Dumbest comment of the day
From the Malta Today comments-board, beneath the latest report about the murder of cocaine-traffickers Mario Camilleri senior and junior:
“You live by the sword, you die by the sword”. This is a scene from the Godfather movie and not something that has happened on this very catholic and very church going people on this island.
This one doesn’t seem to know that Sicilians share our exact same religious culture, and it didn’t stop them giving birth to the Mafia or carrying out intra-familial murders far more horrific than the one we’ve just had reported.
And while we’re on the subject of idiotic ideas about our own innate superiority (so now we are more Catholic than Sicily, too, and we don’t murder people horribly), imagine what would have been said if the cocaine-traffickers, the murdered and the murderers had been – say – Somali and not just as Maltese as the rest of us.
It’s a timely reminder that every society has its layer of scum. The murdered cocaine-traffickers’ customers are Maltese, too – let’s not for a minute forget that. If there were not so much demand from Maltese people, they wouldn’t be killing each other over the stakes.
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Interesting, so when we kill each other, it’s shameful because we are the most Catholic country in the world. But when the prime minister decides to summarily separate men from their families to send them back to possible torture, death and permanent loss of their wives and children, that’s fine, because it’s in the national interest. Very Catholic sentiments indeed.
I was just reading that comment just before I switched to this page, and I thought how dumb this writer is, and does he know that in Catholic Sicily magistrates, most notably Giovanni Falcone, Paolo Borsellino and other high ranking individuals who fought organized crime had been murdered?
Or shall I say that all they read is L-Orizzont and Malta Today?
And Manuel Mallia probably wouldn’t have over 600K in cash, either.
Manuel Mallia’s client-base is being steadily shot and killed. He’ll have to hang on to that cabinet post.
Or else? I don’t think he will die of hunger.
His post is also very useful to deter potentially-ugly police investigations on some of his clients but also on himself. This is indeed one fine mess.
He was probably storing up food as fat like a camel. He’ll be able to survive for years.
Well, as me old grandfather used to say while toiling down t’pit, ye can’t eat Fabergé eggs. Har har har.
Should anyone decide to develop a socio-religious theory about “Catalogue Religion”, Malta would be a perfect location for field research.
And while on the subject, a film has just been released locally, called ‘The Iceman’ based on a true story about Mafia hitman Richard Kuklinski.
We must stamp our feet and stand to be counted to show the world our Mafia is not inferior.
Even dumber – he says this didn’t happen. So what was the report about?
When one look at the origtins of the mafia, one find that it arose as means to enforce law and justice in the 19 th century as there were no efficient means to enforce the law. This sytem later became a sort of state within a state. Religion has no connection to the mafia bar that the mafiosi as the rest of Sicilians are traditionally and at least nominally Catholic.
Catholicism and loads of church-going Catholics do not exclude murderous violence.
Vide Northern Ireland and the IRA.
Far more important than all this is the news tonight that Helen Thomas has died aged 92.
She personified what journalism should be all about.
“If there were not so much demand from Maltese people, they wouldn’t be killing each other over the stakes.”
And if there were no law there would be no profit to kill each other for.
Only a decriminalised market can be regulated and managed. As you should know by now, a criminalised market offers huge profits to those who are ready to take the risk. And there are many takers, as you can see.
[Daphne – I’m sorry, Kevin, but serving police officers and former police officers like you, who argue the case for trade in drugs like cocaine and heroin to be made legal, are arguing only from the point of view of law enforcement and making their jobs easier, and even there the view is skewed. You imagine that legal trade in cocaine and heroin will give you less crime to battle. It won’t. It will give you more. We have had this argument before, and I can’t be bothered to have it again. When you make something legal you make it freely available and you also give it tacit approval. That’s why so many people are openly addicted to tobacco cigarettes, with all the dire/fatal consequences. Just because a historic error was made with tobacco, it doesn’t follow that the same error should be made with cocaine and heroin.]
Unlike you, Daphne, I did not park my brain in a rut. I can argue the case pharmacologically, politically, economically, historically, sociologically, including conspiratorial whys and wherefores. Policing forms only a very small part of my life experience.
The market is something you should understand – but even here your rutted brain fails you. You see, in a criminalised, deregulated market you get thousands of roaming points of sale. Availability is widespread. Enforcement may temporarily cause scarcity – which raises profit margins – but the market quickly returns to its fold in meeting demand.
In a regulated market you have a definitive number of points of sale. Availability remains the same, but not as widespread. And prices would remain the same should the government decide to tax it at galactic rates.
The sociological and pharmacological arguments would explain why demand is not heightened by regulation. The rest is too complex for you to figure out. I’ll just tell you that if you haven’t yet sussed out that we have a prohibition problem and not a drug problem, you’ll never be able to understand the wider world. You’re a Lilliputian pygmy, Daphne, and the ultimate joke – you and your idiotic, educated acolytes.
[Daphne – Kevin, please stop boring on with this argument. As a parent of offspring at a vulnerable age you should know a whole lot better, even if you don’t as a former policeman. What your wife’s extended network of associates do with their noses is their problem.]
