It is humour Daphne or an attempt at it. Looks do not define character. You are right.

Joseph Muscat looks NOTHING like Benito Mussolini. Mussolini was trim and compact and his limbs were in proportion to his torso, as tends to be the case with Italian men. Muscat has the typical Maltese male body type in which the limbs are disproportionately short in relation to the torso. He is also very heavy.

Mussolini strutted. Muscat, because of his unfortunate shape, waddles.

Muscat had blond hair, blue eyes and florid skin. Mussolini had dark hair, dark eyes and dark skin.

Muscat is bald. Mussolini was not.

Muscat has a wide moon-face. Mussolini did not.

The only thing they have in common visually is prognathism, the medical term which describes a deficiency in the lower jaw that makes it jut out further than the upper jaw.

Prognathism does not make two men look alike, no more than baldness does.

In any case, even if Muscat did look like Mussolini, which he couldn’t possibly do less, what is the relevance here? That two people who look alike must perforce be the same sort of person?

Dear God. Do you realise what and who you sound like?

You must have had a truly poor education not to see it. Either that, or your intelligence is in question – or both of those things.

The last thing I am is “trendy” (incidentally, that’s a word my grandmother used in the early 1970s). I couldn’t even be bothered about ‘trendy’ in my teens, let alone now.

I just see the bigger picture, and maybe I just read more widely and so understand things more comprehensively in their proper context.

It helps that I am rational and not predisposed to hysteria, too.

You need to see things for what they are. You say:

“It is ‘these people’ as they are not part of ‘our people’. Our cultures clash, our way of thinking clashes.”

If you were to press the pause button for a little introspection, you would see that this is exactly how you feel about a large chunk of the Maltese population, but you accept them, tolerate them and live in the same country as they do, avoiding them where necessary. They are Maltese, so throwing them out is not an option – but still you don’t like them, wouldn’t want your son or daughter to marry them, wouldn’t socialize with them yourself.

Correction! The Point In Sliema is a suburb of Tripoli where Libyans with stacks of stolen money from the Gaddafi regime come over and pay exorbitant rents and have converted the once prominent residential estate into a ghetto.

Incidentally they do wear headscarves and the area has been completely desecrated. I’m surprised they haven’t begun to slaughter sheep in the open spaces on level one yet, but believe me, it’s only a question of time.

Secondly it is “these people” as they are not part of “our people”. Our cultures clash, our way of thinking clashes.

As they grow in numbers they begin to look down on us and insult our way of life. They will begin to demand we remove our crosses from public areas and to start reciting the Koran.

They will begin to feel insulted when we celebrate Christian holidays and we will have to bend over backwards to accommodate because they will have become stronger in numbers.

I am not prejudice-driven: You are the one who comes across as too liberal simply because you feel it is trendy to be multicultural.

It is only when it is too late that you will realize what we’ve done is so bad, as did the French, and the British. Its called Lessons from History and as much as i agree with most of what you write, this one is a sore issue in which you critisise the Governement for making a sleazy deal with the Italians but offer no solution except LET THEM IN!

I would suggest avoiding ‘these people’; it undermines the rationality of your argument (you, that is, in general) by betraying how you really think, and that it is not rational but emotional and prejudice-driven.

Do you realise that Malta is a suburb of Tripoli, by your definition? There are tens of thousands of Libyan people living in Malta ‘temporarily’ now.

But you wouldn’t necessarily know because the women don’t all wear headscarves and the men look Maltese.

You are completely right. I would add that Muscat with his informal agreement with the Italians has made Malta even more irrelevant in the equation.

We do not have resources to handle the situation.

We do not have the money to make a difference.

We do not have the logistical capability to help.

We do not have any idea about how to stop this, other than “pushbacks” which is now not an option, (thank God, and the lawyers).

We just complain about it because it happens in our seas.

We can yap until everyone else who can do something, actually does.

Two years ago Muscat said he will sort it out, getting them to smell the coffee.

When helpless, do not bark and snarl, try begging.