Today is Thursday, September 30th, 2004. A day that, in my humble opinion, should be called the Kyoto Day.

The Russian cabinet approves the Kyoto Protocol today, barely a few hours ago, blowing life and even extra strength to the once-zombie international treaty on climate change. With Russia backing the Protocol, a legacy of the Earth Summit, the quorum needed for the Protocol to come into force is met.

This victory, the one that might change the fate of our home and us as a species, is probably one of the most important achievements in human cooperation. With such unison, surely pressure will be mounting on the next President of the United States, whoever it might be, to give Kyoto for another thought.

As this great development happens in Moscow, Lieberman and McCain have been continuously working on a bipartisan effort to push for the Lieberman-McCain Climate Stewardship Act in DC. The act seeks to introduce capping and trading of greenhouse gasses emission which in general is similar to part of the idea in the Kyoto Protocol. I can proudly say that I and a few others have written a snail mail petition to Michigan representatives Carl Levin and Deborah Stabenow to urge them to support the act a few weeks ago via Environmental Defense. So far, though support for the act has been steadily gone up, it still shy a few votes from being passed. The proposal will be brought back to the Senate floor soon for another voting.

While the east coast is stuck with red tape, California reaffirms itself as the most political green caucus in the United States. Earlier, California passed the world’s toughest emission regulation and later claimed to be an global warming free-zone (though I think that term is by far is ridiculous but hey, we got what we want. I’m won’t complain too much on the so-called global warming free-zone.) Under the regulation, cars and trucks need to cut their emission by 25 percent while SUV must cut 18 percent before 2016 and it must start as soon as 2009. The auto industry has called this stupid but I say they have gotten off the hook long enough. It’s time they face the music.

At the same time, San Francisco, one of the hotbeds of US environmental movement, plans to reduce 2.5 million tones of carbon dioxide emission by 2012. It is believed that New York would follow the lead soon. How soon is yet to be seen but nonetheless, the snowball effect is taking shape. With enough momentum, hopefully, the Senate won’t be able to refuse their responsibility to reduce the six greenhouse gasses.

These are exciting time for the advocates of Kyoto Protocol. I myself am very excited. Barely a few years ago, things were gloom right after the US removed itself from the treaty and then calling others to do same. Australia joined the US, Canada almost. But now, it’s time we call the US and Australia to reverse and ratify Kyoto.

The European Union must be commended for having a hand in Russia’s change of heart. Without the EU, it would not be possible for Russia to ratify the treaty and in turn, it would be impossible for the Protocol to come to existence. Possibly, there would be less time for us to act against the mistake of our parents.

The initial stage has now been set. It is a high time to call in the developing countries, especially China en India, to join in the fight. It’s time to rally to world against what might come in the future.

Now is the exact point in time where we must redo what the Russians had done; they repelled Napoleon, resisted Hitler. We must confront the accelerated climate change.

p/s - an advertisement has been running on the TV for quite sometimes now. I first saw it during the Michigan - Notre Dame game. It is one of the coolest ads I've ever seen. Make sure to beef up the volume.

Ajax was beaten flatly by Bayern Munich, courtesy of a Dutchman. I had thought we stood a chance by the way we played against Juventus. I guess we didn't. I wish Koeman had played 4-4-3 instead of 3-4-3. I wish Zlatan was with us.

Ajax would probably be in the UEFA Cup soon.

It feels like winter today. With the loss and the winter, tomorrow sets to be gloomy.


I saw the tree above against the blue sky last Sunday by the river Huron. It was a good day and I was in a good spirit.

I wish tomorrow to be as bright as it was in the summer. I don't mind the heat. The cold reminds me of how I hate the winter.

I wish the trees could stay green just a little bit longer. I wish the cloud could stay white for one more moment. I beg the sky would stay blue for just another day.

Cut the chatter, Red 2.

I attended the Michigan - Iowa game yesterday. From the way Michigan was performing in the last two games, I had expected a loss for us. It turned out, I was dead wrong.