@Kev
Cigarettes and alcohol are sold in a non-criminalized, regulated market. That explains the black market trade in contraband, doesn’t it?
You’re spending too much time in the loo.
I would think their noses are more in the trough than on the thin white line nowadays.
Indeed, La Redoute, contraband is the result of extensive taxation.
You people are so predictable one doubts whether you have a mind of your own.
Tfal zghar, skola tan-nuna, flok mohh, xkora skalora.
Taxation being an aspect of regulation. Have you tried taking a walk outside? It might help clear your head.
The Sicilian Cosa Nostra, I think, actually think that their Catholic faith and their organisation go hand in hand.
To my knowledge, “You live by the sword, you die by the sword” is a quotation from Matthew’s Gospel not from the Godfather movie.
It would have taken Churchill much less time than five minutes to argue against democracy had he lived here.
What’s happening to Piano’s plans? I’m referring to http://www.independent.com.mt/articles/2013-07-20/news/pianos-plans-changed-2124283904/.
Is this another case of ‘u kollox jghaddi’?
That’s not news. Whoever wrote that story hasn’t been to Valletta recently. The stone clad concrete blocks have been there for ages.
The explanation for the change is quite simple, really. There’s no way a stone block that size could have been cut and transported safely into place.
The mafia bosses in Sicily are extremely religious and are usually devoted to a particular saint or even the holy Mary herself.
This was documented in various documentaries and news stories. For example, when the police found of the Sicilian Mafia bosses who was hiding in a farm for years, they found a shrine with numerous candles. Likewise with another boss years ago. I can’t remember both names, but I remember reading that they were also generous with their local church.
I am intrigued by these facts and can’t explain it. How can one murder or sanction a murder one day and pray/donate money to the church the next day? It is not just simple hypocrisy – there must be more to it psychologically. Either these criminals mentally detach the two characteristics, or they personally believe that they are redeeming themselves, or they are plain crazy.
Cultural identity. In a milder form, it allows people to get drunk in celebration of their village feast and throw bottles (literally and figuratively) at the fans of their rival Madonna.
Interesting note…but I think it is just for their social image…that at the end of the day they use it for their advantage.
But Daphne, you’re giving them too much credit.
The apparently majority of Maltese citizens would argue that Maltese people have the right to sell or buy drugs or murder people IN THEIR OWN COUNTRY.
They won’t say it in those words, but that’s how their mind works (or fails to work, to be more precise).
Some may be dumb while others, who should know better, are illogical.
Government is not a place for amateurs and the inexperienced. There is no apprenticeship while governing. Martin Scicluna is not excused for voting Labour just for change’s sake.
“I do not resile from what I said before 9 March, but I have a duty to raise concerns since there is yet time for a young and inexperienced government to change direction.”
“The tone of the President’s Speech and the triumphalist way in which the amnesty for prisoners was handled, the reports of the minister sitting in on the supposedly independent selection process for Malta’s Security Service serve to underline the behaviour of a government for whom power and hubris prevail. “We are the masters now”.”
“Overall, the lack of good governance skills still marks out the new government. It would be extremely beneficial if the Prime Minister were to organise a two-day seminar for ministers at Girgenti to take stock of how things have gone in the first five months and to allow the few ministers who have any real experience of governing – Evarist Bartolo, Helena Dalli, the Vellas, Joe Mizzi and Leo Brincat – and possibly experienced senior civil servants to offer their views on how to exercise good administration and to avoid some of the pitfalls of the last few weeks.”
It would have been even more beneficial had the Government retained the Permanent Secretaries there to guarantee continuity and, dare I say, to guide new inexperienced incumbents. But then, after all, everything goes doesn’t it?
Daphne says that every society has its layer of scum.
May I add that, in Malta, it is not an insignificant layer either.
For confirmation just visit one of the popular beaches on a Sunday .
If you prefer to sample it airconditioned, just pop into Mater Dei Hospital during visitors’ hours.
Indeed. Our layer of scum is like the filling of a tarte Tatin. The decent people are the thinnest of layers, hidden away at the bottom.
Anyone who tries to bolster his/her argument by stressing that Malta is Catholic, whether this is to denigrate or praise its people, loses my attention straight away.
Whether we are speaking of persons who are Maltese, or foreigners of any race or denomination, we are speaking of human beings with noble and less noble characteristics, who could be law-abiding or criminals, good, bad or indifferent.
Indeed, “thou protest too much” could very well apply in many cases where speakers have nothing better to say to prove their point.
The day when we realise that we are ordinary fallible mortals, and make it a point to overcome this weakness, then, and only then, shall our society start to improve.
Religion, ethics, morals, integrity, and so many other guides are there to help. Do not blame them if we ignore or pervert them, but rather our arrogant Lucifer-lust.
Lucifer-lust?
@ Liberal
Yes, Lucifer lust.
For those for whom the Bible has some meaning the first sin was that of Lucifer, the best among the angles, but who, like many mortals, cannot accept that there could be anyone above them.
This lust for glory and power is the driving force in their life. Commandments, laws, morals and ethics are obstacles to be brushed aside in the name of liberalism, sometimes spelled ‘libertinage’.