Friday, March 27, 2009

Yes, we have no cojones

This quote is from our President top business tycoon, Li Ka Shing, in today’s SCMP:

"Hong Kong needs to be strong," he said. "Don't waste energy on unconstructive things for Hong Kong. For Hong Kong, the most important thing is that we have the support of our mother country. The individual visit scheme from the mainland has contributed greatly to Hong Kong. Whatever our country can do for us, they have done so."


“Unconstructive things” here of course being shorthand for troublesome ideas like democracy, anti-cartel legislation and anything else that might stop Ah Shing and his mates stitching up Hong Kong for their own benefit which is then followed by the usual brown-nosing towards Beijing.

I’ve never been able to understand the mentality of shameless brown-nosers like Li Ka Shing, Alan Zeman etc. I have no problem with the fact that they’ve made a bob or two, fair enough. I also understand that they might have been tempted to do a bit of brown-nosing in order to get business deals early on when they were starting out (unseemly though that is). What I don’t understand is how there doesn’t come a day when they say to themselves, “I’m doing OK. I’ve got $x billion in the bank, my family is provided for, I’ve got more money than I can ever spend, surely I don’t need to publicly shame myself with incessant toadying anymore, it’s time for me to be a man! And if I don’t get the next backhander construction project from Beijing, fuck ‘em, I can afford it!”

But no, however many billions they amass they keep on sucking up to the powers that be, slagging off democracy and publicly disgracing themselves so they can have a few billions more. What is that about? What is the point of having all those billions of dollars if you still can’t even afford to buy yourself a pair of balls?

1 comment:

Unknown said...

I've wondered the same myself. I wonder if there is some dynastic thing at play, at least in the case of LKS. For Alan Semen, perhaps he just can't believe his luck in making so much money with so little ability, and doesn't want to let go. I saw him on the TV the other day, wearing some ridiculous costume and making a pure prat of himself at some opening ceremony or other, like a performing bear on a lead.