We somewhat slacked off in the very first quarter, allowing a huge yard gain for Iowa. Within a few minutes into the game, Iowa was leading by seven points and my intuition of seeing a loss was strengthened. But thank goodness, that was about the only time Iowa looked stronger.

Well into the second quarter, Michigan slaughtered the Hawkeyes. A couple of beautiful passes, it seemed surreal when you were there and saw it with your own pair of eyes, even more if you were less than ten yards away from the end zone with the ball and the play was garnering momentum to your general direction, were made. I have two favorite plays.

First is the one where Henne, our new quarterback, threw a ball that seemingly hung in the air and was guided by the hands of the angels’ right into the hands of the receiver, who was on the far end of the press box. The receiver was Edwards I believe but I can't recall who it really was.

The second was a rush that happened just in front of me. There was this one guy, again Edwards I think, on the near side of the press box, rushing or standing it seemed with four or five, might be six Hawkeyes for all I know, in front of him but at the same time, there was a space between him and me. When I saw that, I shouted a “wow” in my mind. My mouth blurted “Go, go, go!”

The opposing players appeared to see the same thing too and scrambled to close the space. But, alas for them, hurrah for us, he ran past all, as swift as the Greek god Mercury, for a touchdown.

In the end, to my delight, I’m sure it to the Wolverines’ delight, the score line is 30 – 17 in favor of Michigan.

Next week, it’s Purdue. Some say Purdue could overcome us. I say Purdue, like Wisconsin last season, is nothing but a pretender.

The Michigan Marching Band procession. They marched from Revelli Hall near Elber Field right up to the Stadium, chanting "It's all about the Blue".
We’ll see.

errata - next week game is against Indiana, not Purdue. Another win for us. Should be a walk in the park. Thanks Weehong.

errata 2 - Revelli instead of Revell. Thanks Kirah.

p/s - Now, is there any more correction?

For the past few weeks, I suddenly have an intense curiosity on tragedy of the commons. The idea is fairly simple. It is a concept in economics where everybody overused a public resource.

In the model that describes tragedy of the commons, there is a public good where nobody owns the good and may freely use it. At the same time, there are a number of resource users. If the users are agreeable, then they possibly can assure the sustainable level of resource usage by voluntarily limiting individual consumption. Let’s just say that initially, everybody limits their usage of resource.

However, since nobody owns the resource (also can be called as the commons) and everybody may use the good, then some user, in fact, every user has the incentive to go over the consumption limit and this is done at the expense of the resource sustainability. The incentive for going over the limit is the higher current consumption level with little immediate cost.

Once a person actually goes over the consumption limit (let’s call this guy as Ferguson the bastard), another individual will follow suit (this guy is van Nistelrooy the crybaby). This is because the crybaby’s future amount of consumption is being taken by the bastard and the only way for the crybaby to retake his (crybaby) future consumption is by shifting his (crybaby) future consumption to the present.

The reason for the crybaby’s reduction in future consumption is that once anybody goes over the limit, the sustainability of resource usage is reduced. Simply put, the future of the pie size will decrease. At the same time, the bastard will enjoy a larger share of the pie and the crybaby will increasingly get a smaller piece of the pie if the crybaby does not increase his consumption.

Thus, the crybaby will go over the limit for his own sake. As a result, sustainability of the resource is sacrificed in favor of current consumption. The rate of the pie getting smaller will be faster; and hence name of the model – it is clear that they all will benefit if they limit their consumption but due to self-interest -- it wouldn’t be too much to recognize this as greed -- all in the end suffer the cost. The cost is decreasing consumption in the future. Note that, if there is another person using the resource beside the two, then the person will also increase his current consumption for the same reason as described. In actuality, each and every user of the resource will do the same.

In this explanation, I assume that the resource is renewable – at the level where everybody agrees to limit initial, the regeneration rate of the resource equals the consumption rate of the resource. Whenever anybody goes over the limit, the consumption rate is higher than the regeneration rate.

