into a different shape. It’s not worth bickering about at this stage anyway.]