The following are two excerpts from the April 26 column by Globe's Margaret Wente:
I know, I know. It's not about the math. It's about doing the right thing, and the example we want to set for the world, and the kind of planet we want our children to inherit. A journey round the world starts with a single step.…..
I'm merely pointing out that fixes are very, very hard. And politicians everywhere are in a fix, because people don't want to hear that.
I am sure you all know that she was cracking a lot of nuts in the above excerpts. But you may wonder what she meant by "very, very hard" fixes.
I knew what she meant the moment I read her column because just two days before that, I was set up to hold a small plastic bag (about 3cm x 3cm) of what I now believe marijuana.
Here is the details of the fix. You decide whether it was a "very, very hard" one.
Tuesday. April 24. It was drizzling. I had to go out because I needed to mail out an important letter.
I went out around 10:30AM. I took the usual road. Half way through, I saw a small plastic bag on the ground. Since the bag was sealed, I picked it up and looked at it for quite a few seconds as I was curious about its contents. -- I had never seen marijuana before in my life.
On my way back from the Post Office, I passed a police car near the same spot and immediately feared a set-up because:
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I walked on that road quite often, maybe once every two days on average lately.
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The spot where I picked up the bag was near a chained road-barrier. Normally people do not look down while walking. But when they pass a barrier, they have to look down. The bag was planted there so that I could not miss it.
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There was no police car when I was on my way to the Post Office. It was parked close to the spot only when I was on my way back. But apparently, the police wanted to draw my attention to their car because it was parked on the wrong side of the street with its headlights - maybe even high beams - on and a police officer was sitting inside.
Why the fix? My guess is that, having me in a picture holding a bag of marijuana would be a convenient excuse for the Bush administration to deny me entry into the United States because apparently, letting me learn from and work for Mr. Warren Buffett was the greatest fear they have. In the scenario, people will doubtlessly see me as who I truly am, a genuinely good guy with a sense of self-deprecating humor. -- Maybe when I called the Bush administration a "paper tiger", I was being too charitable. "Chicken little" should be more appropriate.
Although neither Mr. Warren Buffett nor I am a politician, we advocate doing the right things and actually do them ourselves. That made certain politicians very nervous. Why? Because doing the right things is also the hardest thing to do for these politicians, although they all know that it is the true measure of political leadership. The contrast between them and me would be tremendous.
What these politicians lack inside they try to cover it up from outside. This explains why so many politicians are image-conscious. For example, prime minister "Steve" Harper hired a make-up artist just to help him look good.
Because they pay so much attention to image themselves, naturally they would try to use the same trick on their opponents by damaging their images. This is exactly what the Harper government has been doing to me as I am seen as a threat to their political fortune even though I am not a politician. And they would routinely use law enforcement agencies for that purpose. Similar to how the FBI treated Martin Luther King, Jr., RCMP/CSIS is doing the same thing to me. And these so-called fixes are just part of the politically motivated and directed prosecutions the government is trying to pursue against me. Of course, their whole purpose is to drag me through the mud and in the mean time, with the help of the media, the facts and logic of my story would be lost.
Will they succeed? Only if "politicians everywhere are in the fix". But I have not given up hope in finding that one politician who is not afraid of doing the right thing, just like what I have been doing as a simple guy trying to right the wrong inflicted upon Cecilia Zhang.
Oh, BTW, if that ridiculous set-up three weeks ago was a "very, very hard" fix when there was no witness around, why should we even be bothered with the "very, very soft" fix of late when at least one citizen could put me away from that part of the town?