It is not hard to relate the tragedy to the issues related to the environment. The environment in someway is a public good. Nobody owns the air, nobody owns the planet. Also, everybody breathe the same air, everybody lives on the same planet. Similarly, almost everybody is overexploiting the environment.

Knowing that everybody is better off not overexploiting, it is a tragedy indeed seeing everybody is overexploiting the environment.

After reading lightly about cases relating to tragedy of the commons for about a week, I realized and later found out from some reading that one way to reduce this hazard is to privatize everything. A total privatization will eliminate this problem completely, assuming stealing is not an option. How is the problem is eliminated? Simple! There is no public good at all after privatization!

At least in this way, every rational person will rational enough to not overuse his private property though the same can’t be said for irrational person. If an irrational person overuses his private resource, by all means he deserves to face any tragedy caused by his irrationality. Like one of my economic instructors once said, if they want to screw themselves, let them screw themselves.

But it is hard to imagine a total privatization of the planet. I can’t imagine the air being privatized though the same can’t be said for water. I am content to say not everything can be privatized and therefore, I don’t think this is viable.

Another solution is the creation of an administrator over the commons. The administrator will enforce the limit, making sure nobody will go over the limit. If somebody does go over the limit, like the bastard in the first place, sufficient punishment will be administered towards the offender.

And I asked myself: Why is there nobody to govern the environment?

One word came to my mind: Kyoto; all agreements on the environment in general act as that body that governs the "amount of damage" to the environment. But the second option has its own problem – the freeriders. People that don’t agree to the treaty will benefit as much as those that commit themselves to the treaty without incurring the cost of commitment to the treaty, at least when it concerns anything that as global as climate change.

Posted this to the Mirror Project. I had wanted to submit it earlier but it slipped off from my mind.


I took that somewhere in Washington D.C. early in the summer. I wished I had more time to explore DC. Three days weren't enough. I suppose it would take a week to considerably being able to explore the city.

I said to myself earlier that I will try to post an image per day. Barely a day later, I realized that I was a little bit too ambitious. Maybe I should do an image in two days. Hah! We'll see about that!

Let me start over. Lo and behold!


That's the new University of Michigan Life Sciences Institute building. I am referring to the farthest building in the picture. North Hall was demolished to make way for this new structure.

On the lower right, under the dark shadow near the corner, is one of the two pumas guarding the Natural Science Museum. Legend has it that the pumas would roar if a virgin graduates from this school. Below is the other puma, up close and personal.


Neither puma has roared. =)

From now on, I will try to post an image a day.


Life is already complicated for me. I must find people to write for ReMag 5, I need to help organize a sort of joint program sponsored together by four of the Southeast Asian students' associations and I have to dig up some of the University environmental record regarding energy for a person that sits in Michigan Student Assembly's (or was it something else) sort of review board.

To come to think of it, I don't know why am I doing this. Being a senior with a bunch of intimidating classes is tough enough for me.

Anyway, the photo was captured somewhere up near Plymouth and Broadway late in August this year. In the town of Ann Arbour of course.

I read the Wall Street Journal today and I am increasing finding out that I prefer the Journal better to the New York Times. I actually went to the library to read.

Alright, I didn’t actually go the library to read the Journal but rather, went there to borrow Immanuel Kant’s Critique of Pure Reason. I know the book and am familiar with it but had never actually read the book. So, while I am free at the moment, I figured, “Hey, let’s read another classic!” However, that’s not the point of this entry.

Digressing, as I was returning from the library, Kerry’s sister-in-law was speaking at the Diag (a huge green open space on campus from those unfamiliar with Ann Arbor). I decided to hang around but she proved to be boring. I prefer hearing Nader to some democrat ranting about the same old thing over and over again. Regardless of that, again, that’s not the point of this entry.

As I was saying, I read the Journal at the library and a couple articles caught my eyes. To be specific, there were four articles; three concern democracy and another about the World Bank’s Doing Business 2005 report.

