Cartopolitik

Anyone who thinks that map-making has nothing to do with politics needs to think again. My very first blog had to do with that unspeakable Egyptian Mubarak being thrown out of power, by his own brave people. Politics is about countries, and countries are boundaries and geography and maps. Kaartmanne like me make maps for tourists: good politics = good tourism. Look what happened after 1994. Floods of overseas tourists; so many that we started making international-standard maps for all those wonderful dollar- and pound-bearing people. But bad politics = bad tourism. At the moment we're going through about as rotten a bout of politics as we've ever had in the whole history of our Beloved Country.

    I'll explain. Tutu said [I don't always agree with the Arch, but this time I certainly did] that the ANC-govt action regarding a visa for the Dalai Lama was worse than any similar action by those disgusting, racist Nationalists - because at least with the Nats you knew before you planned anything that they would respond in a disgusting, racist way. It was the only way they knew how. But the ANC? They were supposed to be liberators, democrats, filled with sweetness and light and literally ponging of righteousness, of resolve to help the poor [or, as they say ad nauseam, "the poorest of the poor"] and downtrodden peoples of the world. Instead, they obfuscated, cringed and crawled in a really very disgustingly obsequious way to Earth's new imperialists, savage oppressors of Tibet and any other minority nation that stands in their way [like South Africa?] - the savage, barbarian Chinese government.

    The words "savage" and "barbarian" are the only words in the English language that are appropriate for any self-appointed, unelected government - see below.

    I heard Richard Branson on the radio this evening. Virgin Dick [as he is fondly known in some quarters] banged on about Mandela and what a great guy he was, and how the world would view our government's actions over the Dalai rather poorly. Richard saved the bankrupt Health and Racquet club, remember? But Richard missed the same point that Arch-Bish-Emeritus Tutu did, a point none-the-less picked up by some of the sharper and braver radio commentators of our day: with regard to the Dalai Lama and his Visa, our Government, quite simply, lied to its own people.

Two GREAT South Africans: non-liars!!!

    Specifically, Clayson Monyela, spokesperson for the "Dept of Foreign Affairs" [sorry, it has a new handle for reasons that no one understands], lied - as did the oh-so dishonourable Vice-President Kgalema Motlanthe.

    Which is bad news for anyone who thought that Motlanthe, freshly returned from shoving his distinguished head firmly up a savage, barbarian Chinese fundament, might make a suitable substitute for the other lip-licking philanderer who currently occupies the hot seat.

    The only other President we've ever had who licked his lips like one of those poisonous desert lizards was ... PW Botha. Remember that?

    Now, I can't remember who said it, and if someone out there can help me I would be delighted, but what they said was, "When a government lies to its own people, its demise is certain - and, no matter how long it takes, its downfall will come as sure as night follows day."

    This I hold to be self-evidently true. There is no repressive regime in modern history that has lasted for more than a few decades at best. All repressive regimes lie to their people - by their very nature they have to. Hitler, Stalin, Breshnev, Pol Pot, Idi Amin, Franco, Mubarak, Gaddafi, Reza Shah, Hirohito, Mussolini, Pinochet, PW Botha ... how many more have lied to, insulted and upset and abused us [their citizens], and are now gone for ever? Where are they now [apart from being stone dead, thank God]? They are all in history's trashcan where they absolutely belong. No one on today's Earth has a single good word to say for any of these freaks ... except maybe a few freaks. The history books will sure as hell have nothing good to say for them, either. Ivan the Terrible, Emperor Nero, Oliver Cromwell, Louis XV - these ous still get a bad press, hundreds of years after no one can even remember the horrible, crappy things they did to their own people.

    So that's the real problem. Lying to us about the Dalai Lama's visa might seem like a small thing, but it's all part of a larger picture whereby the ANC - a once-noble liberation organization - has ultimately condemned itself to the same oh-so-filthy historical trashcan. To see that larger picture, consider this: what do the governments of unelected savage barbarians [individuals who impose themselves on their own populations without choice are by definition bullies and therefore savage barbarians - see above] like Muammar Gaddafi, Robert Mugabe, China's Hu, North Korea's [?] [- should I bother?], Castro, King Mswati, that awful ou in Equitorial Guinea, Assad in Syria, etc etc have in common? Well, they're all deposed and/or hated and despised by their own people - that's one thing they all know they have. The other thing that they can fondly embrace is that the ANC - our governing party, the party of the people who run and seem, almost daily, to want to ruin our beautiful, proud land - snuggles up to all of them, without exception.

    And you can bet that if there is a single other foul, repressive, unelected barbaric savage repressing his/her own people anywhere in the world, our ANC government loves them too.

    There you have it - liars, liars, liars. And the Freedom Charter ... in tatters?