Most interestingly, the three articles are about democracy in Russia, Germany and Indonesia. I say it’s interesting because in my opinion, I could form three different classes for each country where the groups could be labeled as progress in democracy, stagnation and simply the wrong direction.

The first class depicts progress in democracy and this is about Indonesia. In the coming week, Indonesia is set to choose her President. I think this is the second time the Indonesians will be able to directly elect their leader. With the runoff around the corner, it seems that the incumbent will lose to the challenger and more importanly, there is no news that Megawati, the current President, is trying to influence the election machine. Furthermore, the democratic process doesn’t seem to lose steam after the bombing incident at the Australian embassy in Jakarta.

Trivia: According to the Journal, Indonesia will be holding the largest one-day-election in the world. India is the largest democracy in the world but India runs the democratic process in the time span of weeks.

Then, there is this stagnation class and Germany is in this grouping. Nothing is wrong in Germany actually. It is just that in next German election, it is projected that there will be a smaller majority in the Bundestag for the two main parties. This means it will be harder to pass a decision on many issues through the Bundestag, in particular, decision on the much needed economic reform that Germany needs. It is mentioned in the column that the German people are mad at the current government led by the Christian democrats and the social democrat for loosening up Germany’s layoff restrictions. The liberalization of the barriers increases unemployment while at the same time, helps firms in Germany to cut losses.

Perhaps stagnation is not the right word to describe the situation in Germany. Maybe "possible problem" is the proper term.

The third class is resided by Putin’s Russia. A few weeks ago, 335 human lives, more than half were children, were killed by terrorists. It was despicable act of inhumane, deserving no respect from any civilized individual. Of course, Russian armed force’s decision to storm the terrorists' ground is a contributing factor to the horrific drama but I agree with the storming because no government should ever be held hostage by anybody or else, such ugliness in Beslan would encourage more ugliness.

While some of us were mourning, Putin shook one of Russia's last bastions for democracy by announcing from now on, regional governors will be elected directly by Kremlin instead of via election. Now, it will be from the above instead from the bottom up. It seems that Russia is going back to its Soviet days.

And the last article is about the Doing Business 2005 report. I have nothing much to say on this but merely to repeat one of the report’s result. The report concluded that monetary aid does not help third world countries to improve themselves. Possibly, the aid might even prevent growth. This sounds like a problem with corruption. It might be the fact that the money given is not being fully channeled to developmental projects but instead, it gets into someone’s pocket. As a result, little or no beneficial endeavors being undertaken while debt of the countries increases, making the countries probably poorer.

Oh well. So many things are troubling the world but at least Michigan won, though in a rather unconvincing style in my opinion. The Wolverines won 24 – 21 against the Aztecs. After the game, Michigan probably looks like this.


I wonder how we will look like after the Buckeyes game. I caught that at the Graduate Library.

Also, the world would have one less problem if Manchester United loses to Liverpool on Monday.

p/s - thought this is great.


Sometimes, I guess people are so focused on one thing that they forgot the attributes that they share.

Oh crap.

A dead crow found on Observatory Street and East Medical Center Drive last week has tested positive for the West Nile virus.

It’s the first infected animal found on campus although a blue jay found within the Ann Arbor city limits also tested positive for the virus in August.

More in The Michigan Daily. Goddamn mosquitoes. Go away.

Happy Birthday to the Federation.


Now, if only we could get Brunei into Malaysia. And maybe even Pattani, Aceh and Mindanao. And Singapore is ours I tell you!

For a greater Malaysian Federation!

Kidding. But looking back into the past, it is amazing how the Federation withstood assault from Indonesia and to some extend the Philippines while the US turned her back on us. Thank God for the Commonwealth.

And I find it funny how the mainsteam media in Malaysia is not celebrating this anniversary. I found nothing in the local mainstream media to remind the people of the day the Federation of Malaysia was born.

p/s - I have added WorldChanging under Frequent. It is an excellent green blog. Also added this. Byzantium's Shore has been remove. I do not find it interesting anymore.

The Prime Minister, unlike most other political figures, recognizes the threat of global warming and climate change.

The 10th anniversary of His Royal Highness' Business and the Environment Programme marks what is now recognised as the premier international forum for exploring sustainable development in the context of business.

Over the coming months we will take forward the wider sustainable development and environment agenda. Margaret Beckett is working on a comprehensive Defra 5-year programme to be released this year and a new sustainable development strategy for early next year. This will deal with, amongst other matters, issues of waste, recycling, sustainable agriculture, all aspects of biodiversity; and fishing, and will set out policies in each key area. For example, on the marine environment, I believe there are strong arguments for a new approach to managing our seas, including a new marine bill.

But tonight I want to concentrate on what I believe to be the world's greatest environmental challenge: climate change.

More at Guardian Unlimited.

While he is at it, Hurricane Ivan is on the way and Hurricane Ivan is not the first of its kind in the last few weeks. I am not sure whether global warming has a hand on this but in The Carbon Wars, Jeremy Leggett mentioned as time progresses, more severe natural disasters are going to hit us. He also mentioned that the insurance industry is going to be struck badly. And the insurance industry is certainly feeling the heat, especially when Florida was hit by three different hurricanes in less than two weeks, a few weeks ago.

And there are still naysayers. I wonder when will they stop saying nay.

p/s - a somewhat humorous one but put in a bad taste. A real bad taste.

Marvelous in my opinion.

I was tearing my voicebox at the 12th row in the Big House. My throat was in pain for almost a week but I got a sexy voice for a return. =)

Down on the ground, Michigan was kicking Miami Ohio's sorry ass 43 to 10. This of course, happened almost two weeks ago. So sad to see a week later, Notre Dame screwed us to kingdom come. To come to think of it, I think our goddamn offense screwed our own team. Sigh...


This week, San Diego. The Wolverines are hungry.

Ralph Nader was Ann Arbor today and I skipped a class to attend it. And apparently, I was not the only one that skipped class. Ralph Nader’s speech was okay though the content is unique when compared to what Kerry or Bush would say.


Nader speaking. And goddamnit for the photo quality.
The event was held in the Ballroom in the Michigan Union at 1300 hours. Out of the ballroom, there were some people. Some were some random people handing out some random fliers. Some where Nader supporters. Some were democrats trying to dissuade people from voting for Nader.

The room was full with a number people standing at the back. I sat in the second row. Yup, it was up front but too bad it was too much to the left that I had to twist my neck a little.

Nader talked about a few things.

One concerned how American political scene is becoming a duopoly and how the democrats are trying to prevent Nader from the ballot and how the republicans refused to hold a debate with him. I share his opinion on this. It is just too bad for such thing to happen. Dilemma - face four more years of Bush or face a duopoly well into the future. I do not know which one is the worst.

He also described how the US is different from Western Europe, where welfare level of the people there are higher than the US. Though maybe it is true that social security does not seem to work while the European’s counterpart works better, I believe Europe has a much higher unemployment rate. I am not sure if it is better to be in the US or Europe with these two things happening but in my opinion, there is a certainly a trade off between being a welfare state and not being a welfare state.

The crux of his speech is probably about corporate powers. He talked about why it is important to remove corporate powers from Washington D.C. The one phrase that might sums up all of his points on corporate powers is something like this: corporations are not people; they do not vote and they should not be in D.C.; they should not influent the policies drafted in D.C. While at it, he took a swipe at Kerry for being a face for corporations. Bush also received the criticism. Halliburton was mentioned explicitly though it was in a passing style.

Later, he encouraged the students to get involve in civil discussion and stand for democracy. Among Nader, Kerry and Bush, Nader is the one that deserves to tell people to stand for democracy from my point of view. Kerry and even less with Bush, do not seem to stand for grassroot democracy as much as Ralph Nader does.

Somewhere, he criticized the notion of anyone but Bush. His exact words were “Anyone but Bush. Leave Kerry alone. Ask no question” or something like that. He said this is the right formula for defeat and why Kerry is mostly leading marginally instead of firmly. I however cannot remember why that is so but Nader did make the idea of anyone but Bush sounds hypocritical to me.

He touched a few other things but I do not remember.

After he spoke, a Q&A session was held. I, in fact, most of the students left right after Nader wrapped up his speech. I do not know the reason why the others left but I guess the reason is the same as mine - class.

And quote of the day,

Students at Michigan are blessed, except last Saturday.

- Ralph Nader with reference to the ugly game at Notre Dame

p/s - Today, officially, Bush lets the 10-year assault rifle ban to lapse. Now, it is legal to own AK-47 or any assault rifle in America. This will be a perfect natural experiment to see whether freedom to bare arm, especially when it involves assault rifle, affects crime rate. I bet it somebody will conduct a research on this and I bet the effect on crime rate will be positive.

An explosion along with a mushroom cloud has been reported in the news. Things are unclear for the moment but I pray it has nothing to do with North Korea's current nuclear aspiration.

I found about it while I was browsing Wikipedia and it happened two days ago according to Associated Press.

p/s - Report by Reuters, US Says N.Korea Blast Unlikely to Have Been Nuclear.

I have a feeling that the Malaysian government does not give a damn for the environment. The last time, it was the incinerator in Broga. Despite opposition from the locals and various environmental organizations, the project went through. Now, it concerns the Tioman Island, probably one of the famous diving scuba sites in the world with a beautiful coral reef system.

Here is the situation. The government plans to build a new marina somewhere off the island for the sake of tourism. In their mind probably, they would be able to boost tourism by providing the relevant infrastructure; in this case, a marina. They have argued that the marina will help develop Tioman further and at the same time, help the locals to move up the social ladder.

This is my opinion. People from all over the world come to the island mainly to enjoy the reef system and the tropical weather. Part of the attraction will no doubt be devastated during the planned construction of the marina and thus, what good is a marina to tourism when the marina itself will threaten the main reason behind Tioman's tourism industry?

Tioman does not need a marina. What Tioman needs is to be left alone from a certain type of policymakers.

I, as you would probably guess, disagree with the project. The marina construction comes at the expense of the system. I think it is utterly stupid to destroy the main attraction of the island in order to build a marina. Years ago, similar things happened at Tioman. The government built an airport on a reclaimed land off Tioman and in the process, damaged part of the ecosystem. In my opinion, an alternative to an airport is the usage of floatplane, or seaplane. However, there is no use crying over split milk.

Conversely, the construction of the marina has not even started and any damage to the coral reef system can be avoided by preventing this project.

The Malaysian Department of the Environment (DOE) has recorded its opposition towards the marina project but from what I have read, the DOE has no power comparable to the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to prevent this. To prove this, three barges associated with the project contractor have already reached Tioman even though the DOE has yet to approve the contractor’s environmental management plan.

At the same time, I am never going to trust the DOE again. Even the fast eroding EPA earns more respect from any green’s eye. What good is the DOE when the report environmental impact assessment (EIA) is approved even while the environment is at a terrible loss? How could such body, supposedly to take care of the environment, gave a green light even as the coral reef system is being threatened unnecessarily?

The same thing happened to Broga. The EIA allowed the construction of the incinerator despite the knowledge that the incinerator site is in a proven water catchments area.

Perhaps the libertarian’s common belief is entirely true; one cannot trust the government.

I am not sure what I am going to do other than rant. It seems hopeless. It seems, I have more power in the US than in my home country. Nevertheless, I have just joined Environmental Justice, a campus wide environmental group. Through this organization, I hope I could somehow forward the trouble in Tioman.

p/s - This coming Monday, Nader, yes, Ralph Nader is coming to Michigan. I will be skipping class to attend that.

Netherlands 2 - 0 Czech Republic in a World Cup qualifying match. Thanks to van Hooijdonk for both goals.

Regarding Ajax however, I am saddened to see Ibrahimovic leaving Ajax for Juventus. Though this happened about ten days ago, most Ajacieds are still outraged at the amount of transfer Ajax received, a mere 16 million Euros instead of the expected 45 million Euros.

God damns all Italian teams. From now on, all Italian teams are a micron away from being my most hated club(s) ever. Manchester United is still number one for the time being.

And now, if only Ajax could lose Trabelsi.

Some people were surprised to see me celebrating Anwar Ibrahim’s release last week. Some of these people have seen me belittled the movement that Anwar helped started more than six years ago. Now, let me explain my position.

During the Asian Financial Crisis, I do believe Mahathir did the right thing by reversing Anwar’s decisions and ultimately, refusing IMF’s aid package. The IMF package in my opinion was too austere to act as a medicine. IMF wanted too many changes in a very short time frame. If Mahathir had gone with Anwar’s decision, Malaysia would probably suffer what Indonesia had.

Of course, that does not mean Anwar should be thrown to jail and treated the way he was treated. With a clash of policy, in my opinion, Anwar dismissal was sufficient.

But then, once dismissed, Anwar called up his supporters and his supporters in turn turned Kuala Lumpur into a war zone in 1999. Perhaps, that riot was not planned by Anwar. Maybe the riot itself was instigated by some of his mindless supporters. But still, whether it was planned or not, it was irresponsible to say the least.

The government acted almost swiftly to suppress the dissent. In some sense, it was good to see peace was restored, no matter how uneasy it was. On the other hand, as a result to that, the government used the Internal Security Act, an act somewhat similar to the Patriot Act in idea that was introduced by the Bush Administration a few years later, continuously in order to suppress almost every opposition toward the government then led by Mahathir.

Later, Anwar was charged with corruption and sodomy. I am not sure whether Anwar is guilty or not but the proofs that were presented against Anwar are not convincing. Here is where the ancient Greek wisdom comes in – innocent until proven guilty beyond reasonable doubt. In Anwar’s case, there is certainly reasonable doubt. At the same time, throughout those trials, a few Anwar’s supporters were silenced, their rights stripped.

And then, after all that, somehow, Anwar is associated with freedom and justice.

I love freedom but despite that association, I do not support Anwar. Though the movement did upstart a new call for freedom, it was somewhat shortsighted as it main goal was to fight for Anwar, not freedom per se. It was hypocritical from my point of view.

However, Voltaire once said, “Monsieur l'abbé, I detest what you write, but I would give my life to make it possible for you to continue to write.” I truly believe in that. I believe he was wronged for some dubious reason and as a result, his rights were stolen from him and along with the others that protested with him.

That is the main reason why I celebrate Anwar’s freedom. Notice that I am not celebrating Anwar's release because he is Anwar Ibrahim but because freedom is threatened. I believe it is somehow our responsibility to fight for Anwar’s freedom, may it by force or by merely disagree with the power that be quietly in our heart, regardless whether we agree or disagree with the oppresseds' opinion. If you disagree with this, remember Martin Niemoeller and his stylized words:

First they came for the Communists, but I was not a Communist so I did not speak out.
Then they came for the Socialists and the Trade Unionists, but I was neither, so I did not speak out.
Then they came for the Jews, but I was not a Jew so I did not speak out.
And when they came for me, there was no one left to speak out for me.

The other reason that I am glad to see Anwar free is the state of the opposition. The opposition is in dire need for a charismatic leader. Without a good opposition leader, Barisan Nasional, the current ruling coalition, will retain a ridiculous supermajority in the Malaysian Parliament. Like in economics, a competitive market is more efficient than a monopoly. With a monopoly, a deadweight loss is inevitable.

That, my friends, are two reasons on why I celebrate Anwar’s release. Again, I say, I do not support Anwar.

p/s - Yeah baby! After three semesters, I have finally gotten into the game theory class. Yeah! My misery is now almost complete.

The Malaysian High Court has accepted Anwar Ibrahim's appeal. He has been set free just a few hours ago. Major sources are running reports on Anwar Ibrahim on the front page as I am writing this.

I hope this will be a good development for Malaysia. I do believe this is a good thing for Malaysia.